Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut

I was actually having plenty of fun until suddenly in chapter 5 the game became Quick Time Event button mashing ragebait, PRESS ADADADADADADADADAD IN 3 SECONDS, PRESS F NOW WITHIN 1 SECOND, NOW R, NOW LMB, NOW C, what the hell is this garbage, I thought it was supposed to be a crime novel with shooting elements, not this cringe. What did they had in their heads designing this 'gameplay'? If you want cool crime story shooter, what about BUTTON MASHING NOW, BEACH. Duck you too, I'm never gonna buy another game from these developers, they deliberately want you to rage at a screen. It's a conscious douchebag design.

DISCLAIMER: DO NOT BUY FULL PRICE.

Best game I've ever played. First 10/10 of my life.

i dont get it why people hate this game so much its even better then resident evil

It's a little funny that people are complaining about a bad port of this game, not knowing that the original game worked much worse than this port.
It's a good game, but unless you're ready to experience the pain of humanity after the advent of ubisoft games and battle passes, it's best to ignore this game.

An ambitious, unconventional and gripping game held back somewhat by a low budget and technical problems. This game will really fight you at times and you've got to push on. Twin Peaks X RE4 X Silent Hill X a lot of other things. If you want a truly unique experience I cannot recommend this enough.

Quick summary of what I used: DPFix patch (settings tweaked to taste), Deadly Premonition Controller+ Steam input layout (this one fixes the right stick. The game also has issues with triggers, so swaps trigger and button functionality). Set Win95 compatibility for the games .exe's and then restart your PC so you can up/down further (You can get by without it, but you NEED that aiming later on to beat that game). See PCGamingWiki page for details.

PRO TIPS
- Save save save save save save. Save often.
- Back up your saves often. As often as you want, for me that was every 2 hours or so, just in case.
- The game has a tendency to crash and be hard locked during a certain chapter (8 or 9 roughly? Smoke cigs inside the diner before leaving. See PCGW.) Keep all your saves just in case!. Your save is in the game's main folder with the .exe, in the file "savedata" called dp.
- YOU CAN LEAVE STORY MISSIONS WITHOUT CONSEQUENCE. They just take place the next day, so don't feel bad about leaving them for side stuff. No Dead Rising "SCOOP LOST!" here. However, you CAN miss side missions, say... if anything happens to who gives you them...
- Some story missions "flow together", so you can't do side stuff with certain people between them.
- Side missions, there's a great steam guide for them listing how to find, start and do them: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=775095092
- DO MISSION 4 (Dumbbell), THEN 5 (get a flower when it's raining) ASAP! It unlocks fast travel to anywhere you've been before with the Radio. YOU REALLY WANT THIS.
- The Spirit Maps you can buy from The Milk Barn store (talk to the rocker bro!) lead you to brief combat gauntlets and reward you with infinite ammo upgraded weapons, get them.
- Do side missions 24, 23, then 25 (they are rather short, don't worry, a cinch with fast travel too) to get increased item slots.
- Play darts and beat the high score at SWERY65 to earn increased weapon slots.

Despite being unplayable without like tons of mods, BUT when finally get it rolling man this game is masterpiece in every aspect, outdated but you will have fun with it.

love this game its so incredibly broken in the most nostalgic way possible, 10/10 would complete once every 3 years.

I fucking love this game. I really really do.

But if you are not mentally ill enough to enjoy suffering trough crashes all the time, i wouldn't recommend playing it on PC.
However, IF you ARE,, give this game a shot.

There is something very indeering about it..... The old graphics, the bad late dialogue and the weird ass music... it's so so good.

AWSOME GAME

An entertainingly thrilling detective game with a gradually unfolding main story revolving around the mysterious Red Seed Murders case. Eventually, fate leads you to a small mountain town called Greenvale. Could this place hold the answers to the Red Seeds, or is there more lurking beneath the surface? The investigation awaits!

Gave up after 17 hours of wasted time. Constant crashes making the game basically unplayable. Don't waste your time

[H3]Good plot and characters, but the technical state of the game is disgusting.

the game is good just the pc port is bad and crashes

I know that people say this game is bad, but its actually very quickly charming and I was really enjoying it.
However I can't recommend it on PC because of technical problems. This thing does not run, crashes constantly, and is impossible to fix.

