Developer: Supermassive Games
Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment
Platform: PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5
Tested on: PS5
The Dark Pictures Anthology – The Devil in Me – Review
With a steady flow of one release per year since 2019, The Dark Pictures Anthology has finally arrived at its finale of season one. The series has spawned three games with the fourth one being the title we’ll discuss below. The series has seen its dips in quality, but the stories themselves were often quite interesting to play through. While we have dealt with witches and vampires in other titles, this time the topic will hit closer to home, as the game revolves around a serial killer. As a whole, we once again enjoyed the story but were ultimately disappointed by the severe lack of polish.
Story
With an introduction that revolves around the horrific murders of H. H. Holmes, also known as America’s first serial killer, the game sets up the proper atmosphere. After a grim introduction where our main characters encounter the nefarious murderer, we are taken to the present day where a group of documentary filmmakers is preparing for their next project. The next documentary they’re shooting will revolve around the aforementioned H. H. Holmes, and when they get an invite to see a massive private collection with rare objects that were originally owned by the 19th-century killer, they decide to head out. Under very hush-hush conditions they make their way to a remote estate, where they are forced to turn in their smartphones. What seems to be a great new episode for the filmmakers eventually turns into their greatest nightmare, as someone lurks inside the massive hotel-like building and this person is clearly trying to mimic Holmes’ work.
Overall, the story presentation is great, and the atmosphere is really tense. The narrative is very interesting because the story being told here is quite realistic, as it’s in a way a modern version of the murders Holmes committed back in the 19th century.
Graphics
The graphics of The Devil in Me are nothing shy of atrocious when it comes to overall polish, graphical bugs and glitches, and character movements. From start to finish, you’ll see constant texture popping, weird movement glitches, and just horrible facial animations. We were immediately captivated by the story, to simply lose our immersion due to the shoddy graphics. We feel as if this game was simply not tested, or that it had to be released by a certain date. We found this a shame, as the game has a lot of interesting backdrops and an overall haunting setting. Sadly, even these sceneries then get neglected due to a lot of areas being too dark, and the flashlight mechanics being absolute rubbish. More than often we simply struggled to shine our flashlight at points of interest, because the lighting of the actual flashlight, and what was emitted, didn’t even make any sense. In these scenarios our flashlight would be facing forward, only to have it shine a light on either the left or right side. It felt like the light and the actual light source were completely disconnected. The other games in the series also lacked a hefty dose of polish, but this one truly takes the cake.
Sound
The game’s sound design is quite good. The Devil in Me features high-quality voice acting, and the overall background music is decent. Some background noises are quite unnerving, which is great for the overall tense atmosphere. Sound effects are also quite good, and all in all, for a horror game, the developers have created a great soundscape.
Gameplay
The Devil in Me is, like the other games in the series, a survival horror game that focuses on branching narratives. You’ll be able to choose the general flow of the story, while also exploring your surroundings. Overall, the main gameplay loop is very simple, and it all depends on the choices you make and also on keeping your wits about you when QTEs pop up. The latter is something you either love or hate, but it can be sometimes difficult to go from paying attention to story segments to pressing the right button the next second to make sure you don’t get chopped up or miss an important key item. The story choices, however, don’t always make you feel like you’re in control, as some choices have a completely opposite outcome or make the character(s) do something that doesn’t really correlate with the choice that has been made.
As a whole, the game doesn’t feel that smooth when controlling your characters. Everything feels unnecessarily clunky, and during segments where you have to hurry and hide in a safe spot, it’s just a struggle to actually navigate properly. This, in combination with the aforementioned lighting issues, makes for a very frustrating experience at times. For us, it felt as if we were playing one of the first Resident Evil games when it came to the general controls. Luckily, the game doesn’t have you complete very complex actions, as you’ll just be running around while interacting with objects, occasionally climbing on obstacles, or shimmying your way to the next area.
Conclusion
The Devil in Me showed a lot of promise, and in all honesty, it was the most haunting story so far, but it sadly did not deliver. The overall story is still quite enjoyable to play through, but the game is dragged down by the horrendous amount of graphical bugs, an overall lack of polish, and poor controls. What could have become the best game in the series eventually turned out to be the most disappointing one. Don’t get us wrong, the previous games in the franchise weren’t polished either, but as we are now already at the fourth title of the series, things should have been handled a lot better. If you’re a fan of the series, you’ll still enjoy this one, but we still suggest waiting for a few patches or a heavy discount.
The Dark Pictures Anthology – The Devil in Me – Review,
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