The Evil Within

The Evil Within
Developers: Tango Gameworks
Director: Shinji Mikami - developer of Resident Evil games and regarded as a king of gaming horror
Publishers: Bethesda Softworks
Known as in Japan: Psycho Break
Platform I played it on: PlayStation 4

“What do you fear, little one?”

Dr Jonathan Crane, meet Elizabeth DeWitt. Heart-pounding tension across multiple dimensions. That’s The Evil Within in a nutshell. If you can keep your sanity and bravery in check for long enough, across the ever shifting planes of twisted realities, you might just be able to understand the storyline and plot. No doubt you’ll die trying.

Booker? Booker DeWitt, is that you?

It begins, as every horror story should, in the rain. Detective Sebastian Casteanos – not Spanish but sure sounds like it – is looking into a series of brutal murders occurring in Crimson City’s mental hospital. Good start. Five, certainly not ten, minutes into the game and you’re met by the main antagonising antagonist. You won’t know his name for some time, you’ll only think he looks like a zombie in Assassin’s Creed clothing. But this zombie is fast. Sebastian watches on the CCTV as Enzio-Zombie kills four policemen in quick succession, looks up at the camera and is suddenly behind him. Then let the horror begin.

By Enzio-Zombie’s power, you are cordially invited into his own personal nightmare. Across fifteen in-game chapters, you will come to know his rage, his fear, his passion, his back stories and his absolutely INFURIATING one-hit move of killing you simply by touch. It’s quite a thing to see, resembling an ultimate-fail high-five. His arm goes up and your legs come off. Everything fades to black, my apologies, red. Because you're in his barb-wired-brain, he rules everything and changes everything. A hospital can turn into an asylum, a church can turn into an underground labyrinth and, for some reason, two crushing walls of giant mannequin heads can end at a cornfield. I don’t know. I’m not mad.

Okay, that mad.



Ruvik. Or as I christened him, 'Stitches'

Fortunately, Enzio-Zombie – from now referred to by his real name Ruvik – doesn’t appear all the time. He leaves the job of killing you horrifically to his inner-demon-minions, known as the Haunted. I can’t fully tell what they are to Ruvik. A cutscene at the start of the game suggests they’re just your usual average Joes and Josephines that have been clawed into Ruvik’s world of sheer dominating thought. The general concept of The Evil Within involves combining the minds of others into one collective mind. As you'd expect, it doesn't quite work out. People don't like to share thoughts and memories, it's understandable that they want to fight back when it feels their brain has fallen into a needle pit. Like all horror genres, the main character is somehow excluded. Something about Sebastian keeps him sane, keeps him away from the glowing eyes, horrendous skin conditions and that general “I wonder how your intestines taste” sort of look. His job is to survive and escape them, or simply kill them. And not just kill them, slaughter them and burn them with his dwindling supply of matches or else they get. Right. Back. Up. Or they lie in waiting for you to walk over them and suddenly you’re without a left shin.

You can also use headshots or explosives to do the job. Tricky to get up when your head and feet are occupying the exact same space.

That’s just the little monsters, the used-to-be-normals. In Ruvik-land, there’s a whole load more nightmares. I’m unsure on names, so I personally fought “the girl from The Ring crossed with Dead Space aliens”, the “Fishermen”, the “Mutant Wolf” (two varieties), “Safehead” and “fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck-GET IT AWAY FROM ME!” The latter actually adapted as a name for most in-game enemies. Especially the invisible ones.

You read that correctly. Invisible. For about 90% of the time. They're quite generous, they do become visible just when they're inches from grabbing you. So keep an eye out for moving bottles and doors, or else you'll end up with a lot of tentacles very suddenly in your face.

But all the hell-bent horrors, all the masked, armoured, armed, fat, full of nails, debris, glass and furiously angry, are what contribute so well to the in-game tension. Never in my life have I gripped a PlayStation controller so tightly in such an everlasting state of terror. It's always there, gently chewing on the undersides of my brain and letting your spine go ever so slightly colder. A few chapters in and experience made, your own manic preconceptions are so well integrated that even walking around is scary. You start to mistrust things like...corridors, doorways, floors, the ceiling, basically everything you'd think would be a constant. There's a sneak mode and trust me, you'll use it. The slightest noise, a twitch in shadows and *thwpp*, knees bent, crouched and progressing at a speed that although doesn't get you there fast, it might just get you there alive.

