Layers of Fear - Play the Scary Pictures

Happy Halloween, Virtua Ghosts! The Ghostly Month of Virtua SPOOOOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!! nears its end, but it's been a fun ride thus far. We're looking at horror in its rawest form today so let's SPOOK OUT!

 If there was ever an influence to first person survival horror, it was PT in all of its cancelled glory. The Playable Teaser for Silent Hills, which Konami seems to regret bumping off now, brought us into an actual world of creepy terror and showed us that games did not need to be especially long in order to get under your skin. While we lament its passing, we have been gifted with many in its wake. Layers of Fear took that premise and put it to some good use. Here, you're looking over a mansion that seems to have belonged to a painter, and as you find clues around this very creepy mannor, you begin to uncover just how obsessive one can get in order to create art. 

Layers of Fear brings you into those hallways with a sense of dubious caution, but there is a refreshing hesitance to it at first. This starts out as a slow burn horror game, making it to where the truly horrific things don't occur until you unfurl the painting that you will be putting together. Every single item on the list has something to do with creating the painting. There is skin with which to make the canvas and there is blood with which to create the red. 

It doesn't just go for jump scares, although there are a good number of instances as such. There are also burning and rotting rooms that you watch decay in front of you, sounds in the many crevices of the house, pictures that suddenly move and puzzles. Yes, this is a puzzler, but they don't get out of control with how to solve them. Usually it just takes walking around the room to find the instructions or it's just a common sense puzzle that brings you one step closer to the next item for the painting. 

The story behind the painting is interesting, but it does kind of out stay its welcome after a while. After about the seventh or eighth instance of someone being drawn to misery or killed in some horrible way it's basically "we get it, he was crazy, get on with it." The third act of the game is where this game starts to take a dip. The atmosphere has already reached its many peaks and valleys by the time you make it to the end. Some of the puzzles get monotonous in that they're not hard to solve, it just takes up precious game time in order to move on. One good example of this is when you're walking around one of the upper levels and phones keep ringing. The creep factor is hindered a bit by the fact that the same thing keeps happening over and over again until you start predicting the sudden scares of the game.

There are some brilliant instances of scares, like when hallways suddenly disappear behind you and now there's a wall with a tiny painting on it. The room with the record player that you need to play backwards is also a memorable addition to some of the better parts of the game, the earlier levels. It's also a lot better when you don't know what the painting is at first. As you bring colors to the canvas, the artwork begins to paint itself and you're left guessing what it could be. These are the better aspects of the game and the ones that work well with the story and scares. 

The DLC, however, only gets worse. You've already done the painting and gotten through the house, and now it wants you to complete a story book. These are some of the most mind numbingly boring segments of the game. By now, Layers of Fear has given you its best in the ways of survival horror, and these on-going scares and cinematic puzzles just stop doing it after a while. 

Layers of Fear is worth playing through to completion, but dealing with everything after that is a bit of a chore. It's worth revisiting the earlier levels to get the game's full effect, but after a while, you'll figure out which parts of the game are your favorites. There's still a lot of good horror material here and it successfully can be considered one of the better haunted house survival horror. That is much trickier than it sounds because many have attempted it. Give Layers of Fear a try, especially in the Virtua Month of Ghostly SPOOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!! Hope you all have a safe holiday and are ready for some of the colder temperatures. Remember to visit haunted houses responsibly and bring holy water. 

Mortal Kombat Annihilation - Feel the Suckality

Happy Halloween again, dear spooksters! This ends the Virtua Ghost of Virtua SPOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!! and we're taking a look at a very scary movie. You know what I mean if you've seen it. Nothing can prepare you for Annihilation!!! 

If there was ever an argument that proves the Video Game Curse existed, you could just say the phrase "sequel to the Mortal Kombat movie" and there will be some uncomfortable silences. This movie hurt in every single way. You cringe so hard, it hurts. The movie bombed so bad, it hurt MK as a franchise. It hurt. The more you watch every single scene and how much time they waste, the more you start to realize, there really was no plot to begin with. The movie could have ended at the very start and the world could have been better off. They introduce every single mythical object and badly costumed fighter in their arsenal and there is no room for any of them.

