We went to the digital presentation of the second chapter of the Supermassive Games anthology, The Dark Pictures: Little Hope. Terror comes in the summer.
Bandai Namco and Supermassive Games set out to make us tremble with fear back in August of last year. Man of Medan came as the first step of The Dark Pictures Anthology, an anthology full of passages of terror in the style that only the British know how to do. His career in the last five years speaks for itself: Until Dawn, Hidden Agenda, The Inpatient … The common denominator is wanting to make the player tremble.
Due to the COVID-19 crisis, what was to be an in-depth visit to the studio, has become a virtual presentation. "Too bad we can't be in the same room," begins Pete Sammuels, the company's CEO. Despite the coldness given the loss of human contact, we are witnessing a half hour that will take us to the main keys of its second chapter. Forget for a moment everything lived on the high seas; Little Hope will make us lose our minds.
Man of Medan, first chapter of the anthology.
Road to Little Hope
The Dark Pictures journey began with a sharp disparity in criticism. Pete acknowledges that this division has allowed them to locate the weak points of his formula. Together with the community, they are the two main pillars on which the improvements incorporated in this second installment are sustained. Improvements that impact the "quality of life" at the controls and are always appreciated.
But before delving into them, we want to solve the unknowns around Little Hope. This chapter will take us to a fictional abandoned town in New England, in the northeastern United States, today. A group of students from the University of Massachusetts will arrive by chance from the destination to their moors without having the remotest idea of where they are.
Every good horror story begins with an accident …
Building a lattice like Little Hope responds to the region's dark history in the late 17th century. It was the typical community in which the neighbors denounced each other to maintain the tradition that prevailed from its foundations. Religion is who guided them in their constant witch hunt. Anyone who showed the slightest sign of rebellion was condemned "to the cruelest punishment."
Based on real historical facts is one of the principles with which Supermassive Games has wanted to shape its new project. Maintaining a connection between reality and fiction is super important to them. The choice of this area was not trivial. The Andover region, back in 1692, was the area where the most reports of witchcraft were filed compared to its neighboring town, Salem, whose background is full of horrors at a time when anyone was liable to be executed.
The conservative explores a new chapter.
At that point is our leading quintet. Taylor, Daniel, Andrew, John and Angela, embraced by the dense fog, end up in the midst of the remains of a ghostly, decrepit place, the passage of time seems to have stopped. Little by little, the hallucinations that will take them to 1692 will become habitual, at the same time that they must survive the horror that lurks in real life.
The levels of loyalty are even transferred to the clothing of the villagers. The studio enlisted the help of British television experts to scan real models from the same time frame. But not only the visual has to be taken into account, but also the interpretation. The one that, when closing our eyes, we can recognize all the vocal nuances of the actors who give life to the characters on screen.
Will Poulter (left) plays Andrew.
The cast is led by Will Poulter, renowned actor for his appearances in feature films such as Midsommar, The Revenant, Detroit and the special episode of Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, among others. His talent allowed the capture team to facilitate the transfer of his two 'I's': the current one, with an American English accent, and the past, with the closed British accent that characterized them. Because, yes, there are two versions of Andrew, the character he plays … So far we can read. The rest of the cast are natives of the North of England, like Louise Atkins and Martin Walsh.
The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope is the result of synthesizing several of the great influences for the development team. Pete tells us of plays like The Crucible, Arthur Miller's theatrical performance of the Andover and Salem witch trials. On the more current side, classics like Blair Witch, Season of the Witch, the Witch, Hellbound Heart, Hellraiser, Silent Hill and their favorites: It Follows and The Omen sound. Almost nothing.
Signs of prophecy lurk throughout Little Hope.
You will not catch anyone by surprise your offer on the net. We are told of a playable story of about five hours long, approximately. It will be available from the first day its local features (up to five players who pass the command) and an online mode for up to 2 players. We will be able to unlock an alternative version of the story, called Curator’s Cut, where we will experience the original plot from the perspective of other characters, which will provide the full spectrum of events. It will be available on PS4, Xbox One and PC.
Impressions: the origin of terror
Given the current circumstances, we could only observe a hands off by Pete himself on the prologue and a more advanced chapter in the story. In just a couple of minutes, the improvements he told us about at the beginning of the presentation come to light. Little Hope has significantly improved both camera control and scene transition as the script progresses.
The camera gains control and distance between the character.
When we can move freely, the camera acts just like in a third-person adventure title. Its position is high and leaves a lot of distance between the character's back and the target. Forget about the headaches in Man of Medan. The fluidity is total and allows you to savor even more its fantastic setting.
Contextual warnings have been included by the environment. Each action that we can perform in the world will be represented by the icon of the button that we must press. We will not miss absolutely anything. On the other hand, in uncontrollable scenes, an icon will warn when a Quick Time Event is approaching. That is, the sequence of buttons will not appear suddenly, but we can relax with the remote until the icon is drawn.
Trait-related decisions follow.
We want to avoid any possible revelation about the plot, especially about the prologue, since keeping the surprise is vital to connect with the game from the first moment. What we can say is that the decision system is the same as in its predecessor. The responses are linked to certain traits that determine the personality of the individual.
The entire foreword is a demonstration of the qualities of Supermassive in film directing. Those 20 minutes do not envy at all any film of the same genre. The muscle behind the cameras takes even more advantage of its visual power, perhaps more refined than in the previous one. We say "maybe" because of some small flaw when it comes to representing facial animations, although most of the time they correctly translate the interpretation.
The face of death.
It does not cut at any time when representing macabre situations. As a spectator, he plays on the line between brutality and psychological terror. Everything you see on screen is subject to the carousel of horror in which the protagonists are. That is real? What is fiction? As Pete defined it, it is a constant "paranoia." The two worlds are blurred. We should not be trapped.
Summer 2020
We still do not have a specific date to experience it first hand. The framework, this next summer, would follow the same cycle as the first installment, whose launch was scheduled for August 30, 2019. In any case, we must wait for the next few weeks to know in detail when we will enter the town of horrors.
What was seen in The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope allows us to be calm before doing Supermassive Games. That is, they seem to have improved the present while offering the same impact narrative. We could have tried it for ourselves, but in any case the advance offered is enough to want to enjoy the complete work.
Trust nobody.
