Eurogamer's Kristan Reed scored the PlayStation 2 version a 5 out of 10, arguing of the trust/fear system "It is nowhere near as much of a neat gameplay innovation as the hype had some people believe [...] As a squad based game it would work far better if you ever had to care a great deal for anyone's survival. As it is, most of the team seem to split off once a level's over (or turn into aliens at pre-determined moments during it), so you're left merely using each NPC as a means of progression." He was also critical of the graphics, which he argued "look old school, with bad texturing, uninteresting particle effects, and vanilla architecture." He concluded, "If you can pick up "The Thing" cheap you won't be too disappointed; it's by no means a bad game, but it's all the more disappointing thanks to the fact that it could and should have been brilliant."