To warn SPOILERS ahead, but it's no real spoiler to say that Scorpion is in the movie for, maybe, two minutes. Sub-Zero appears as Kuai Liang and he has one scene with one fight, says some lines and he's gone. Mileena, Ermac, Rain, Shiva, all of them are wasted with either three to no lines at all in the movie. I almost feel bad for saying that Street Fighter the Movie packed too many characters into its lineup, I completely forgot how many characters were in this film!

Seriously, Raiden could have killed Shao Kahn's Generals with the swoop of his arm and he gives it up, causing the death of Johnny Cage. They couldn't get his original actor back for this movie, so off he goes. They couldn't get Sonya Blade either, but she actually sticks around and gets the new actor for Jax. Are you recognizing the pattern here? They got rid of one character, bump off around five or six characters through out its runtime, but they still leave an entire army of people. For obvious reasons, Christopher Lambert also did not return for the sequel. He was horribly recast and this new guy has no presence what so ever.

It's so convoluted, that the worst part of the movie is brought on by Nightwolf, who is another one-scene wonder in the film. He is just there to tell Liu Kang that he, too, can become a terribly animated CGI effect if he really wants to! The Animality was just so painfully brought into the story, because as soon as he turns into the barf looking dragon, Shao Kahn turns into the most laughably random hydra! Seriously! He has multiple heads as a monster because... he's... Shao.... no... uhhhh... Oh who cares! They did not care! You don't even know his father's name but he's apparently the... baddest bad guy. 

Yes, Shao Kahn is a daddy's boy, even when he's supposed to be the most imposing figure in Mortal Kombat at the moment. In this film, he answers to his father, Shinnok. Oh, yes, dear readers, the random older guy in the hood, that's Shinnok. We never learn his name in the movie and he just sits there berating Shao Kahn and driving his character into a weakling to the audience. This is not even bringing up Kitana and Sindel! 

That's right, it only gets worse. Sindel and Kitana are a subplot that this movie never should have had. Not only are they two of the worst actors in the film, the whole thing goes nowhere! It brings about one of the most memed lines, goes into pointless fights that stack upon each other already, and then they attempt to release her from Shao Kahn's control. No, that only happens after Shao Kahn is defeated, so, she accomplished nothing other than making Jade another pointless character. Oh, you heard me right, Jade is randomly in the film and she goes the exact same way, for nothing! 

It's all just a big huge mish mash of fighting. There's useless Elder Gods that make matters worse by taking away Raiden's immortality for LITERALLY no reason. Through out the whole movie, Raiden just keeps saying the Elder Gods will help them, but they don't so there's more fighting. Shao Kahn brings an army of soldiers that disappear by the end of the film, but still has random fighters like Cyrax to come out of nowhere and have yet another fight! Nothing in this movie works story-wise, it's just a vehicle for fight scenes that get tiresome and is occasionally good for a laugh.

This was a real let down. We get plot twists that have no point and are left with an ending that is entirely too happy, bringing dead characters back to life with happy music. The fight between Liu Kang and Shao Kahn was obviously anti-clamactic with a weak premise. The Elder Gods just jump in after 40 or 50 rules have already been broken but at least it was better late than never, right? No, this movie threw away a brilliant premise and destroyed everything that the first movie built up with a decent quality film. The writer obviously had no idea how to use Mortal Kombat characters and only saw the dollar signs that he wanted to make by using the IP. We can only hope that the new Mortal Kombat II is as cool as it looks from the trailer. Virtua Nut Shot!

DUSK - Twilight to the Dark Side

The Halloween season is thick in the air now as the Virtua Ghosties Halloween SPOOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!! continues. Let's take a look at an instant classic that will make you want to fall asleep with a shotgun close at hand!

Very few games can perfectly emulate the game style of the late 90's and early 2000's. Dusk does this seemingly without even trying. With the leather headed badguys wanting to kill you for their ritual cultist sacrifice. You survive the sacrifice and quickly gain the upperhand with some sickles cleaving into them. Soon, you gain an entire arsenal, much like Doom's, and you go to town on some chainsaw leatherheads and scarecrows that come to life out of nowhere and attack you with a double barrel shotgun. 

