Around this time of year, people love to be scared. Halloween time stirs that up in us, and every market, understandably, wants to take advantage of that. When I was a kid around this time of year, a new video game would come out that was designed to scare the piss out of you, more times than not it was a Resident Evil game. I loved when a brand new, fresh horror game would come out because that series seemed to be getting dull. When Resident Evil 4 came out, everything changed. It was scary, it was fun, and it was interesting. The style of the game was something that we hadn't seen in the genre before, and something that stuck around until this very day. Well, the creator of the original Resident Evil and RE4 (easily the best two installments of that franchise), Shinji Mikami, is back to give us something new. Something fresh. He has given us The Evil Within and it is terrifying.
I knew this game was going to be worth the hype because I had to go to two Best Buys and a Gamestop to even find a copy. That hasn't happened to me in what feels like forever. I've only played through the first chapter, so this is spoiler free, but that first chapter had me feeling very uncomfortable and anxious. The amount of detail presented in the game is startling and I can't begin to express to you how claustrophobic and on edge the game makes you feel. Throughout the first chapter, there is but one enemy. One terrifying dude with a chainsaw that stalks you throughout the entire level. You can see the inspiration from the Texas Chainsaw movies right off the bat, and although its just a video game, it does a good job of making you feel like you are actually there. The first chapter is slow, yet extremely fast paced. I know that sounds contradictory but you've gotta play it to understand. My heart must have been going a mile a minute as I hid in lockers to avoid being detected by this maniac. It was very unsettling, but I had a great time playing it even though I died about 218 times before I moved on to the next level. It's scary, its challenging, and its new. This game is FUN.
That's a good thing not only because it means its worth your money, but because this genre has been beaten to death. Each game is exactly like the last and they stopped being scary. They started heading in this new direction where the games were more action oriented, which can also be fun but is not what people are looking for in a horror game. The Evil Within has saved this genre. The sales alone for this game are going to make developers like Capcom rethink the way they've been doing things. This is a great time to be a horror fan and I can't wait to see where the future takes us.
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