N.B.
Game is up-to-date, running with the recommended settings (even though that's set up by default), and with no scans or other things running that are likely to hog resources.

After coming back to life the first time, choosing to go through a door and what not, the player will eventually guide Susan to a room with a saw blade, sink and a bar of soap. In this room my game froze, with the audio still playing normally.

(1) Entered room.
(2) Walked to soap, examined it and picked it up.
(3) Walked to sink, examined it and turned it on. (Looking to see if the steam would reveal anything.)
(4) Walked to saw blade, examined it and picked it up.
(5) Pressed arrow-key Down to go to inventory, examined saw blade, passed wooden leg, highlighted the iron bar, then pressed arrow-key Up to leave inventory.
(6) Game froze with audio playing normally. Iron bar was no longer highlighted. Pressed arrow-keys but could not move character.
(7) Alt-tabbed to look for a solution. Found fuck all.
(8) Clicked back on the game to see if anything that hung up fixed itself. Iron bar was now highlighted. No other changes.

At this point I have restart the chapter from the very first conversation with Doctor X (about Susan's father). I wouldn't be terribly frustrated by this if there was a way to (a) 'hurry' conversation or (b) save the game part-way between long sequences such as Doctor X's conversations.

Addendum
After going back and completing the Chapter I discovered two things. First, I was wrong about the Chapter: the above issue took place in Chapter 2, not Chapter 1. I would appreciate it if a moderator would be able to change the title accordingly since users aren't able to do that. Second, it was worth going back through to see the end of the chapter.

I've since beaten the game and...fuck me but it was worth it!

The above issue was also encountered in Chapter 4 but, thankfully, not again after that. This is a critical issue and is either confined to those two chapters or can spring up at any given time. My only advice is to attempt to pull yourself away from the story now and again and SAVE between stretches of dialogue.

1. Use space key to skip dialog lines.
2. X gives you some time to prepare ('count to 10 and talk to me when you're ready'). And there are some interactive segments... but I guess this tip is of no use if you already finished the game :)

(1) I'm not sure if I tried pressing Space but, fuck me, that's a bit of knowledge ANYONE playing this game needs to remember. If one forgets to save and encounters the game freezing toward the end of a chapter (Chapters 2 and 4, for me) that's a hell of a lot to sit through.

(2) He does, you're right, and so do a number of segments. Unfortunately, there's no way to puase and save the game at a dialogue prompt, viz. when asked a question and given a number of potential responses. There are a lot of long sequences in this game and the inability to save at-will, so to speak, is a problem on par with the audio issues: it takes the player out of the game. With this issue it's the player taking themselves out of the game to press Esc to see if they are able to save. A neat auto-save feature in addition to traditional saving or ready access to saving as mentioned above would be great.


Still, with these issues (and others) aside...goddamn was this a game worth playing!