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The Blair Witch Projects
Ritual Entertainment/ Humanhead Studios/ Gathering
of Developers/ PC
Prepare to be Witched.One
of the many, many great things about a show like E3 is that there is plenty
of spotlight-space for everyone, plenty of medals and accolades to be
handed out. It's not all just about the prettiest graphics or the fastest
processors or the most polygons or the biggest product rollout; sometimes,
it's about niche performance, about filling a very specific role nobody
else can fill. Of all the weird, hard-core, propeller-head splinter-groups
in the realm of electronic entertainment, you won't find many more vehement
than the horror-gamers, who demand their games not only be fun, but provide
an emotional element that can only be called unpleasant. Either that,
or horror-gamers are just violent, evil, soul-soiled bastards. Either
way:
Blair Witch Volume 1: Rustin Parr
Blair Witch Volume 2: The Legend of Coffin Rock
Blair Witch Volume 3: The Elly Kedward Tale
The dark, consuming black star of E3's onscreen creepshow is the forthcoming
trilogy--that's right, trilogy---of games utilizing various tweaks
of the Nocturne engine, and all based within the cosmology of The
Blair Witch Project. Each of the three titles marches further and
further back in time into the evil of the Blair/Burkittsville woods, and
each manages to tie up numerous loose ends---while creating many others---of
the seemingly bottomless Blair myth-pool.
Terminal Reality's Blair Witch Volume 1: Rustin Parr takes place
in 1941, immediately after the conviction of Parr for the murder of seven
Burkitsville (formerly Blair) children. Moviegoers and watchers of the
Blair Witch "mockumentary" that ran on the Sci Fi Channel know the basic
story: Parr killed the children in his remote house, and then wandered
dazed into town claiming that he was "finally finished." Sometime between
Parr's conviction and the point where a Burkittsville mob razed the building,
the player takes the role of Elspeth "Doc" Holiday, sent by the ultra-covert
goverment "Spookhouse" agency to investigate the killings---the Spookhouse
is called in whenever it detects the smell of the supernatural, and something
about the Burkittsville murders stinks to high heaven.
BW1: RP uses the same beautiful cinematic engine as Nocturne, which
means gameplay is redolent of a horror movie, complete with the barest-minimal
lighting and dramatic camera angles one might find in such films. Nocturne
starred a gruff, trenchcoated, monster-busting badass (who, in fact, makes
something of a cameo in this new game), but BW1's hero is much more a
normal human woman, faced with less-straightforward challenges: What is
the thing throwing its legged shadow from an empty doorway? What is the
significance of those eerie stick-figures suspended from the trees? And
just what does any of this prewar history have to do with the disappearance
of three film students decades later in 1994?
Blair Witch Volume 2: The Legend of Coffin Rock is developer Humanhead's
entry, and regresses further still to the year 1886. Players investigate
the disappearance of little Robin Weaver, an 8-year-old girl possessed
of supernatural talents well beyond her years. What we saw of BW2 appeared
to revolve around a Union soldier separated from his unit, bereft of his
memory and---worst of all---stranded in the worst parts of the Burkittsville
woods surrounded by Confederate enemies who can't seem to stay dead, among
other, worse things.
Ritual Entertainment's BW3: The Elly Kedward Tale may be the strangest
of the Blair Witch trilogy of games, and is slated for release on---when
else?---October 31st, 2000. Set during a the harsh winter of 1785, BW3
casts the player in the role of Jonathan Prye, a New England witch-hunter
come to the township of Blair following the banishment of Elly Kedward...and
the subsequent disappearance of numerous children. Slated as the "action"
game of the three, BW3's combat system will involve of a spell-casting
system that incorporates the three main belief systems tied to the Blair
Witch mythos---pagan witchcraft, shamanistic rites and Christian invocation.
-Chris Hudak
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Alone
In The Dark: The New Nightmare
DarkWorks/ Infogrames/ PSX/ DC/ PC/ GBC
AITD uses a spiffy new high-end 3D look on a par with
any cinematic effort out there, and truly emphases in the "Dark" of
the title---the player is armed with a gun and a flashlight, and the
flashlight's feeble cone of illumination sweeps over furniture, walls
and other objects, creating an intense atmosphere of paranoia. AITD's
new incarnation, ironically, pays the most attention to the player's
natural apprehension of the dark and what it hides.
Evil
Dead: Hail to the King
Heavy Iron Studios/ THQ/ DC/ PSX/ PC
Even the dark side of a computer/video game show needs
its moments of Lite-beer, comic relief, and what better than the game
inspired by Bruce Campbell's tough, one-liner brushes with the armies
of darkness? ED over-the-top cinematic violence seems less about careful,
anxious ammo conservation and clever puzzles than about the coolest
way, at any given time, to splatter the enemy's brains---or whatever
passes for them---on the nearest wall.
Ominusha
Warlords
Capcom/ PS2
It's Resident Evil, feudal Japan, combat-charges and
what happens when the three of them collide. What more do you need,
a road map?
Nightmare
Creatures 2
Konami/ PSX/ DC
It's just as base (and twice as bloody) as horror gets,
but it will definitely make you think hard about how you're gonna take
on the next monstrosity and survive. Music by Rob Zombie. Ambience by
Rob Zombie. Attitude by Rob Zombie. In fact, just go get your ass kicked
by Rob Zombie, right now---the game is still two weeks away.
Resident
Evil Zero
Capcom/ N64
A prequel to the happenings at Raccoon City, Resident
Evil Zero also introduces the ability to "zap" between two active characters
at once, either or both of whom may be having their spines chewed by
rotted zombies.
Run
Like Hell
Digital Maven/ Interplay/ PS2
This latest game from the man who created the twisted
world of Sanitarium has creatures of a much more terrifying and deadly
sort than shambling zombies. Players will be doing a lot of fleeing
for their lives in Run Like Hell.
D2
Sega/ DC
D2 takes place in the Canadian Rockies, and involves
phallic looking aliens which hits just a little too close to home for
us here at EP.
Resident
Evil Survivor
Capcom/ PSX
It has been widely published that RE Survivor will be
diminished from it's Japanese form in North America by not supporting
the PSX light gun. Even so, Survivor should startle often with lots
of creepy monsters lurching out at the player.
Clive
Barker's Undying
DreamWorks Interactive/ Electronic Arts/ PC
Clive Barker has experience telling tales in print,
picture, on stage and in film. Bringing his touch to videogames seems
a natural and horrifying combination. Besides having Mr. Barker's input,
the developers are working hard on interactive sound effects that provide
eerie and important environmental information for the player.
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> Ten Games Other than Conker That Will Make You Pee Your Pants