This title is far darker in scope than its peers, and it should be noted that this is a very good title to play around the season. DUSK brings about a darkness that has not been seen since Quake or Blood. It's much more recent, but this title brings about the soul of the original 3D shooters. The monsters are actually quite creepy, especially the Wendigo. The only way you can see them is if you shoot them or they take damage. Besides that, you need to see their bloody footprints or hear their breathing. The darkness in the tunnels and the skulking enemies all around you can bring about some feelings of terror. There's even a tornado of blood! DUSK should be on your list this Halloween, far and away one of the best retro style FPS games.

Dusk gives you hordes of enemies while also giving you small puzzles to figure out in order to find secrets that may lead to stronger weapons. The rivet gun is the strongest weapon, which really doesn't count it for a BFG type weapon, but it does some very hard damage that can take care of some of the stronger enemies. 

Cowgirls are some of the worst enemies in the entire game. They take several explosions to finally kill them, and their exploding mortar shells do almost just as much damage to you. Then there are the zombie alligators, yes, I said zombie alligators. There are so many weapons that go better with so many of the different types of enemies you face throughout the game. On top of this, you're searching for their most powerful being, Jakob, who is the one you must kill in order to get him off of your back. 

This game has so many fascinating game mechanics throughout its entire runtime. There are entire levels that rotate along with a strange square mechanism. It changes the entire outlook and playstyle of the game because now you have a completely different set of obstacles to overcome. It has some awesome Endless Mode levels and it's just fun to play. 

It's one of those games where you can wander around entire levels in order to find all of the secrets. The story is also interesting enough to keep you occupied throughout the duration. It's not a lot of story and it doesn't get in the way of the gameplay at all. There's still a ton of running and gunning as you attempt to survive through waves and waves of cultists and dark creatures. Play it and see how it stands up to the likes of the First Person Shooting legends that came before it. Just remember to quaff some water.

Doomverse #23 - The Doomed Films

The Ghostly Month of Saturn Virtua SPOOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!!! continues with some questionable choices in movies... DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!

 Doom (2005) 

The video game movie curse seemed very real for over a decade. For for this period, filmmakers and studios did not feel a very strong loyalty to the fanbase. Many of them seemed to just ride the coat tails of a strong video game intellectual property while doing the bare minimum in staying close to the source material. Doom seemed to be a victim of this mentality toward the franchise we know and love. Doom had a surface level understanding of the game it was trying to replicate. When we see the levels in the original 1993 release, there is an interesting theme of diesel punk mixed with demonic images with a dash of cyberpunk mixed in. 

Instead of trying to stick to the video game's atmosphere, this film seems to stick more toward Doom 3's outlook. It's more a spaceship theme with darker tones, reminding you more of Alien than Doom. This could have been a good way to go about things, but the movie doesn't extract anything out of it that feels inherently Doom. That's not to say it had to focus on a single Space Marine going up against an entire horde of demons for two full hours. There is obviously room to play with the source material, it's just that they put in some Marine cliches, made them walk around in dark areas, get scared and then get killed. That's a large part of the movie.

The cast is probably one of the better things about this movie. Karl Urban turned out to be a decent protagonist, the real problem is the way that they treated Dwayne Johnson's character. The way they integrated all of the Doom lore into the movie relies heavily on both of these guys, and the rest of the movie is just your average action horror movie with zombie fodder and all. 

Oh, yes, this is a zombie movie through and through. It's understandable that they wanted to stick more to practical effects, but it would have been worth some CGI if it meant we actually got more demons. We get a pinky and an imp and the rest of them are zombies. I don't know what the Rock turned into, but it wasn't on the demon roster. At this point, zombies had already been played out in Hollywood and one of the best zombie remakes was made around this time with Dawn of the Dead. This was just the cheapest route they could take and it did not do the film any favors. 

The BFG was so mishandled in this film, it's almost comical. After already pelting us with such a clunky First Person Shooter segment that goes on for FAR too long, they had to shoot the BFG twice, making it do next to nothing in terms of the actual story. This was the effort they put into making this movie a Doom movie, and it just flat out did not work. 

What we actually got was just mediocre and might be a little fun to have in the background of a Halloween party or something along those lines. It's not terrible in terms of quality, and you can easily sit through it without too much discomfort. It's not exciting enough to really capture the essence of Doom and the atmosphere it did go for was just so generic. The film makers obviously didn't know that much about Doom or what fans would have expected and that shows in the product. That's not to say it's worse than what came after, though...