I am very tolerant of games with technical limitations, especially when those games are running on systems that did not exist at the time they were developed. I am willing to scour the internet for patches and forum posts. If it's a cult game from 10+ years ago that I am interested in reviving to work on my current computer this comes with the territory. I have a very good jank tolerance and I am proud of it, however, this game must be ruled unplayable in its current state. It is basically free, I paid very little for it but I am still mad. Even on a good day it runs very very poorly. Odd sounds, odd behavior in-game, crashes, freezes, it doesn't want to be played. It needs a serious overhaul or it needs to be put out of its misery. Furthermore, it seems to be getting worse with time. I lost my mind and tried to give it another go recently, It looks terrible, much worse than before, not sure why. It's basically a computer virus. Cannot recommend.

Great atmosphere and story. Unfortunately, the technical status is really bad. So if you don't mind that, then buy this. I managed to run this game with few fixes on Windows 11 so I hope you will be lucky as well.

Buy on sale!

"Did you see that, Zach? Clear as a crisp spring morning! FK... in the coffee!"
I ♡ York ꒰(ू•‧̫•ू )꒱

This may be my first review on Steam, but this game is worth it.

Lets see, the gameplay is clunky, the story is nonsensical, the tone is all over the place, the voice acting feels like intentional sabotage, the minigames are too few and far between, the open world is a chore to traverse....

But it all works. WONDERFULLY.
This game is the product of many small glowing gems of awkwardness, fused together in a way that elevates the sum of its parts into something that can genuinely called art.

11/10 game, if you can get it to work.

possibly the only good game

The best video game story ever

games goated, but this port is literally unplayable, even after modding it to hell and back. I only payed like 1.40 for the game so im not incensed, but this is kind of embarrassing to have for sale in the state it is in

I'd heard from many places that this twin-peaks inspired noire was a surreal and unique experience worth trying, but was fully warned about the technical issues. The game itself is indeed weird in a very intriguing way, and I was ready to be hooked in and see it through despite the jankiness. However, I found the absurd amount of time wasters and constant crashes created a feedback loop that very quickly ate up my time and after trying some of the fixes with no good results I resolved to just watch the rest on YouTube.

An entertainingly thrilling Detective game with gradually in-voiding main story , which spins around of the Mysterious Red Seed Murders case. Eventually, the fate brings you in a small mountain town of Greenvale. Would it possible that this place might have some answers about the Red Seeds? Or maybe this town has more than it seems? The investigation awaits!

[...] Le jeu ne s’en cache pas du tout, il est très largement inspiré par les deux premières saisons de la série Twin Peaks de David Lynch (I-coeur-U D.L. !!) mais ici, la narration est particulièrement discutable : York est relativement imbuvable dans son comportement prétentieux, le fait de ne suivre que ce personnage est assez vite ingrat de fait et sa construction est très brusque, elle manque de subtilité : pour comparer (puisque le jeu demande cela en hurlant) Dale Cooper dans TP paraît exceptionnel parce qu’il y a une vraie part de mystère en lui qu’on ne découvre que par touche, il y a certes Diane (comme Zach) mais c’est un personnage au moins incarné à travers un dictaphone, et pas simplement dans la tête du personnage, en tant que spectateurs on se demande simplement qui est Diane et si elle existe (réponse de la saison 03 : oui). De même qu’il faut un sacré moment avant que Cooper ne pénètre dans la Black Lodge. Ici, tout est précipité et c’est même après la première cinématique. Par ailleurs, le fait qu’il ne s’agisse pas d’un vrai-faux soap-opera comme TP mais d’un pur jeu d’enquête montre aussi très vite ses limites : l’intérêt de la série de Lynch est de montrer comment un évènement brutal touche une communauté relativement restreinte peut briser complètement leur routine, c’est une série qui ne parle que de dualités, d’échecs ou plutôt, d’impossibilité de complétion. Dans Deadly Premonition, les PNJ remplissent difficilement leurs fonctions narratives et vidéoludiques par ailleurs. Certains dialogues sont bien écrits cependant, mais rien d’incroyable du tout. Enfin, ce qui finit de sabrer la narration, c’est l’ambiance assez médiocre qui se dégage de l’ensemble du jeu, mais pour cela, il faut détailler un peu l’aspect technique.

