Until Dawn-Super Frickin Awesome

Until Dawn is a unique horror game created by Supermassive Games and was released for the PlayStation 4. It is an interesting horror game in that it has a lot of movie like elements that create an amazing playing experience. The story runs on a butterfly effect process where the choices that you make reflect what will happen in the future…which always spells for a lot of fun and a lot of suspense.

The setting is a ski lodge high up in a mountain owned by a family of wealth. One year ago, Sam, Chris, Mike, Ashley, Jessica, Emily, Matt, Josh, Bethany, and Hannah go to spend a weekend at the lodge and when a prank against Hannah was pulled, a series of events was triggered which led to her and her sister Beth, death. A year after the incident, all of the teens were invited back to the lodge by Josh (Hannah and Beth’s brother) on the anniversary of the death to have a fun weekend. Within the first hour of the arrival of the group, things begin to go awry as they are being pursued by a psychopath and a mysterious non-human shadow.

If you are a big fan of teen slasher films, this game is perfect for fulfilling that need. There is tacky romance, cheesy sex jokes, hormone pumped teens, and a psycho killer stalking everyone. Fun times, right? There is also a supernatural aspect that turns this teen thriller into a legit fight for survival as the teens learn more about the disappearance of the twins, the psycho killer and discover that they are being hunted by something more unnatural on top of the mountain. They encounter the stranger and learn more about a group of miners that disappeared in the 50’s as they struggle to wait till the arrival of dawn.

A few things that make this game unique, as mentioned above, the use of the butterfly effect has made it so that every plot twist that happens in the game is in the player’s hand. This determines how the characters interact with each other, who lives, who dies, and how the environment functions. With this system, the suspense keeps the adrenaline going on a base level to a max ‘scream your head off and pee a little’ level. The controls made the game even more intense as it utilized motion controls to control how the character hides and interacts with the environment. With traditional QTE, and they are very quick) they implement not moving the controller AT ALL. Which is a little difficult to do, I literally did not breathe during these sequences because the tiniest movement can get you in trouble. Justin Graves, the composer, creates an amazing sound environment that helps set that thrilling mood. This man did the music for the Dead Space games and Tomb Raider, so you should know the sound of fear. The cast for the game has big name actors that play their roles fantastically and really shows you what fear means for them.

Will everyone survive? Or will they submit to the horrors of the mountain? It all depends on you, as the player. And if it helps, my husband won’t even finish the game because he hasn’t seen me do it and he isn’t prepared. Like a big ol’ sissy pants.

-A Review by Meghan Rodriguez (Twitter: @collins_m81)

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