Doom Annihilation 

You'd think they'd learned their lesson on calling their movies such a generic subtitle, but I guess the failure of the Mortal Kombat sequel just hadn't quite sunk in. This is very fitting because this movie is really no better in many ways. Joan D'arc was a completely mediocre protagonist with very little character development. Despite this, all of the other characters get even less character! The entire movie is packed with even bigger Marine cliches than the first movie and that is saying something. It turns into a more action leaning zombie movie, but it's still, yet again, a zombie movie. 

We get more in the ways of Doom, on the whole, but none of it is handled well at all. Even the BFG's big second appearance is marred by a complete lack in presence. They devote an entire scene to introducing Doom's greatest weapon and all it is is just a simple laser gun. They cheaped out on the biggest asset in the movie and that is not even close to where they stop cheaping out. 

The sets, the costumes, pretty much everything about this movie takes you out of the atmosphere and reminds you that these are just people dressing up and shooting fake guns. Even their comically pathetic attempt at the Super Shotgun was another flop. It is just sad how they tried to make this look so awesome and action packed, but executed it like a C movie straight to video film. 

Overall, the story is the same as the first movie, only it had a bit more of Doom mixed in. What that amounts to is some impressive looking demons with a nice hellscape that lasts maybe five minutes. They blew their entire budget on a CGI background and left nothing for the actual spaceship itself as they reuse the same three hallways for every shot. The acting is hardly worth mentioning, as it's as bland as the movie itself. 

Annihilation should never have been made in the first place. It's obvious that they were just making it to keep the movie rights to Doom and maybe get a shiny nickel out of the deal. What we got was panned and quartered by fans in a beautiful barrage of horrible reviews and scathing memes that dropped it down into a punchline among Doom fans. They had a chance to bring a lady into the arena of Doom heroes and they failed in the execution. The actress they got had a very expressionless performance and the attempts to humanize her with a tragic backstory just fell flat with nothing but a halfbaked love story between her and one of the technicians on the base. It's pretty obvious where everything is going and the movie makes no moves to disuade any and all predictions. 

There is very little to like about this movie, and it was lambasted by critics and Doom fans. This movie was a simple kick out the door to keep the license and they shot it out in a very large hurry with little expense. This shouldn't be seen as the video game curse, not when so many corners were cut. It did the bare minimum to make it even close to having the atmosphere or right to call itself Doom. The leading lady is bland and seemingly on autopilot while the rest of the characters do next to nothing to make us care about them. It didn't even have Dwayne Johnson or Karl Urban to bring any sort of dignity to it. While it did beat out the first movie in actual Doom lore in a 5 minute scene, there's really no further effort as there just was no budget for any of it. Hellfire lit by flashlight.

Left 4 Dead 1 & 2 - Why was it Zombietastic?

The Ghostly Month of Virtua Sonic SPOOOOOOOOKIES!!!! continues with one of the greatest action horror shooters! Let the zombie mashing begin! 

Somehow, Valve solved several problems when it came to the formula of zombie horde shooters. Left 4 Dead is far from being in a rare genre of gaming, but when it comes to online team shooter games, this has a special place in Steam. Left 4 Dead 2 has never had a dead concurrent count and is still popular enough to find games easily. This is coming from a game that is over a decade old. When you play it for yourself, you'll start to see why it's so popular, even after players have already poured hundreds upon thousands of hours into this title. 

This game is not perfect, but it does have many different game modes. While the zombie mode is fun, it's always been the core game of 4 players against zombies that has captivated the real interest in this game. Even without mods, it was a lot of fun to go through entire armies of zombies. Even when you don't have 3 other players in your game, the bots in the game are not really terrible to play with. They're not as helpful, but that just leaves more zombies for you to kill by comparison. 

There are elements that force you to use your teammates to save you. The special zombies are a mixed bag of awesome and annoying zombie types. The spitters and the boomers have annoying ways of using projectiles to either damage or blind you. The Hunters, Witch, Tank, Jockeys, Chargers and Smokers all have moves that can incapacitate you immediately. These all require the help of your other allies to get you out of it. The Tank and the Witch are in a category of their own, being able to take the most damage and deal the most damage all at once. They both of have monitors on your stats on who did the most damage to these two special zombie classes. 

