MetaCritic Score: 79 What It Deserved: 68 There's no point arguing with the fact that Until Dawn is a fun game, but there was a far better way to execute the concept. You see, Until Dawn is essentially a 7-hour interactive horror movie, and though it spends much of that time reveling in the cliches of the genre, it's not nearly witty or subversive enough to do much more than merely emphasise the absurdity of these tropes. As such, this gets rather tiresome over the length of the campaign, which players are pretty much encouraged to blast through in one sitting, preferably with enough pals so that you can assume the role of one character each. The abundance of cliches feels draining over such a run-time without sufficient satirical content, and so it becomes apparent after a few hours of play that the game would've been much more entertaining if the 7 hours were split into 3 or 4 "movies" with different takes on various horror film scenarios. After all, would you really want to watch a 7-hour film about a bunch of horny, idiotic teens trapped in the woods? Probably not: variety is the spice of life, and had we seen more in the way of diversity, Until Dawn perhaps could have lived up to those lofty reviews. Also, the game's insanely low frame-rate, often hitting the early 20s, is enough to knock it down a few points.
Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes).
General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.
