We analyze Layers of Fear, the new from Blobber Team, in its PS5 version. A title that bets on the most conventional terror, but sowing some doubts for the future.
He horror genre It is one of the most recurring in video games, since they serve to generate certain atmospheres and environments that may seem impossible in any other proposal. In this sense, the Polish studio Bloober Team is one of the specialists in this field, which is why Konami has decided to entrust them with a project as important as the Silent Hill 2 remake. There is still a little to discover the result of said work, so the team continues to demonstrate its capabilities and, on this occasion, they wanted to return to their beginnings with another remake: that of Layers of Fear.
Through the proposal that saw them born back in 2016, Bloober has wanted to reinvent itself by bringing back the two adventures of Layers of Fear and expanding its content to complete the proposal even more, connecting them in the best way and adapting it to current times. , by means of the promising Unreal Engine 5 technology. During the last days I have been able to enjoy everything it has to offer Layers of Fear to perform his analysis and find out if the terror that Blobber is betting on is still in good shape.
+ Pros
- Great atmosphere for an immersive experience.
- Great opportunity to revive Layers of Fear with extra content.
- The jump to Unreal Engine 5 is a joy.
– Cons
- It hardly has a complex challenge.
- The corridor structure can be made somewhat heavy.
- Some technical errors.
- Layers of Fear: price, release date, platforms and where to buy
- Layers of Fear Final Rating
Layers of Fear: price, release date, platforms and where to buy
Layers of Fear | |
---|---|
Platform | PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC |
Release date | June 15, 2023 |
developer | Bloomer Team |
Gender | Terror |
Language | texts in spanish |
Layers of Fear is the horror game reinvention of the same name developed by the Polish studio Bloober Team. With its release the June, 15 from 2023, it includes the two titles of the saga with added content for the new generation: PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. In addition, it has translation into Spanish through texts, while the voices are in English.
A most intimate horror story
Layers of Fear is a title in which the most important thing is the atmosphere in which their proposals are developed. Bloober Team has been criticized a lot about its latest video games, especially with regard to playable mechanics, but it is impossible to criticize its undeniable gift for generate environments that provide those doses of terror What is expected of a game of the genre. Both the mansion in which the first title takes place, and the lighthouse in the second, provide that disturbing atmosphere that can give you goosebumps.
In this way, the narrative is the forte of everything that can be played in this remake that includes the two main installments and a kind of DLCs that willingly expand what could be enjoyed at the time. It is admirable how that atmosphere manages wrap the player and invite you to want to know more about what happens with the painter and the writer who star in both proposals, generating a spiral of confusion and changes in the environment that cause more than one scare and that psychological fear in which Bloober has completed a master’s degree in recent years. If what you expect is a bet on the purest fear and with spectacular graphics, You have come to the right place. But if you’re looking for a regular video game, you’d better not go into this room.
A flat gameplay and without too much fanfare
The gameplay of Layers of Fear is really simple, based on corridor environments in which you have to explore slightly and open doors, observing the environment. In this way, you enter rooms to reappear in different rooms, where everything has been transformed. You can watch a perfectly normal frame transform into something terrifying with a single camera twist, for example. Shadows that take the shape of the painter’s wife and slide slowly through the corridors. Definitely, that idea of atmosphere and anguish are very well integratedbut, do they work at a playable level?
Well the answer is that they work halfway. And it stands out for how little it has evolved compared to the original proposals. While not as lacking in interaction as a walking sim, Layers of Fear he walks along this path with some awkwardness, embracing it more if possible with the story of Layers of Fear 2, starring the writer. Proposals constantly use their twisted and ever-evolving environments to present really simple solving puzzles. On the other hand, an attempt is made to attack the action through persecutions by the entities that inhabit both places, a cheap tactic that fails to provide the necessary terror nor does it feel useful to the gaming experience.
The bad news is that there is not much more to contribute to the gameplayexcept for certain moments in which you have a lantern to illuminate the rooms or make the persecutors flee before the light it projects. If you like the intimate stories and with small doses of scares and a decaffeinated terror, you will find enough reasons to enjoy it. Otherwise, surely you will find many other proposals that can satisfy your desire for the more conventional horror genre.
In addition, it should be mentioned that it is appreciated a cohesion problem between both stories, giving much more importance to the first installment. The writer’s main story and both DLCs share the first game’s approach towards weak, ubiquitous voice acting. Layers of Fear 2 should have been an evolution for the series that informed what Bloober wanted to build at the time of it and everything that the studio has evolved in these years, but that is not the case. A missed opportunity to give a bigger twist to this remake and get a hit of effect.
Unreal Engine 5 graphics that still do not extract the full potential of the new generation
Where Layers of Fear does stand out is in its graphic style, which looks like art, despite not yet being able to extract all the potential expected from the new generation of consoles, especially considering that it has been developed under Unreal Engine. 5. The art direction is looking for a similar level of dirty and greasy realism, with the most disgusting details to achieve that effect of horror on the player. Deep down, it doesn’t stop resembling what Kojima did with PT, achieving that effect of not knowing what you can find behind each room with a terrifying realism that almost forces you to close your eyes.
Layers of Fear is not as hyper-realistic as Silent Hills could have been, but it achieves this same effect, so its result is more than satisfactory, even more so considering the original titles. Of course, it is the environment in which Bloober feels most comfortable, since all its titles have always stood out for being capable of squeezing great graphic quality, which is why they have smaller environments and largely sacrifice gameplay. to allow these kinds of graphic details to be sharper and more fantastic.
Lastly, we must mention one of the essential aspects of any self-respecting horror game: sound. It has a spectacular and very solid sound design, which manages to provide that effect of terror and tension that is expected in this environment. In addition, the narration of the characters is also superb, making it extremely easy to put yourself in their shoes while you unravel all the mysteries that are hidden in both stories.
Layers of Fear Final Rating
I have to admit that I expected more from Layers of Fear, to be honest. Building on Unreal Engine 5, it hasn’t given me a huge dose of terror or shocked me too much. The experience is uneven across the separate stories, which makes it all feel especially disconnected, considering it’s presented as a complete game. It is a proposal suitable for those who hope to find something more psychological and enjoy the narrativewithout much fanfare in the playable, almost as if it were a interactive movie.
In this way, despite the fact that it has its virtues and the Bloober Team team built it in its day with the idea of generating this type of sensation, I have not been able to connect enough with both stories, much less with its playable mechanics, what has turned it into an experience without too much entertainment. A pure procedure if you like the purest terror in video games, in which the mechanics, the environment and the enemies go hand in hand with a somewhat clearer projection than the one that this collection shows off. However, taking into account the basis on which they are based, nothing to reproach the work done on the remake.