Techniquement donc je dois dire n’avoir jamais vu un jeu dans cet état auparavant : le jeu date de 2010, il est porté sur PC en 2013. D’abord, le lancer est une petite épreuve de force. Impossible sous Ubuntu (enfin si mais voilà le bricolage!), je repasse sur ma partition Windows 10 (sorti en 2014) et là, il faut activer le mode de compatibilité Windows 7… bon. Je lance finalement le jeu, et j’ai littéralement au moins un crash toutes les 20 à 30 minutes... Par défaut, le jeu bien sûr n’est pas compatible avec ma manette trop récente (mais la communauté Steam a réglé ce problème). Bon, ce problème résolut, je constate que le jeu tourne à 30 images par secondes en faible résolution (1280x720) et dans une qualité incroyablement affreuse. J’ai vraiment l’impression d’avoir entre les mains un jeu Gamecube ou Wii, ou PS2 ou Xbox qui n’aurait pas été terminé mais à peine poussé pour atteindre le seuil minimal de la Haute Définition. Devant ce constat, je fais les gros bras et joue 2 bonnes heures (au moins 4 crash donc). Fatigué du 30 fps en particulier, j’arrête, et pars chercher des mods pour tenter au moins de résoudre les problèmes graphiques (et de maniabilité mais je fais choux-blanc pour ça). Après trois essais, je parviens enfin à installer quelque chose qui ne crashe donc plus systématiquement au lancement (on retourne dans la zone des 20-30 minutes) : un mod HD, avec plein de filtres, enfin, plutôt des cache-misères et surtout jouable à 144 images par secondes. Mais bon, ça ne remplit pas les décors, vides, les environnements, vides, ça n’améliore pas les animations pitoyables, répétitives et robotiques qui viennent de Resident Evil 1… sur PS1 pour la majorité, et mis à part un « effet cartoon » des mods graphiques qui consiste à épaissir les traits des personnages qui est un minimum convaincant, le reste persiste dans l’austérité et c’est franchement moche… Ce n’est pas qu’une question de technique, la construction de l’environnement est ratée ! Le visage de York est cireux avec quelques animations faciales convenables même si parfois il essaie de sourire (et c’est épouvantable), celle des autres PNJ m’ont fait me demander si GTA San Andreas était sorti… Ah et aussi, la petite surprise, avant l’installation du mod, je constate que le jeu ne valide pas les succès et en fouillant sur internet ça dépend vraiment de la bonne volonté du jeu… Ah ?

Vous savez, j’aurais sans doute pu en faire plus si le jeu n’avait été qu’un début de narration un peu raté et graphiquement et techniquement moisi, mais par dessus, se rajoute une belle couche d’un système de jeu extrêmement bancal. Premièrement, le jeu fait le pari d’un open-world, ce qui est audacieux quand on voit ce que je précise au dessus et expliquant le fait que la sensation de vacuité soit si forte. Ce qui est évident, dès que l’on conduit la première voiture, c’est que les développeurs ne sont pas parvenus à quelque chose d’agréable. C’est lent, mensonger, le compteur affiche une vitesse clairement imperceptible à l’écran parce que les sensations de conduites sont nulles et surtout, tourner va être un supplice à CHAQUE fois. Les marches arrières sont interminables. La voiture se coince dans les décors, c’est littéralement une brique avec des roues. Les effets de gouttes de pluie sur le pare-brise sont ridicules. Le frein à main lance un triple-salto. Bref, c’est vraiment insupportable. Et lorsque j’ai réalisé que le jeu allait me demander assez souvent de prendre une voiture pour aller à des rendez-vous temporisés, ça m’a mis un coup ! Mais encore une fois, j’ai persisté, je me suis dit « allez, on fait encore un effort, il y a peut-être du bon à en tirer ». Parlons des combats : plusieurs armes de corps-à-corps ou de poing que l’on dégaine donc pour casser des obstacles ou abattre des « fantômes ». En dégainant un pistolet, plusieurs constats : York ne peut plus se déplacer (pas grave, RE4 et RE5, c’était pareil, pénible certes, mais admettons), York ne peut pas tourner sur lui-même lorsqu’il a sorti son arme, il doit agir dans un cône visible par dessus son épaule horizontal ET vertical (là c’est nettement plus inquiétant, je n’avais jamais vu ça, tout simplement)… Ensuite, sa boîte de collision et celles des ennemis n’étant pas claires, il est facile de les toucher avec le pistolet, mais parfois on va leur rentrer dedans sans qu’ils ne réagissent quand d’autres fois ils nous attrapent d’une sacrée distance… Du coup, même les combats sont mous, embarrassants et n’apportent qu’un vague instant de satisfaction au début. Je peux enfin préciser que les menus sont périmés : l’utilisation de la carte est minimale, il n’est pas possible de placer un repère par exemple, le zoom est ridiculement bas, l’accès est long… Globalement, je ne saurais pas dire si les développeurs voulaient véritablement réaliser un monde-ouvert, parce qu’on voit qu’il y a un vrai souci de cohérence générale, ou non parce parce qu’il est si peu fonctionnel en définitive… Enfin se rajoutent de temps en temps des QTE, c’était à la mode à cette époque, et là encore, ne cherchons pas la cohérence entre l’action à l’écran et le bouton demandé. [...]

