Looking Ahead to "The Evil Within"
Do you know what would not be a barrel of laughs? Being ambushed by evil monsters and thrown into an insane, violent world filled with scariness and more blood than could ever fit in an elevator. That would not be a barrel of laughs and I would just go home and cry.
Well, this is the premise of Bethesda’s upcoming Evil Within game! You play a detective named Sebastien Castellanos, investigating a series of mass murders. While investigating a lead, you watch your team get slaughtered before being knocked out and dragged to a MAAAADDDDDDD HOUSE! It’s a standard plot, from the looks of it. Standard isn’t necessarily bad, especially not with horror; it’s often the execution (Heh...) that makes the best horror stand out. And it’s looking like The Evil Within is going to pull that off. But this isn’t your average horror game. This isn’t just another Resident Evil rip off, no. No, this is from the CREATOR of Resident Evil; Shinji Mikami. The man who created one of the biggest horror video game franchises in existence, rivalled only by Silent Hill. This guy not only created Resident Evil, he also directed Resident Evil 4, arguably the best of the series. As you can tell, it’s a pretty big deal. But besides coming from one of the masters of video game horror, it’s also a AAA horror game. AAA horror games haven’t done so well in recent years, prompting a lot of people to suggest AAA horror is dead (or undead! Dun dun duuuuuuuun!). Horror is seen as incredibly risky by big publishers, so action and gunplay is often crammed into anything horror-related (Dead Space and even Resident Evil, especially). So, it’s refreshing to see a big publisher like Bethesda taking a project like this on, focusing entirely on the horror elements, rather than trying to appeal to everyone and failing. Bethesda is responsible for some of the biggest and best video games of all time, including Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas and the Elder Scrolls games, so this isn’t just any big publisher. Hopefully, if this game sells well, we’ll see a lot of mainstream horror in the future. Not that there isn’t a lot of horror in the video game world, of course; it’s just that it’s pretty much all from independent companies (Amnesia, Penumbra, Outlast, Limbo, etc). Of course, it wouldn’t be great to see the market flooded with poor imitations, but still! Silent Hill started off as a Resident Evil rip off, and look how that turned out! Besides having a very talented director and a respected publisher, Evil Within also looks plain awesome. Developed by Tango Gameworks, founded by Shinji Mikami himself. They boast employees from the likes of Grasshopper Manufacture (Killer 7), Clover Studio (Viewtiful Joe) and Capcom (Street Fighter). It’s all about the talent! Smell that talent!!! It’s a third person game, very similar to classic Resident Evil games. Thankfully, the controls don’t look as sluggish and tank-like. Sebastien seems to move more like a human being than Leon Kennedy ever could. Sebastien can even walk and aim his gun AT THE SAME TIME!!! Take that, Resident Evil 4! Speaking of guns, it seems like a lot of focus is put into making the player feel powerless and ammo is supposed to be very scarce. So, a lot of gameplay is going to be based on avoiding confrontation as much as possible. Gameplay seems to be pretty basic, for the most part, but far from bad. It’s looking perfect for a horror game. But it’s the atmosphere that really makes a horror game what it is. The Evil Within seems to have a fantastic atmosphere; it’s dark, messy and full of gore. The violence looks just disgusting enough and seems to be used perfectly. It’s not just there for the sake of it (Well, it is a bit) but it also helps develop the game as a whole, especially the character and setting. Speaking of characters; We don’t really know a lot about the protagonist, but he seems like a nice enough guy! Likeable but nothing special (Something that’s pretty common in the genre). The monsters look excellent, of course! One guy has a safe on his head for some reason! There’s barbed wire everywhere! Things come out of the floor! So cool. Overall, the game looks freaking fabulous; it looks like a welcome return for big budget horror games and it’s always nice to see Shinji Mikami working on a new project. It’s a game I’m, very excited for, and you should be, too. So... ARE you excited for Evil Within? What are some of your favorite horror games? Don't keep us waiting, sound off in the comments! |
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