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It looks like I’ll be pushing my Top 5 Octoberween Game Titles of 2019 a little late again. Life has a way of making things difficult. One day I’ll be able to get these kinds of blogs out much sooner but till then let’s get to my choices. As before I try to find games that are not exactly fully price or possible hidden gems, so they can make anyone’s budget for some great non-mainstream gaming goodness. Enjoy!

Okay first off I have to make a confession: I wasn’t a fan of the Blair Witch Project movie. My family and I bought into the hype for this movie when it first came out and made plans to see it when it was still in theaters. We went as far as to watch it at an old drive in movie theater in Council Bluffs, Iowa (a bit of a drive for us to given how far away we lived in Nebraska) as my parents said it would add to the atmosphere like how they saw horror movies back in their time. It was a three movie showing that night with The Blair Witch Project being the main feature. When the movie ended all I could remember thinking was “Wait that’s it?” and hearing the booing of other movie goers FROM INSIDE THEIR CARS at the movie’s ending. To paraphrase a twitter post from someone I follow Julian Titus:

“Blair Witch the video game is a lot like the movie to me. To paraphrase Brian Griffin: Nothing’s happening, nothing’s happening, nothing’s happening. It’s over; people look pissed.”

I admit I share his sentiment about The Blair Witch Project. That movie was just as disappointing to me as have been the Paranormal Activity movies. I didn’t understand where people were coming from about it being the scariest movie of our time. Overall I didn’t like the movie, it didn’t do it for me. Yet I have to admit years later I did enjoy the movie’s sequel and the short lived FOX Network TV series developed by the creators of the Blair Witch Project: Freakylinks. So when I heard that a videogame was being made based off this movie I have to say I was a bit apprehensive. The game’s trailer didn’t impress me but the developers of the game did given they were behind the “Layers of Fear” game series and the game Observer. In the end I didn’t give it much thought and figured I’d check it out sometime later on when I find the game on sale for the cheap digitally. But when I decided to give Xbox Game Pass a try I didn’t realize that the game would eventually be offered on that digital service upon its release. So with some time to kill, and a helping of Game Quest missions offered in playing the game, I decided to give it a download and try the game out. After my play through I can confirm I understand where Julian Titus is coming from in his statement above but I still find myself adding this game to my Top 5 Octoberween Game Titles of 2019: Blair Witch

 

The game takes place roughly two years after the events of the first movie (seemingly to ignore the events of the sequel movie I think) as you play the role of Ellis Lynch, a former police officer from the area with heavy hintings of being a recent military veteran, who volunteers with the local search party to find a lost boy who went missing in the Black Hills Forest. With the help of your trusty canine companion (and possible emotional support animal) Bullet, a weak flashlight, a late 90’s style cellphone and a police supplied walkie-talkie, you both venture into the woods with the original intent of trying to find the missing child. Instead you find yourself getting lost in the Black Hills forest as you’re stalked by supernatural creatures, mocked by a man named Carver, hunted by the Blair Witch and end up battling Ellis Lynch’s inner demons as you slowly come to understand why exactly Ellis came to the forest in the first place.

The game is basically a “walking simulator” game with horror effect elements added to the mix. It has your basic story elements, some puzzle mechanics, as well as a simple combat system that’ll remind you of the video game “Alan Wake” as you shine your flashlight on any supernatural foes that Bullet notices in the area. I’ve never been one for walking simulator games, seeing them being too one dimensional when it comes to what you can do action wise in the game. Exploring the world, gathering bits and pieces of a story isn’t usually enough to keep me engaged in playing, mild puzzle solving offerings notwithstanding.  The game controls well enough with action commands being prompt and it not being a hassle to move around the game world. The puzzles themselves are not overtly difficult or simplicity easy so as a whole it’s your basic affair when it comes to walking simulator games. But unlike other “walking simulator” games, this one added something different that had me playing the roughly 6 hour game in one sitting: mysteries.

As you start the game, Blair Witch does a good job of world building as you begin your play through. The graphics are decent enough to accurately portray a forest as you search for clues. The voice chatter on the walkie-talkie from other search volunteer’s help to give you as the player character the world’s lore and what you could expect in the future. Its heavy foreshadowing is evident when/if one recalls the events and locations from the movie. Eventually you end up getting “lost” in the forest and it’s here that the game shines for me. Blair Witch is one of the games where it is mandatory for it to be played in a dark room at night with either a decent stereo surround sound system or at the very least a video game headset. The game delivers a great experience (if you can call if that) of really feeling lost in a forest. I can personally attest to that given my experiences of being “lost” in forests during paranormal investigations. At first it doesn’t feel that bad given its still daylight out originally and you do find a path in the forest with the help of Bullet. It’s not till you find the campsite, along with a time period specific night vision camcorder, when you start to realize that your idea of “lost” isn’t the kind where you can be found if you just follow the river.

Besides finding clues to the story from left over documents, polaroid photos and iconic Blair Witch stick figures, Bullet comes in handy in showing you the right direction in not just finding your way out of the forest but in guiding you to the next part of the story. The overall story is to find the lost boy but you end up getting caught up in other events within the forest as you learn that logic and reason don’t exactly make sense. The best example of this is when you find the camcorder and play certain colored videotapes, you learn that some tapes can actually reverse time events shown in the video like making objects appear in the area they were filmed in to appear or reverse area effects like reigniting long dead fires, fixing broken equipment or removing physical objects in your way of progress. Bullet himself does more than just helping to find the next path but it turns out you need him close by you as to not have an episode of PTSD, point out the location of enemies hidden in the forest and depending how you treat Bullet (and others) will help determine what your fate will be in the game. Bullet himself acts well enough to be a decent companion in the game. You don’t exactly get any “Dog.exe has stopped working” moments and he sounds and acts a lot more like a living, breathing dog than like in other games like Fallout 3. I myself haven’t noticed any buggy moments with Bullet though there will be some missing frames of animation depending when you make certain voice commands. It’s not immersion breaking but possibly bothersome for those who know how dogs act like. And yes you can pet the dog….