Critique complète: https://www.senscritique.com/jeuvideo/deadly_premonition_the_directors_cut/critique/313501340
Mes autres critiques: https://www.senscritique.com/Altie-/critiques

Unplayable. I'm hard stuck because of one particular crash. Can't get around it at all, tried everything on the Internet.

Playing this game (PC port specifically) is a true labour of love. But it was worth it for me in the end for the utterly delightful, schlocky and charmingly quirky experience that Deadly Premonition is as a whole. I went in completely blind playing this and oh lord did I love it despite the many technical and mechanic related downfalls there are too playing it. And I know I really love it because with a mediocre game I would have rage quit and uninstalled it at many points in my play-through.

I'll start with the bad so you know what you're in for:
>You MUST go through the effort of installing fixes and mods or you simply can't even play this version (it literally won't work lol)
>You'll need to persist through many crashes and reboots and I mean MANY to play it. Sometimes you will just get plain pissed off and turn it off for the day lol.
>The quick time events are god-awful. Literally the worst I've ever experienced.
>The sound balance can get really annoying in terms of the music randomly being way louder than people speaking in some cut-scenes, then being balanced fine in other scenes.
>The combat and driving mechanics are pretty average, but honestly I didn't find them that bad- they're serviceable.

Things I loved:
-The pure unhinged, amusing hilarity that is the entire experience with York, Zach and the story overall. The characters and the writing are what make the game great. There is a real quirky charm here for people who are a fan of media like Twin Peaks (the influence is strong and noticeable) as well as campy, schlocky movies/tv. If you're not expecting to take it too seriously, you'll have fun. It's not meant to be a gritty, realistic detective story. It's meant to be fun and leans into being ridiculous.
-The music gives the entire vibe and atmosphere to the experience- I just love it. Especially the main theme when you boot up the game- I find it so calming and chill.
-The voice acting is really good, especially for York.
-I think the beginning of the game is stronger than the ending portion of the game, but I loved York's arc at the end.
-I loved the open world aspect of the game, getting to roam around and quite literally spy in people's windows.

My recommendations if you're going to give this game a go are:
-Install the mods and fixes available (if you do a quick google- there are people that have done guides to help with this).
-To get the full experience of the story, characters etc. you're going to want to use a guide for the side missions (the one I used was on the True achievements website). I would generally say I HATE a game that you need a guide to play to fully experience- but this is an exception as it was worth it for me to see everything the game had to offer. There are many side missions and interactions that are only available in earlier chapters and several of these give you key items that make your experience playing the game much easier and more enjoyable. (Note you can do chapter replays to do things you missed- but playing them in order is much more immersive and just easier imo).
There are a LOT of side missions, but I'd say overall they're worth doing as they're how you get to experience the true vibe of Greenvale and its people.
-If TLDR on doing all the side missions- PLEASE at least do the one for George early in the game to get the radio which will allow you to fast travel.
-Use the map not just for locating where you need to get too, but for tracking where the citizens are around town. The map will show where each NPC is at the time of day. E.g you can spy on Thomas when he goes home to his apartment for the day for an amusing scene. Or if an NPC is in a weird area you wouldn't expect- you can go spy on them and see what they're doing there. And if you're not sure if a place is going to be open/an NPC you're looking for is there yet- just check for them on the map (it will save you a lot of time).
-Make manual saves at least every couple chapters. There is only one save file in the game- so you will have to make copies of the actual save file in the game's system files. Your save can get corrupted so this just makes life easier.
-If the game crashes or something is just not working, just restart your computer. You will honestly be surprised how often a restart will just fix the issue randomly. If I knew this earlier in my play-through I would have had a much better time.

