4/5 ★ – Endless_backlog's review of The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes.

12hrs First of all, House of Ashes is the best instalment from supermassive games since Until Dawn, and remains so after playing The Quarry (yet to play Devil in Me). I can’t help but feel that both the prologue set in 2231 BC with the battle of the Akkadians and Gutians, and also the first exposition into the temple ruins in the 1940s would have gave so much more depth to the games environments. The archeologies should have been playable flashbacks as they would not have been equipped with any weapons unlike the loaded military we play as, and could have offered a stark contrast in facing the monsters, from all out shoot em up to stealth or creative battles in the past. The story itself is pretty well done in my opinion. It takes what could be a pretty basic idea and develops a facinating back story and underground environment to deploy it. There’s also a theme throughout the game of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” which is used well throughout. I really enjoyed that you got a look into Salims family life, highlighting the devastation of war and how both sides are human and just being used by their superiors to fight their battles. The setting was dark and eery without looking bland, utilising over the shoulder camera angles to emphasis the claustrophobic feel of the caves. I particularly enjoyed the creepy music that greets you for the first time in the opening menu. In terms of gameplay there was a few glitchy moments where someone was levetating their gun etc or the faces didn’t quite look legit delivering dialogue (particularly Ashley Tisdale’s character). The characters are okay, but I felt Jason and Salim particularly carried this. I actually tried to save Clarice as long as possible as I thought she’d turn and have some defining moment where she saves the gang from the rest. Looking forward to playing the curators cut and seeing how my story pans out controlling other characters in the same scenes we played through the first time round. OOHRA.