When it came to which title is which, they're both essentially the same game, like Doom and Doom 2, they differ only in added bonuses when getting the sequel. Chargers and Spitters were added into the roster, while changing the overall detail in the graphics as well. They also introduce four new survivor characters that take up the mantle of their journey. Left 4 Dead 2 possessed all of the first game's levels and characters, while introducing new levels and new player characters alongside all of it. The new weapons were plentiful, including a nice pump action shotgun and an AK-47. The game is the same, though, and you can easily skip the first Left 4 Dead.  

The entire system of random zombie hordes and special zombies mixed with special events was just a fun ride, like at a theme park. No, I'm not joking, this is like one of those simulated experiences where you're working as a team and you must get to special horde and special zombie events. A lot of these special horde events involve a large quantity of zombies along with tanks. Tremble in fear of the tank, for its enormous girth can make you crumble. One hit from this thing and it can incapacitate you, or even throw you off of a building where you are dead. These things can wipe out an entire team with one throw of debris. 

The witch is different, but not to be taken lightly. When you find her, she is crying in a corner somewhere and getting close to her agitates her. If you frighten them by shooting them or touching them, they will go after you with a one hit knock out. If you have all of your team attack her at one or hit her with a powerful enough weapon, she goes down easier. Witches are not as bullet spongy as the tank. 

The thing that has truly kept this game alive is the fact that it is also fully customizable with mods. You can change the zombies and players into virtually anything thanks to the free downloadable content. There are mods that range from cartoony to very exotic, and yes I mean that in the most adult way possible. Be sure you're 18 or older if you get into some of these mods. You can change your entire party into the Doom Marines and then turn around and get Rick and Morty zombies. It's just a fun time all around to see them work within the game. 

Left 4 Dead 2 is a game that is just so perfect, it really doesn't need an update. Perfect doesn't really mean perfect, but it is so popular for a very good reason. It became timeless without the use of unique stats on weapons or a Looter Shooter mentality. It's just fun for the sake of being fun and despite its flaws and glitches, it has become the Skyrim of the zombie games. That's right, I use that term unironically. It's just a good way to blow off some steam (pun not intended) and mindlessly shoot things while having the option of looking as silly as possible. You can't fault them on that. Roast them with a Molotov but also remember to drink water. 

Goodbye, Playstation 4 - With a Fondness

As of October 6th, 2025, Playstation has officially stopped producing new games or new hardware for the Playstation 4. It really seems like only yesterday, they had just come into the market, and that was a little over ten years ago. Was that a long enough lifespan? Well, yes and no, but it was a long enough life to have some very memorable games come out for it in the generation. From Spider-man's greatest game to Resident Evil's seventh mainline entry, the memories are seemingly endless. This is the console that holds Doom 4 and Doom Eternal and those two games alone hold hours upon hours of gameplay in them. 

Now, I'm being sentimental, I know. I've already talked about my grievances with the lifespans of the Sega Saturn and its worthy successor, the Dreamcast. I'm no stranger to the death of great consoles. Playstation has had a long list of great consoles, despite my semi-joking mocking of the first console in the line. The Playstation 4 had some serious shoes to fill, given the awesome Playstation 3 and its capabilities. It succeeded. 

The eighth generation was very unique in several, SEVERAL ways, and that's mostly due to the Xbox One. While Playstation was going about business as usual, wrangling up all of their games and all of their game console features in line, Xbox was... not doing that. Instead, for some reason, Microsoft thought it would be a good idea to sell you a box that did television and movie streaming, music, basically anything a PC would already be more than equipped to handle. Oh, but THEN they were going to get to the games, you know, eventually. People were pretty baffled.

That's not even CLOSE to the worst part, though. They were starting to rattle off features like, ALWAYS ONLINE, the massive privacy camera on the front of the Xbone was always on, once you loaded the game from the disc into the console, the two were married now and you could NOT share your game with other console users. This meant that they were effectively erasing the used games aisle in every single gaming store. People saw this for what it was. While they were angling it as a more personal touch and a way to be closer to the customer, it actually came off like they wanted to get more money out of you so you could only buy new games, while also keeping you online to keep up full access to their online store while they watch you constantly with their camera and get all of the marketable information out of you they could. This was an absolute travesty of a mess. 