Blair Witch can be a collect-a-thon when it comes to learning about the story as you play. Aside from the basic achievement hunting unlock items it offers a bit of item lore to help fully understand the overall plot of the game. None of the plot is told to you right out and it’s up to you as the player to pick up the pieces to learn the truth about not just the missing boy but asto why the player character Ellis Lynch is the way he is in the game. You’re given certain glimpse to Ellis’s persona during random phone calls from his ex-wife, former boss and others he interacts with be it on his cellphone during calls or scripted events with the walkie-talkie. They begin to paint a picture that Ellis isn’t quite all there at the beginning of the game, which helps to explain certain dream-like sequences in the forest that he experiences along with specific supernatural episodes along the way. During the game I couldn’t help but wonder if what Ellis was experiencing was either from his weaken mental state from his current life circumstances or was the forest/Carver/The Blair Witch indeed messing with him.

So the game may sound lackluster with the basic trappings of a walking simulator, collect-a-thon elements, simplistic combat and an obtuse plot that you may not fully understand unless you’re familiar with the first movie and give the game several play overs. With that said why would I add this game to my Top 5 list this year, especially given I’m not much of a fan of the first movie or walking simulators. The reason is the one word I mentioned at the beginning of this writing: mysteries.

The game atmosphere mixed with the excellent sound quality encapsulates the supernatural lore and some of the mysteries that are involved with “Lost in the Woods” stories. Blair Witch captures the very feeling of being “lost” when you’re in certain chapters in the game where you are literally re-treading the same path back to a central point over and over again despite walking in a straight line. I’m sure that can easily be done given how the game is programed yet that very programming trick helps to drive home the feeling of helplessness in being lost in the forest. The time dilation effects, a staple in the Blair Witch lore, also helps to deliver the feeling of confusion during plots points where Ellis is missing for hours when the environment and communications seems to indicate it being a lot longer than that. The game even ventures into alternative locations during certain events where you and other characters are at the same location yet you’re unable to see each other. They cynical may consider that a “No Man’s Sky” situation but the one has to realize this game isn’t an online game. It’s events like these that mimic other “Lost in the forest” stories one reads about online where a person swears they’ve been lost for a few minutes when according to search and rescue teams it was actually days, or when people swear they were at a specific landmark in the forest at the same time only not to notice anyone there at that time. The eerie sound effects heard in 360 degree stereo sound help to give you the feeling of being in a forest be it nature sounds or the spooky soundtrack, which is only amplified 10 fold during certain moments in game when you get the feeling something isn’t right at that moment. It’s one of those hard to explain events unless you’ve experienced it while being out in the woods at night. When the night is too quite with hardly any breeze, only the sound being your breath out of your mouth, Bullet panting by your side and the possible supernatural sound of either an unknown tree creature or a totem nearby.

The game even helps to deliver a true Blair Witch Project experience where you can play the game by just using the night vision camcorder to find your way in the forest. Depending on your mindset playing the game in this manner can be either annoying or unnerving when all you see on your main screen is total darkness and just the view from the camcorder’s viewfinder being your own source of knowing where you need to go. Near the end of the game you end up taping your weak flashlight to your camcorder given that certain puzzles/enemy avoidance encounters can only be found/avoided with the night vision mode with the flashlight only needed as a purely psychological measure. It’s not till this point is when you run into jumps scare territory. Aside from the tree monster encounters, the last level is when you’ll be treading carefully to avoid jump scare instadeath moments and explore a certain iconic area that mixes elements of what it’s like to be inside the Tardis from Doctor Who and the player character’s confrontation of his own inner nightmares.

It’s because of this along that it’s made me want to go back and play the game over and over again. If not to just get the “true” ending or to fully understand the story or the fates of everyone involved but to get the feeling of what it’s like to be lost in a forest. It’s a feeling that is hard to explain and one I wouldn’t recommend or wish on anyone to experience. But at the same time it’s one of those unique feelings of horror that one would enjoy in the same veil as watching a slasher movie or visiting a haunted house. I don’t get to play many of these types of games that are able to delivery this level of horror and psychological terror. It’s simplistic enough yet the story and environments are able to convey a level of uneasiness that the first movie wasn’t able to delivery for me.

Normally I don’t recommend games that are fairly new but after trying out The Blair Witch on Xbox Game Pass I can’t help but pick this game for my Top 5 Octoberween Game Titles of 2019. In truth if it wasn’t for Xbox Game Pass I probably wouldn’t have played the game. The current asking price of $29.99 is a bit steep for me to consider it as a solid buy myself. But after playing this game and still trying to unlock the true ending, I could see myself spending that kind of money on the game if/when it is removed from Xbox Game Pass. Given that The Blair Witch is only available on Xbox One and PC as of this writing it’s the only option in being able to try out this game. It’s hard for me to give it a hard recommendation with its current price but if you happen to have Xbox Game Pass, you can’t go wrong in trying out this title this year. It’s short enough for it to not take up much of your time to celebrate the Octoberween season. I’m glad I gave this game a chance and if you’re in the right mindset when playing this game you may be glad to.

My Top 5 Octoberween Game Titles for 2019

5) Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon – Price: $15.99 for PS4 and PS Vita version for me with 50% off code at check out. Free with Microsoft’s Games with Gold program on Xbox One.

4) Blair Witch – Price $29.99. Free with Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass.

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