Slender The Arrival review

Anyone who watches my reviews knows I’m a sucker for horror games but oddly enough I’ve never really played any of the true survival games that have come out recently apart from Alien: Isolation. Slender: The Arrival isn’t exactly new, but this remix for the latest generation of consoles delivers a couple of new chapters and ideas to the game which sees you exploring a house, nearby wood and more in search of your friend who has gone missing.

Armed only with a torch, what seems like a nice sunny day soon turns into night and things get really creepy. Movement feels a bit clunky but this all adds to the sense of foreboding as your torchlight focuses your attention and as you turn, you fully expect something to be staring at you from outside the window or crouching in the corner ready to go “boo!”.

There are notes to find and collect around the place for you to read that not only help fill in the blanks but also give you lovely cheevos, and there’s also no map, meaning that as you explore it’s easy to feel helpless as you get lost.

Most of the chapters involve you having to collect items or switch on generators which is tricky enough when the locations of the objects and environments are random every time, but made even more terrifying by the fact that a creepy tall man in a suit with no face and a red tie is stalking you, and it really is bloody scary if you play this game in a dark room with headphones on!

The bass booms, strange scratchy sounds swoop around you and your vision twitches to announce his arrival and then you see him from a distance but then he’s gone, and then he teleports behind you! The fact that you never know where he will be next really puts the willies up you and I’m talking metaphorically even though you are alone in a forest with him and he’s obviously up to no good.

When it comes to graphics, they don’t really stand up to close inspection – in fact the textures are pretty basic, however when the camera is twitching all over the place and your torch is wobbling as you run breathless through the forest, it does actually look really good.

Slender: the Arrival is a short game but it will get in your head. I had funny dreams after I played it and I’m sure Mr Slenderman will visit me again. The game’s less than a tenner too so if you like to get scared, it’s definitely worth a go. All things considered it gets a cheap and not so cheerful 7 out of 10.

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Slender The Arrival screenshot Slender The Arrival

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