I don't play a lot of video games. I really only feel compelled to talk about the ones that really had an impact on me. Blair Witch (2019) had me thrilled. I've been a fanatic of this franchise ever since my uncle told me about it when I was 13. I was fascinated by the concept of the film and the details he told me, even watched it alone at night the next year, all the lights out and doors and windows kept wide open (I wasn't the smartest kid) It was the first Horror movie to give me nightmares and still does to this day, just an atmospheric and horrifying theme park ride of a film. Later seeing the film in Cinema Salem in 2019 was one of the greatest and most memorable experiences of my entire life.
I saw Book of Shadows shortly after the original. It's one of the worst films ever made and killed the license (and the production company Artisan Entertainment) until the great Adam Wingard resurrected the franchise with his 2016 film. It's nowhere near as good as the original, but it was still a treasured theater experience for me.
Between them, I consumed pretty much ever bit of Blair Witch media I could find. The documentaries associated with the original (and even its otherwise irredeemable sequel!), books and comics.
Finally, it's 2019 and we're getting a major studio game from an experienced publisher. I hadn't anticipated a game this much since Jurassic World: Evolution, I pre-order the second I'm aware of its existence.
This makes Book of Shadows look like it belongs in the Louvre. It's more disappointing than college and not an ounce as useful as anything other than an abomination for the industry to never repeat. It is the worst game I have played on a console where I have suffered through Agony, the Saints Row reboot and 3 Madden games.
The boring story fallows an unlikable violent asshole named Ellis, a police officer whose only way of expressing emotion is to be violent and belligerent even to people he claims to care about. The only reason anyone would even have to think of liking this guy is because he has a cute doggo named Bullet (and we'll get to him) It doesn't help that the voice acting in the game has no urgency or believability. The twist with Ellis' character near the end feels like something out of a Paul Dini comic book and is about as scary as an edgy teenagers sketchbook drawings.
The game gives a bullshit warning before starting about your choices mattering. There is genuinely only one choice in this game that means anything and it's choosing to save your dog or leave it to die. Any human being with a trace of empathy is going to save the dog, there is no reason to change this apart from justifying an ending that is just as unscary and anticlimactic as the one people with souls in their bodies will get.
This game has almost nothing stylistically in common with the original film. If you took out the stick figures, it wouldn't even be a Blair Witch game. It seems to take the 2016 film's misguided idea that a story about a witch take place in the Summer rather than October, but at least Wingard's Black Hills Woods felt endless and expansive. With its constant invisible walls and extremely linear design, how the hell is anyone supposed to get lost? This game is so scripted and doesn't have the slightest fucking clue why the fuck the original film is so iconic and scary.
Speaking of the 2016 film, its astonishing that a game that takes so much from a movie all about the witch's minions to have such boring enemies. Just flashes of light that jump around like fireflies or shadows. They didn't even try, so I can't even feel sorry for how much of a failure this is. Everyone involved should be fucking ashamed of tarnishing such a great legacy. And the saddest thing is that we're unlikely to see a new video game adapting the property for a while.
The early 2000s survival Horror shooter games weren't great, but they at least had some sense of style. They had scares, they had atmosphere and most of all, they were fun. Far from perfect, but at the very least entertaining. This thing is as entertaining as drowning in molasses without the scares.
If you see this game on sale, do not buy it. If a friend of yours owns the game, steal their copy and destroy it. There is no reason to buy this game, no reason to play it, especially as a fan of the franchise. This is trash. Never, ever play Blair Witch (2019).
I saw Book of Shadows shortly after the original. It's one of the worst films ever made and killed the license (and the production company Artisan Entertainment) until the great Adam Wingard resurrected the franchise with his 2016 film. It's nowhere near as good as the original, but it was still a treasured theater experience for me.
Between them, I consumed pretty much ever bit of Blair Witch media I could find. The documentaries associated with the original (and even its otherwise irredeemable sequel!), books and comics.
Finally, it's 2019 and we're getting a major studio game from an experienced publisher. I hadn't anticipated a game this much since Jurassic World: Evolution, I pre-order the second I'm aware of its existence.
This makes Book of Shadows look like it belongs in the Louvre. It's more disappointing than college and not an ounce as useful as anything other than an abomination for the industry to never repeat. It is the worst game I have played on a console where I have suffered through Agony, the Saints Row reboot and 3 Madden games.
The boring story fallows an unlikable violent asshole named Ellis, a police officer whose only way of expressing emotion is to be violent and belligerent even to people he claims to care about. The only reason anyone would even have to think of liking this guy is because he has a cute doggo named Bullet (and we'll get to him) It doesn't help that the voice acting in the game has no urgency or believability. The twist with Ellis' character near the end feels like something out of a Paul Dini comic book and is about as scary as an edgy teenagers sketchbook drawings.
The game gives a bullshit warning before starting about your choices mattering. There is genuinely only one choice in this game that means anything and it's choosing to save your dog or leave it to die. Any human being with a trace of empathy is going to save the dog, there is no reason to change this apart from justifying an ending that is just as unscary and anticlimactic as the one people with souls in their bodies will get.
This game has almost nothing stylistically in common with the original film. If you took out the stick figures, it wouldn't even be a Blair Witch game. It seems to take the 2016 film's misguided idea that a story about a witch take place in the Summer rather than October, but at least Wingard's Black Hills Woods felt endless and expansive. With its constant invisible walls and extremely linear design, how the hell is anyone supposed to get lost? This game is so scripted and doesn't have the slightest fucking clue why the fuck the original film is so iconic and scary.
Speaking of the 2016 film, its astonishing that a game that takes so much from a movie all about the witch's minions to have such boring enemies. Just flashes of light that jump around like fireflies or shadows. They didn't even try, so I can't even feel sorry for how much of a failure this is. Everyone involved should be fucking ashamed of tarnishing such a great legacy. And the saddest thing is that we're unlikely to see a new video game adapting the property for a while.
The early 2000s survival Horror shooter games weren't great, but they at least had some sense of style. They had scares, they had atmosphere and most of all, they were fun. Far from perfect, but at the very least entertaining. This thing is as entertaining as drowning in molasses without the scares.
If you see this game on sale, do not buy it. If a friend of yours owns the game, steal their copy and destroy it. There is no reason to buy this game, no reason to play it, especially as a fan of the franchise. This is trash. Never, ever play Blair Witch (2019).