Fortunately, the tension calms (to a point) for the storyline transitions and save points. Leading on from the mentioned shifting realities, behind every cracked mirror is 'The Asylum' which, like it or not, is your save haven. It allows you to exchange green gel collected in game for upgrades, as well as the bitchiest receptionist you'll ever run into. Feel free to make quips every time she asks "whatever is the matter?" (She even asks 'A careful one, aren't you?' if you visit in quick succession) You just fought two mutant dogs that outweigh Cereberus, you don't need that kind blasé crap from anyone. Also enjoy how your save haven starts to turn on you over the course of progression. The Asylum you start in is never The Asylum you leave. It certainly taught me one thing: always listen out for Claire de la Lune. It plays softly behind every splintered cracked mirror and each eerie, yet somewhat soothing, note basically translates as "get in! We've got some down time!" 

You'll also get a chance for a breather with the narrative based cut scenes. Sure, scary stuff can still happen but at least you know there's bugger all you can do to stop it. You'll make the run for your life - the only thing you have left - and then walk calmly into another room to chat with your fellow detectives (who funnily enough drop in and out as frequently as Infinite's Lutece twins), Ruvik's old partner, or Leslie. (For spoiler reasons, you can find out for yourself exactly what Leslie is. All I'll say is, have fun chasing him!) 
It's something that threw me, or made me laugh, every single time. Sebastian will crawl his way out of multiple nightmares, literally claw away from demons and ass-tightening boss battles, and never ever act like it. There's a couple of "what?" or "oh shit" (rather more justified), but for the most part Sebastian plays the calmest horror genre protagonist I've ever seen/played.

(With the exception of Jack from BioShock. But Atlas never said 'Would you kindly speak?' so what're you gonna do?")

I guess it can only be a good thing, we've all seen horror films and games where 80% of the dialogue is screaming and hated it. But I'd have liked a little something, just a smidge more emotion. Especially when he saw the final boss - play it and see.

The Keeper. Agreeable looking chap, isn't he?

At least the weapons show emotion, even if the ammunition is less than limited. There's a pistol, for desperate measures, a shotgun, for head-explodey measures, a sniper, ditto, and the Agony Crossbow. With a name like that, you know it means business. Its ammo is derived from scrounging for tool kits or disarming bombs. They supply you with gear pieces, to create ammo. There's a good eight variations of bolts, but I can guarantee the one you'll return to the most is the Explosive head. Clears a crowd, shortens a boss battle - though if the times comes when you've unloaded three into The Keeper's side and he's still standing, you will swear. Believe me. There's also a basic spear, fun for head shots, and an incendiary bolt. The latter costs a lot of gear pieces, but spouts three plumes of flame for a short time. Loosely translated, get one into the middle of a crowd and brother, you're laughing. Your enemies sure won't be.

As I've mentioned it, be sure to scrounge. Scrounge, scrounge, scrounge like a thief. Not just from an advantage point of view, you will need to. The ammo you require is hidden in cabinets, in forgotten old rooms. Pick up axes, kill with torches, ALWAYS MAKE SURE YOU'VE GOT MEDICINE. etc etc etc.

And while I have this chance? Sebastian, baby...you can't sprint for shit.

Anyway! Now that I've survived it, after 15hrs 25mins and 38secs, and a grand total of 34 deaths, I have this chance to reflect on what it is easily the scariest game I've ever played. And one thought that's been playing on me all throughout: is it scary? Or is it just hard? Does the tension of avoiding enemies actually translate as a desire to miss them and survive? Because every time you die horribly, yes it's not a sight you want to see, but what else does it mean? I means you have to do it all over again. There's a scene around the middle chapters when Ruvik is chasing you, all with his one-hit-kill move. I failed a few times, exploding into death and such. Each attempt following was tense, sure, but was I tense because of the demonic assassin teleporting (yes, teleporting) after me, or simply tense because I couldn't be bothered with a second attempt?

I'm not sure myself. Certainly parts of the game disturbed me and that isn't linked to anger or frustration. I had to perform three different brain experiments on subjects that were still alive. I sure as hell wasn't furious. In fact I was rather British in apologising every time the needle hit memory sections rather than emotions.

But I can say quite definitely that I enjoyed playing The Evil Within, and if that makes me worthy of being admitted into Crimson City's mental hospital well...just loan me a shotgun first. It's been quite a while since I've played something so immersive, so mesmerizingly and hauntingly addictive and, something that's missing from a lot of modern games, so challenging.

Maybe that's my Evil Within. Always a desire to play again.

I'll admit that since buying my PS4 I've yet to find a game that has truly justified my purchase. My fingers are crossed for Arkham Knight. For now, The Evil Within gave it a damn good go.

See the trailer here, you know you want to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxlo67zhOWc