REVIEW: The Evil Within

This is a tough one to review. I’ve been a fan of Shinji Mikami’s brand of horror from Resident Evil to Dino Crisis, and knowing Bethesda had handed Mikami a blank cheque to raise survival horror from the dead, my interest was piqued, albeit cautiously.

Resident Evil 5 – whilst fun in co-op, was certainly not what I expect from a Resident Evil game. By Resident Evil 6, Capcom had almost killed the franchise, gunning for a broader appeal, ramping up the blandness in the process. Dead Space 3 went a similar route, bringing in co-op gameplay and gun wielding human enemies, inter-spliced with chest high wall cover-shoot-out sequences. Ugh.

Horror has enjoyed steady success in the indie scene, with games like Outlast and Amnesia seeing unanimous praise. The Evil Within launches hot on the heels of the utterly terrifying Silent Hills teaser P.T., and carries the pressure of starting a renaissance for triple A horror. Does it live up to that charge?

Graphics, Sound & Story

The Evil Within is deliciously horrific, a veritable feast for the eyes. The game features wondrous levels of dismemberment and skull popping. Bullet holes travel through enemy skulls leaving gaping wounds, bullet holes protrude dynamically on enemies, oozing crimson goo, assuredly enhancing satisfying combat. Dispatching enemies up close often showers Detective Castellanos in crimson gore, painting nearby surfaces in the process. The Evil Within is a game that literally lets you paint the town red.

Environments are diabolically detailed, implicating of a true labour of love. Tango Gameworks have spared no quarter building a world that closely resembles a seriously bad acid trip. From corpse-rife catacombs to eerie mansions and dilapidated hospitals, there’s an impressive variety of locations to be enjoyed (or despised) in The Evil Within, complimented by a gorgeous lighting engine.

The art direction is impeccable, and not without an air of nostalgia. The inspiration from other horror staples is often blatant. From the iconic Boxman’s Pyramid-head esque apron and helmet, to the Hellraiser-inspired use of chains and barbed wire, it often feels as though The Evil Within seeks to pay homage to horror greats rather than steal from them. Certainly more than once, I felt as though The Evil Within paid direct homage to Shinji’s Resident Evil. Red handgun ammo boxes look heart-warmingly familiar, and some of the mutants looked as though they’d been directly infected with Racoon City’s eyeball-enlarging G-Virus. This menagerie of mutated freaks await to chomp, stomp and stab Detective Castellanos into bloody paste. The Evil Within’s chapters each feature a uniquely grotesque boss monster, imparting their personalities onto each sequence.

All that gorgeousness comes at a price – the game often chugs on Xbox One, dropping frames and very occasionally grinding to an unceremonious halt. The game is yet to crash on me, but its apparent The Evil Within could’ve done with further optimization. The game also features an odd aspect ratio. Black bars adorn the top and bottom, accompanied by heavy film grain, giving the game a 1970s grindhouse feel. Whether or not the black bars are there to induce a cinematic quality or aid the oft-flagging frame rate, will likely remain unknown. Besides some systemic issues, The Evil Within is a game that delivers heavily in the visual department.

Whilst The Evil Within has an impressive array of sound effects to compliment the combat, the treatment of voices is perhaps less inspirational. Voice acting is solid, and although the portrayal of the games various monsters and nasties are top notch, often monsters only have one sound clip to represent them. A mutated wolf I battled used the same growling sound repeatedly, often cutting out to re-initiate the same sound file. It’s quite hammy at times and can serve to break the player from the immersion, sadly something the game’s systems seem to do fairly often. The game doesn’t deliver foreboding music very often, instead opting for silence, laden with environmental ambiance and zombie groaning. Some may find this to be more horrific — and at times I might agree. During the mansion stage, hearing foot steps in the floors above was decidedly ominous and unsettling, although, for me, a wider sound track might’ve added to the creepiness.

Story telling is certainly one of The Evil Within’s strong points. Detective Castellanos is thrown into a world collapsing at the seams, and you alone are tasked to find out why. Initially the plot seems like horror for the sake of horror, offering little explanation or reason for the carnage taking place. As you progress, it becomes apparent that there is a method behind the madness, and that Tango Gameworks aren’t going for an approach that puts plot on the backfoot. The game features a strong cast, an intriguing mystery and oozes horror spectacle, but above all – for any horror game – what matters most is how it plays.

Gameplay

Horror games are notoriously difficult to get right, particularly of the triple A variety. Most fall short of striking the balance between creating engaging gameplay, whilst simultaneously leaving players feeling vulnerable and susceptible to horror devices. Tango Gameworks do a great job of achieving this golden balance, but fall short of Resident Evil 2’s utter perfection.

The Evil Within has a stealth system, which it introduces at the very beginning. You can toggle stealth on or off with the tap of a shoulder button, enabling you to sneak up on enemies for an instant, ammo-saving kill. The effect is very satisfying, if not a tad odd, given that your kills involve stabbing your enemies in the head, many of which already have impaled skulls.

Detective Castellanos has a formidable array of weaponry which expands as you progress through the game. To start with, ammo is particularly scarce… emphasis on ‘to start with’. Playing on normal difficulty, by the half way point I was no longer bothering to play stealthily. Enemy corpses produce resources “intelligently”, seemingly based on your needs. No health kits left? The next kill will likely produce one. No ammo? Same scenario. It’s a system used by Resident Evil 4, 5 and 6 and is one I personally don’t favour. The alternative is providing ammo at set moments, hidden throughout the game’s universe, forcing you to be more conservative, in addition to incentivising exploration. The downside of course is a blow to replayability — knowing the locations of all the ammo could serve to produce a formulaic experience… although the linearity of The Evil Within achieves that for you.

The Evil Within is tragically linear. The game guides you, often literally, through corridors, from spectacle to spectacle akin to a haunted house ride at a theme park. Eventually the formula becomes repetitive, and serves to remove you from the immersion. Not to be too negative, the roller coaster ride is an incredibly fun one. Combat is satisfying, enemies heads pop with gory glee, the boss fights are incredibly challenging and varied, and it’s incredibly easy to be overwhelmed by unthoughtful play — but I found myself yearning for Resident Evil’s maze-like approach to progression. A few levels teased a more exploratory, non-linear game, but often just required you to go through one corridor and back having found a key or flicked a switch. Resident Evil required thorough exploration of all available rooms and locations, various combinations of keys and puzzles were required to progress — all whilst living in perpetual fear for what would be around the corner. The Evil Within has none of this, or at least very little, and it’s a painful reminder that we may never get another real Resident Evil.

Conclusion

Would something less on-rails result in a narrower appeal? I’m not sure, but the linearity prevents The Evil Within from achieving true greatness on it’s extremely solid foundation. The story is intriguing, the gameplay is fun, but, perhaps its a little too fun? It smacks of Dead Space’s brand of horror-action rather than Resident Evil’s paranoid survival, and honestly… that’s okay. The evil within The Evil Within is that it’s not Resident Evil. Whilst this may be a disappointment for fans such as myself, what lingers instead is a satisfyingly challenging horror-action game, that will hopefully develop into a staple Bethesda franchise.

Clocking in at around 15 hours, not including replay value and collectibles, The Evil Within is a solid investment brimming with meaty content. Fans of horror games should definitely check this out, but don’t expect it to give you nightmares.