In terms of movie night spook factor, this is easily the most effective chapter yet. Instead, thumbscrew duty is entrusted to the Shining and Hitchcock-inspired atmosphere, and bolstered by some impressively fraught audio design and visual trickery. This isn’t torture porn, mind, despite the Saw influence - violence is brutal and decisive.
I love supernatural horror, but it comes with a comfy buffer of make-believe alongside the chilling human sadism. However! The Devil In Me does something The Quarry didn’t: It’s actually genuinely unsettling quite a lot of the time. It could be as good as The Quarry - it’s certainly more creative with its horror - but it can’t quite outrun the curse of The Dark Pictures: a compulsion to tease out serious themes from a fundamentally goofy and self-aware framework, like Ash Williams monologuing about how his chainsaw arm is actually a metaphor for the fractured body politic, or something. The Devil In Me is also not as good as Until Dawn, but it is the strongest of the four episodes.
So, let’s rip off the plaster, revealing a nasty gash you probably could have avoided if you’d just been more understanding of Brad the Jock’s underlying inferiority complex in a previous dialogue choice. Since then, the studio have released three ‘episodic’ (although narratively independent) Dark Pictures titles, and The Quarry, all of which can best be summarised: Like Until Dawn, but not as good. These games are best when they lean into the cheese like a drunk buffet guest, and I was pumped to watch it stumble around a schlocky murder party and get baked brie all over the elbows of its best tux.įor those yet to stick their snout into Supermassive’s truffle-trove of horror offerings, the basic premise of these narrative adventure games can best be summarised: What if shouting at the screen to try and stop idiot characters performing horror film no-nos actually worked? The formula was both invented and, miraculously, perfected in 2015’s Until Dawn. Supermassive are being knowingly, playfully tropey again.
Something quite similar to this happens to our ill-fated documentary crew early in The Devil In Me. Also, they say something like “You won’t need it where we’re going” and then do a murder wink at an imaginary camera. Now, imagine that, but also someone asks you to pop your phone in a lockbox, you know, for safekeeping.
Two final girl sprints forward and one terrified limp back, The Devil in Me is the strongest Dark Pictures to date, but still feels like Supermassive are yet to find the right balance between fun and frights, camp and terror, and interactivity and storytelling.Įver had a real-life experience where you’re something like 90% sure you’re actually in a horror film? Answers in the comments, please. The Dark Pictures Anthology:The Devil In Me review
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