David Cage makes games that aren’t supposed to be funny, but sometimes wander into the realm of comedy anyway. The Parisian auteur, who’s perhaps best known for PlayStation 3 exclusive Heavy Rain, tends to discuss Quantic Dream’s ‘emotional’ output in a very self-serious manner – and yet, scenes such as ‘Jason, Jason’ often undo all of his hard work.
However, for all of his faults, the French luminary has single-handedly constructed a new narrative centric genre, which is now being replicated by the likes of Telltale Games among others. Until Dawn, the PlayStation 4 exclusive horror from British studio Supermassive Games, feels like a title that the Beyond: Two Souls maker would create – if he was intentionally trying to be funny.
The Guildford-based developer has said that since switching its Cabin in the Woods-esque escapade to the next-gen format, it’s adopted a darker approach than was originally intended for the PlayStation Move powered version that was announced a few years ago – but this is still so utterly ridiculous that you can’t help but laugh out loud.
There are clearly other hang-ups from the unreleased PlayStation 3 version, too, as the release uses all of the DualShock 4’s features and functionality. Tilting the controller allows you to observe objects, or point your torch towards branching narrative decisions; you can even move the character’s head on occasion, which is a mechanic not too dissimilar to LittleBigPlanet.
Until Dawn is so utterly ridiculous that you can’t help but laugh out loud
What about the premise, then? Well, the setup is as intentionally cliché as it gets: eight teenagers have taken to a remote mountain retreat for fun, games, and, well, you can guess the rest. Unfortunately, they don’t take into consideration the psychopathic member of the Insane Clown Posse that resides in these parts – and so things quickly go awry.
The gameplay is incredibly reminiscent of The Walking Dead or one of the aforementioned Quantic Dream titles: you walk around lavishly produced environments, searching for clues and triggering cut-scenes. Occasionally, you’ll need to make decisions which branch the story. These can be as simple as picking up a pair of scissors, or as drastic as whether your friend lives or dies.
In the demo that we played, we followed the agonisingly awkward Chris and Ashley through an abandoned hotel basement. As the taster progressed, it became clear that the teen twosome wanted to be, shall we say, romantically involved. However, neither is willing to commit to this until the very end of the sampler – where one of them must choose between murder and suicide.
And it’s these types of impossible decisions that the developer is really emphasising right now. It’s using a system dubbed the ‘Butterfly Effect’, which means that every choice that you make will have enormous consequences on the story that you see unfold. Apparently, there’ll be thousands of different endings, but it remains to be seen how unique they’ll actually be.
Assuming that they’re good, though, you’ll probably want to see them all, as the dialogue is just ridiculously silly. Supermassive Games has brought in Hollywood actors such as Hayden Panettiere and Rami Malek – and clearly told them to turn on the cheese. The whole experience stinks of stilton, as characters earnestly toss Twitter hashtags and memes into their ordinary speech.
And that means that you probably shouldn’t expect Silent Hills-esque psychological scares. Instead, the game tends to lean on jumps, which are cheap but placed well enough to at least deliver an adrenaline surge. There’s one section, for example, where a ghostly face will flash onto the screen; it’s never explained or expanded upon, it’s just there to get your pulse racing.
The developer perhaps needs to be careful in that regard, because scares for the sake of it could get a little bit irritating after a while. Similarly tedious are the controls, which felt like they needed tuning during our hands-on. The game adopts an old-school Resident Evil approach with fixed camera angles, and we found ourselves bumping into objects more often than we’d like.
The biggest problem that the developer has, though, is just how poor the animations look. The visuals are extraordinary – with faces being a particular highlight – but unnatural body and facial motions break the illusion a little. With so many titles employing performance capture these days, the game’s limited budget in this regard seems destined to stick out like a sore thumb.
And that’s a shame, because the B-movie aspects outside of the above work perfectly. The title manages to fuse teenage angst with a real grim atmosphere, and despite the silly dialogue, we still found ourselves longing to know more about each encountered character. This is a game that seems to understand exactly what it is: dark, divisive, and really, really dumb.
Are you shaking with anticipation for the silliness of Until Dawn, or does the very idea of a story-driven scare-‘em-up make you want to yawn? Join us in the Jacuzzi in the comments section below.
Comments 21
I so can't wait for this game. It is going to be awesome! B grade terrible, and absolutely awesome.
I wish it was 40$
@tulaib_100 I don't think they've announced a price yet, but I assume it will be full-price. Like I say, animations aside, the production values are actually really good — despite the B-movie approach.
This sounds right up my alley! I've always wanted to experience that terrible-80s-slasher-feeling in a videogame, and I feel like the more 'hands off' gameplay is probably the best way to achieve that.
Hmm I don't think I'll like this, the B-Movie theme just isn't really my thing especially american B-movies though I do like Kung Fu B-movies.
Can't wait to scare the sh*t out of me 😂😂 😚💨💨💨💨
Language - get2sammyb
Coming out in 2025.
I think after P.T. we can all do with some nice, funny horror instead (if such a thing exists lol)
Id really like to know when it will be out.. I think it should be really good and looks fantastic. Was hoping for some great fun around Christmas with it XD
i dont want to watch any demo to avoid spoilers
@N711 It'll be next year. I think it would make sense around Hallowe'en, but all of the other big stuff traditionally comes out then, and I think it would struggle to stand out. Perhaps a late summer game, instead?
I prefer the square Enix one, that one get my attention but this one... No
I have been excited for this game since... was it E3 this year they show the trailer?
@adf86
Nah, I enjoy the mind-f**kery that SH has provided in the past on PS1 & 2 and appears set to provide again. The more horror games like that, the better. Condemned: Criminal Origins was another good one. I'll take that over B-movie cheese anyday.
Awesome, I forgot about this game.
@artemisthemp Gamescom
Looks good, but if its $60 theres not a single chance im buying it for that
$50 would be pushing it, $40-$30 seems more like it
(Steam pretty much killed my prie perception lol, there are so few games worth $60 nowadays)
Looks amazing, i'm a sucker for these type of games, looking forward to it.
Don't mind 80s or any other decades b movie horror shows. Hard to find the decent stuff, more into the weirder stuff like Dario argento or gore horror stuff. Would love to see another stab at evil dead made for ps4/vita.
There have been different flavours of horror game over the years...I'm a Silent Hill (1-3) fan and hyper excited for Silent Hills. While that dealt with twisted psychological horror there are so many other varied horror games from resident evil, Dead Space through things like Project Zero, Outlast and the weirdness of Clock Tower. Even the modern things like Slender. None of the games I can think of had the schlock horror feel of the films I used to watch in the 80s but this seems to...if it replicates the likes of Heavy Rain (which I loved) then I'm in.
Is it violent j or shaggy 2 dope?
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