To say that Playstation 4 won the console wars for the eighth generation is underselling it. People went to Playstation straight from Xbox 360 and they started buying PS4 games, leaving Xbox in the metaphoric dust. This KILLED Xbox sales to the point where not even offering free digital games through their Xbox Live service could make them catch up. It helped them along for a little bit, but Playstation won, hands down. 

This spelled the absolute death of Microsoft's Xbox console, and we have been seeing its deteriorating state ever since. They almost straight up cancelled the Xbox Series X and the tenth generation console is still in heavy question. The problem was that the eighth generation was the worst generation to lose, and the Xbox lost so substantially, that it hurt their sales even MORE with the PS5. All of those PS4 games the customers had, both digital and physical can very comfortably be transferred to the PS5 with no sweat involved. It's takes a little over an hour and you are ready to play your old games on the new console that has already wiped the floor with the Series X system. 

To say that Playstation could convincingly put on the good guy mask in this situation is the reason that they won the war. The video where they show how you can share games on the Playstation 4 has to be one of the funniest things they could have thought of and it probably sold them a couple million extra consoles as a result. The Playstation 4 came out on top because it focused on GAMING. Losing focus on gaming has killed many a console (though, I am hesitant to count the Philips CDI among them) because people are here for the sharpest gaming edge they can find. It gave us that and in great quantities. So, here we say goodbye to another console generation with the Playstation 4. It was a true gaming console, despite the other features. The Blu-Ray player, the streaming apps, playing old DVD's, all of it was there if you wanted it, but I'm here for GTA V because I have the urgent need to kill digital people! What? You all do it!

Reliving D - Back to the Horror Mind Mansion

 Next on the Ghostly Month of Virtua SPOOOOOOOKIES!!!! We're taking a look at one of my all-time favorite scary games on the Sega Saturn! Let the haunting festivities begin!!!

Of all the games that deserve a new life, it is comforting to know that D was seen as worthy. If you happen to have a Steam account, there is a small chance you know that this Sega Saturn gem was given a new port that can work on modern computers. Faced with the engine speeds of a Sega Saturn, Playstation and CDO, D had a strained performance. This slow execution actually did a little bit to help it in the ways of atmosphere. The slow movement speeds do get a little monotonous, but now this port has improved all of it. SPOILERS for D ahead.

Not only does it look cleaner, but most movement just takes about a second. It looks a lot more stable now while not getting rid of its crude charm that we fell in love with. D was a little hard to get to remember. The last time I played it fully was to review it back in 2019, so this was a little harder to get back into than was expected. The heightened movement speed did a lot to help in ways of going the wrong way as well. If you accidentally made the wrong move and had to go back, it was a lot more annoying back when movements took three to five seconds. This may not seem like much, but when you move in a point and click like this, those few seconds make a lot of difference. 

This is how a game should graphically clean up. If you remember in the Daytona Champion Circuit review, the graphics looked sterile. Sometimes, they look entirely too clean and change what made the game look so cool in the first place. D, on the other hand, keeps the grain, but there's just not as much of it. This keeps its identity as an older game while keeping itself fresher for the new systems and computer engines. 

Not going to lie, I had to use a guide more than once when I couldn't remember where to find certain answers to certain puzzles. It was better to revisit it through text so you didn't give away the visual of finding the puzzle piece in the game itself. Sometimes you'll find answers in blood and sometimes you'll find evidence in some secrets that are fun to find throughout the Crazy Mind Mansion thing you're going through. 

I made it a point to find all of the scarab beetles that bring about the flashbacks. Everyone loves finding completions and this was one of the more satisfying. It shows images that your dad erased of your mind when you kill your mother by stabbing her to death. There was only one other time I was able to do this in the game, so this was a nice little welcome surprise. 