I hope more people can get through all the issues and experience the delightful charm of this game!

I runtime error freaking runtime error love runtime error love runtime error this game, Zach!!!!!

This is a godawful game. If you like this, I love you.

I'm convinced there's a Bethesda bug that accidentally launches the .exe file of this game instead of Starfield, hence all of the boiling hate. Either that, or when you double click on "Dragon Age: The Veilguard," this abomination pops up.

This is by far the worst game I've ever played, but it moved me tremendously and actually made me cry.

Zach, we should probably tell them to literally restart their computer to successfully beat the hospital level in Chapter 3, eh?

----

Notes to my past-self:

* You will momentarily quit playing the game because of computer crashes. Eventually, you'll figure out that you need to save A LOT. Every chance you can. If a cutscene freezes, just restart your computer and you'll be able to continue. There are a lot of save points, so you won't ever lose much progress.

* The beginning will be really off-putting. Some kinda funny, juvenile things. But you will really start to like the game once it opens up. You get a cop car and get to drive around Greenvale, and you'll really love doing that.

---

I feel bad for anyone who wants to play this but can't due to hardware/software issues. Luckily, my computer was able to run it, albeit with several hard crashes/freezes.

The game can be very gruesome and perverted and clunky, and so there's no way I would ever recommend it. But I'm compelled to someday make my own "Let's Play" series on this so more people can experience this game. I would honestly use this as an example of "video games as art". Only 6.1% of all players on Steam have reached the ending, and I'm SHOCKED the number is that high. But I'm really glad I contributed to that statistic.

THIS VERSION NOT RECOMMENDED - The game is derpy and jank but brilliant hence the good review. The port is not and will need lots of additional work to get the game to run and not crash at certain points. Get it very cheap or elsewhere

small town psycho-noir detective story with lots of atmosphere. the jank serves the narrative.

You've already heard it, its time to hear it again. The NO recommendation isn't for the game, deadly premonition is AMAZING. The no is for this port.
This port is fucking atrocious, probably one of the sloppiest most nonfunctional PC ports I've ever played. Constant crashing, weird bugs, and issues that are so confusing they have to be seen to be believed. No fault to the people who made this port, they tried to fix it.
The menus don't work, theres random crashes, and throughout my playthrough I had to deal with swapping between multiple different compatibility modes just to make it through certain damn portions of the game. Not in windows xp or lower? your item menu is unusable! Although if you swap to windows xp or lower... you can't aim up or down at all really! also no matter what you do, the darts minigame is messed up, anything that uses physics bugs the fuck out. I still got that side quests and the weapon bag, take that game! Apparently swapping to windows 98 compatibility solves both of those issues, but I wouldn't know because trying to use that crashes the game without fail on windows 11. Does it work on windows 10? Who knows!
Other people have experienced save file corruptions on crashes, something I avoided. A few crashes in a few chapters were only avoidable by driving certain paths and using the cigarettes to change the time. It makes no sense.
Add that all on top of the port by default only runs at 720 with limited options, and I had to install a fanmade patch to make it not do that. Deadly premonition is a good game and I highly reccomend it, but try to find a way to play the xbox 360 version of directors cut, or buy the switch version. If you can stomach the issues, this port does go on sale for a literal dollar quite often though, so if you really want to put up with it for achievements and that sweet sweet deal, be my guest. theres a guide somebody made, and if youre on windows 10 you can probably have a better time than me since your windows 98 compatibility will work.

if you can, get it on switch or mod this version. It is, unironically, one of THE best games possibly ever and a work of art. it also goes on sale for like a dollar so you have no reason not to at least try it out, the opening scene with York in the car sets the tone of the game perfectly and shows you all you need to know. please god play this game ive gifted it hundereds of times.

