I don’t remember much about Hellraiser, being much too young to watch the original even if the image of Pinhead superseded any affinity for the movie series. But I had been assigned to get hands-on with the upcoming horror-action game Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival, and I came away with two prevailing thoughts experiencing it on its own terms. One, holy hell I got acquainted with its brand of body horror, and two, it makes a hell of an impression from the 30-minute demo I played. It’s borrowing from several other games – think modern Resident Evil with a little P.T. – and fusing them together into what feels like a solid, cohesive survival horror-action game that seems, in part, to align with the Hellraiser series.
I had to quickly get up to speed on the main character Aidan (voiced by renowned indie game developer Xalavier Nelson Jr.) whose girlfriend Sunny had her soul snatched by the Cenobites, and at times he’s going through literal Hell to find her. Through that, you see flashes of a tumultuous relationship between the two of them, who are basically crashouts; it’s passionate and intense, laden in BDSM accompanied by the horrifying image of what the Cenobites have done to her. As someone who didn’t really know what to expect, I was like, “Oh…okay.” I’m not a prude, so I carried on knowing that stories that are violent and/or sexual in nature can have a place in games, too, when told with purpose and not with direct malice.
This demo was a slice of what’s roughly in the middle of Hellraiser: Revival, and the first section thrust me into a Resident Evil-style section in a theater venue (or museum?) that’s been outfitted as an HQ for a violent sex cult. There are guns, combat, and environmental puzzles to progress along with some good old-fashioned inventory management – even with my limited understanding of Hellraiser, guns and shootouts aren’t exactly part of its identity, but hey, it’s a video game and I suppose it needs combat. While it’s not as polished or tight as a Resident Evil at this stage, controlling Aiden in first-person and scavenging for any weapon or number of bullets felt familiar and sensible for what it’s going for. These cultists seem to be chasing after you and they’ll pop out at surprising moments that jump-scared me during my demo (I could feel the gaze of everyone in that room).
I’m not sure how this fits narratively, but I got a feel for the slower-paced gunplay after I burned through all the ammo I could find (including a submachine gun that was left behind reception, hmm). It wasn’t enough for the encounter, so after frantically running through the backrooms of this theater, I remembered to use the thing that Hellraiser: Revival revolves around: the Genesis Configuration. It’s the magic puzzle box object that Aidan holds in his off-hand and it effectively lets you do telekinesis, BioShock-style. I could then get a little more creative, pulling fans from the ceiling or wooden planks from shelves, or wielding fire from a burning torch, to then blast enemies with. Again, these are elements we’ve seen before, but they’re fluid, and when done well, it complements the exploration and environmental inspection that comes along with finding the right key for the right door or deciphering a code from a note left behind.
What’s more interesting is that past this section, Aidan goes into a sort of psychosis and is taken back to nightmare scenarios in his house. This is where the P.T. influence is abundantly clear. You walk down a dark hallway, turn the corner, walk upstairs and go through a door in his house at night. The cycle will continually repeat until you do certain things in sequence, however, such as looking through text messages on an old Nokia cellphone left on the table, hitting your printer that spits out a disturbing image of Sunny, or opening a closet door that leads to a room with chains hung from the ceiling. It’s creepy as hell, and plays into the sort of supernatural horror that aligns with the touchstones of Hellraiser.
When all things are done correctly, the door at the end of the upstairs hallway turns into a gate into the Labyrinth, which in Hellraiser is this extradimensional maze-like hellscape where the Cenobites come from. Here, I saw another wrinkle in its gameplay – manipulating the physical space of the Labyrinth with the Genesis Configuration. It plays out like a sequential pathing puzzle where the walls and ground move like gears and you need to lock them into place to create a path forward. Like its other gameplay aspects, these sequences aren’t necessarily groundbreaking, but they break up the pace and ask you to engage with its grimey, disturbing world in different ways.
Hellraiser’s brand of horror isn’t ordinarily my jam, but I can at least tell from getting hands-on with the demo that the development team have a strong grasp of what makes modern horror-action games click. Drawing bits and pieces from other games and melding them together seems to be a smart move judging from my short time with it. And if Hellraiser sickos don’t know yet, the original actor Doug Bradley is voicing Pinhead here in Hellraiser: Revival, and Clive Barker isn’t just slapping his name on the box – the team confirmed that he consulted on the project.
I can see all of that fitting nicely into what’s said to be an 8- to 10-hour campaign, which we’ll be able to play on October 8 this year when Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival launches for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC.
Michael Higham is an editor at IGN who regularly contributes with reviews, previews, features, and news in written and video form. He’s usually entrusted with covering long RPGs and tech products, but he’s got range when it comes to games. You’ll also catch him at events and hosting video content, including IGN’s weekly podcast Unlocked.
