House of Ashes , because this is the subtitle of the third installment of the Until Dawn authors’ series , was traditionally announced just after the final credits of the previous one, Little Hope . Thus, we have known for almost a year that along with the new history, the developers are preparing an extremely interesting setting for us, full of lost ruins, which we will visit together with a branch of the American Marines. It took another twelve months to see what exactly we were going to face – but we must admit clearly that the end result is extremely satisfying.
Sumerian Myths and Great Guns
While House of Ashesthe beginning of the presented plot is located in antiquity, its proper part takes us to 2003, right in the middle of the conflict between the USA and Iraq. It is in the uncertain realities of the Middle East that we meet members of the US Special Forces unit, who are assigned to a mission to investigate the potential location of a missile depot. On the spot, it turns out that the intelligence data has failed – but in return, a few unfortunate coincidences cause the protagonists to end up hard landing in an underground complex of caves and ancient structures. As they discover more secrets of an archaeological wonder that has been lost for hundreds of years, the heroes realize not only that they unintentionally became the authors of one of the greatest historical discoveries of modern times, but most of all … that they are not alone in it.
Supermassive Games has proved with previous installments of The Dark Pictures that it likes to play well-known horror themes. After the haunted ship in Man of Medan and the town of Little Hope strongly associated with the witch cult, this time we are going on a sightseeing trip among the Sumerian ruins. So while the backbone of the story should not surprise fans with anything particularly new, it must be admitted that the script sells it extremely effectively. First of all, the dynamics of events can be praised here. A horse with a row of those who would expect that in a production based, after all, mainly on dialogues and making decisions in any way, there can be a place for effective fire exchanges, but we will also find such here. The story itself unfolds as quickly as the individual sequences. Nobody wastes time here on prolonging the moment of showing us our opponents in all their glory, we also watch the first spectacular deaths quite quickly. When, in turn, he develops sufficiently high speed, House of Ashes he doesn’t take his foot off the throttle until the finale – so there’s no question of getting bored.
Almost like home
In addition to the successful – though certainly much more emphasis on action rather than horror itself – plot, this state of affairs is also partly due to a well-thought-out and, more importantly, well-balanced gameplay. It seems that in contrast to the boring at first Man of Medan and basing its strength mainly on the jumpscare Little Hopein this respect, Supermassive Games has finally found the right balance. So when the exploration of the rooms in search of secrets and the background of the notes begins to lull our vigilance a bit, we can usually expect that we will be jumped into action at any moment, and this is some sudden turn in the story, and this is one of the QTE arcade sequences. The adrenaline buzzing in our ears after a successful escape is, in turn, countered by dialogues that affect the relations between the characters, the co-authors of which, using the well-known mechanism of choices, are, of course, ourselves. In other words, House of Ashes is good at measuring individual elements well, even if they themselves will be only a repetition of the entertainment for the stagers of the series.
If you look for changes somewhere compared to the previous parts of the anthology, it is rather in the way of presenting the events – this time, the cameras fixed to specific shots in individual scenes have been completely abandoned, and the entire game is observed from the perspective of a third person. This has its advantages and disadvantages – on the one hand, it takes a bit of a cinematic atmosphere to the game, on the other hand, the creators can play with the perspective at the right moments and hang the lens just above the hero’s shoulder, and as a bonus, we also get the possibility of more thorough combing of the visited rooms.
Another novelty in the game is the ability to choose the difficulty level, which will undoubtedly be welcomed with open arms by all those who would like to focus more on learning the story than fighting the demanding time trials. While playing the title, I checked each of the settings – and they fulfill their task, as in the highest ones you really have to show some catlike agility, while with the easiest ones it is much more difficult to lose your life.
Single scratches on the glass
In the quite impressive, as it can be seen from the above, barrel of honey, there is also room for a teaspoon of tar – that is, the quality of the binding. While there is basically no fault with the audio layer, and the creators traditionally invited a recognizable face to the main role, this time in a person known, for example, from High School Musical Ashley Tisdale, the graphics clearly show that it has been gnawed by a tooth of time. In truth, the grandmother said for two here: particle effects, play with light and shadow are still the strengths of Supermassive Games, but the textures lack a bit of sharpness, and the scale of the underground complex also seems very limited compared to what we would like to imagine.
It was worth coming back
However, these are relatively minor offenses, which in the end can be treated more as inconveniences caused by an individual attitude – because as a whole, House of Ashes presents itself very solidly. Unless we expect a game that will turn the industry upside down, we will have several hours of appropriately increasing pressure, balanced and intriguing production. Exactly the one we would like to see on the long, late autumn evenings.