This game does not work. I followed all the guides and downloaded all the scetchy dll files to make it work. But it still sucks. I like twin peaks but this just feels like some kind of twisted ARG bullshit.

It says it is compatible with your controller, but that is a trick to make you watch the logos 15 times while you try to figure it out.

Either fix the fucking game or don't sell it.

Stuttering, black screens, freezing, crashing, headache, heartburn, nausea, dizziness, drowsiness, dry mouth, constipation, upset stomach, change in activity or mood, and unpleasant thoughts are all side effects you will experience if you try to play this port.

The game is a wild ride. With hysterical interactions and the janky port only adding to it, this game can be both a blast and frustrating.

What's that Zach? Oh Right! Make sure you check the guides section on the community page here on steam for the "2022 fixes collection, everything in one single file" patch to help the game run better.

Yes Zach, I'm not forgetting... Make sure you save frequently as this game can crash unexpectedly and often, I also recommend playing with a controller too. Another tip for anyone playing/going to play, if you use an xbox controller (unsure if the same applies to PS controllers or other controllers), when aiming your gun you need to press the right thumbstick to "unlock" the aiming so you can aim up, which is necessary for boss fights, I didn't see anything mentioning this online.

Buy the Nintendo Switch Version "Deadly Premonition Origins".
The Steam Port is straight up broken. Even after doing A LOT of fixing via fan-patches, trying diffrent windows compatibility modes and fixing the deafault wrong controller inputs (right stick axis is roted by 90° for some reason). It was barely playable with a lot of game crashes for the most part but it completely fell apart. After starting the second chapter i had to stop my playthrough and buy the switch version.

Deadly Premonition is an amazing game.
Give it a try. But not here.

Masterpiece (maybe play on console)

bullshit

no full screen, ridiculously long cut scenes with horrible acting, bad dialogue, nonsense plot, no way in options to see controls and it doesnt recognize a 360 controller, horrible frame rate, runs like crap on a computer vastly over spec, even at $1 this is trash

THAT IS HOW IT ENDS WTF?! I cried my eyes out!!! HOW IS THIS SO CRUDDY BUT ALSO A MASTERPIECE!?!?!?!?

This is art.
#3 in my Top 5 Games I Never Knew I Wanted

I love this game so much
the best worst game ever

The game cannot be played properly when installed. You must install other files available outside of Steam to make it "work". You will still have the game crashing often. Now the game will not even load. I at least bought it when it was cheap, I cannot imagine how upset I would be if I paid more for something Steam knows will not work upon installation.

Started off great except for needing to reopen the game multiple times for the left stick to work. Then the further i got it started crashing consistently. Tried dpfix and modding. Nothing works. Wish they would fix the game.

Deadly Premonition has always held a very special place in my heart. I've played it since I was a child. Despite the absolutely abysmal driving mechanics and ever so slightly dated graphics, this game will always be one of my favourite games of all time. This game has everything: An outrageous story, quirky lovable characters (most of them, anyway), and a setting akin to a beloved TV show that this game takes inspiration from. If you ever checked it out yet, I strongly recommend that you do because it is an incredible experience and a game that you won't soon forget after you finish it. However, word of warning, this version of the game does have it fair share of bugs and crashes, but once you get around the technical issues, it is definitely worth playing.

Terrible. Just terrible.

I might return to this at some point but if I do it will not be this port. Do NOT buy this port, it is a gigantic turd. Spent about an hour patching it yadda yadda, got it stable enough to play for a few hours at a time. After the end of a rather long game session where I started to notice very odd physics bugs, on the way to a save point the game bugged out, killed me randomly while driving to finish a chapter replay to save and I lost hours of progress from something I had absolutely no control over.

This is a shame because the mood, music, characters, story etc is all very unique and I'd love to finish it I just do not want to sit down and drive around that awful map redoing the same garbage again while running the risk of the game randomly self destructing while I do it. Horrendous port.

PLEASE UPGRADE THIS CULT CLASSIC FOR MODERN PC'S mostly because the ps3, switch version was bad and this game even if it's terrible to many people it still one of the best worst game to me.

One of the games of all time

Game literally does not work. I don't care how many fixes people talk about and how many workarounds you can try, this game is in an unacceptable condition on this store. Do not buy this game (and maybe buy something cool like D4 Dark Dreams Don't Die instead)