It really isn't a long game once you know what you're doing. Take that with the enhanced movement speed and it's almost a shame the game is so short otherwise. It's short because of the game's limitations and they used that to tighten up the scare sequences throughout D. Now, it is a graphically enhanced game for the mid 90's. It's obvious that I talk about D a lot with it being in my top 10 favorite Sega Saturn games. I only thought of it as having been reviewed before, in one of my first Sega Saturn articles ever written. It turns out that I have talked about this through favorites list, the sequel comparison and game comparison. I have mentioned it in several others as well as a statement on how to do horror correctly.  There really will never be a substitute for these 32 bit games and how crudely charming they look. The new port looks great and if you're interested in playing some old games, this is one that shouldn't go overlooked if you're looking for something different. It's best played in the dark, here in the season of Halloween. Just remember to break it out during the Virtua Month of Ghostly SPOOOOOOOOOOOKIES and everyone will finish the night with both of their wings. Bring back the Saturn Spookiness this season and don't step in the spikes.

Laura!!!!

Doomverse #22 - The New Quake

Welcome back to the Virtua Ghostly SPOOOOOOOOOOOOOOKIES!!! once again! We're rolling this out for 2025 and taking a look at one of the most awesome horror based First Person Shooters ever made. With Nine Inch Nails at the helm of the soundtrack and monsters at every turn, get ready to blast through the one and only Quake!

Quake has been covered a lot on Planet Virtua, and there are several reasons for this. It was a landmark game for the first person genre and opened up all new layers of gameplay and reality through unlocking the third dimension. Doom was much more limited in scope because of its 2.5D approach to FPS. Quake changed everything. It was hard work, but it was also a labor of love. This is why it is very refreshing that the game is still very alive to this day. People still play it, and that is obvious when you just open the game, get into a DM server and start lobbing grenades at N000000000bs!!!! 

In 2023, Quake got a whole new makeover. It's a win-win for all of the Quake fans, because they can still play the old version on Steam. Much like Doom 1 + 2, Quake opened up all of its maps and even offered up playing the fan made mods as well as the official mods. This new version is dirt cheap, even the PS5 version is available for 9.99 at the time of this article's writing. This includes the mod QDoom as well as several others that change the entire experience. 

The game looks amazing, even with a slightly shinier shell, it still retains the old polygons we fell in love with. Quake now has all of the official add-on levels and lets you select which level from each expansion you want to go. The movement is smoother and there's a lot less graphical lag. This includes whether you want to split screen and play a second player in Death Match or Co-op. You can play through the entire game with a second player and have access to all of the death match maps if you feel like blowing their head off. 

This also opened up internet servers that allowed players to go back to the Death Matching days of old. Quake has always had a great culture of multiplayer, and it's refreshing to see them open back up to a whole new crowd. This allowed old friends to get back in the ring and test their skills in blasting through metal! 

This is just the tip of the iceberg for the entire package. The add-ons you get with all of this and the downloading capabilities are through the roof. One game that uses the Quake engine, while giving it a complete makeover, is Slave Zero. This game is an entire different game, but it's still a good little first person shooter with some rather unique settings. They give the entire game new purpose and the levels are a lot of fun to play through. 

Quake was do for a bit of a remaster and this brought it about in style. If you owned Quake on Steam already, you got this update free. Yeah, ID Software games have been pretty generous with their newly refurbished games and I mean that in more ways than one. The downloadable content is free, you get to explore the entire game through level selects and it gives you a whole new outlook on how to play in Quake Multiplayer. 

Five Nights at Freddy's (2023) - The Video Game Horror Movie Ever

The FNAF franchise has been outside Planet Virtua's scope. This is mostly because those games just aren't the #1 horror games when it comes to interest. Yes, the lore is vast and interesting and the game itself is interesting in its gameplay mechanics. However, getting jumpscared every five minutes and building anxiety through cameras and impending doom just seems stressful over a long period of time. This didn't stop me from watching playthroughs and getting some good commentary thanks to Youtubers. Spoiler Alert for the FNAF movie.

I'd taken enough of Five Nights at Freddy's in order to be considered the FNAF movie demographic. The results of this movie's opening scenes are obviously more of a horror movie setup for our character to get the job of the security guard you play as in the game. This didn't bode particularly well because then there came the contrived plot involving his child who is also going to the pizzaria with the scary mechanical mascots. 

The first image we see in this movie is Freddy's brigade of mascots killing off a security guard. Now we get to see how they go after the child. Well, it turns out that these mascots are all children reincarnated, and the security guard has been having dreams about these particular children. Why this is happening is also quite contrived but they at least make an attempt to make it make sense. This man's brother was kidnapped when he was a kid, and somehow he is forcing himself to relive the same dream for ten years. Yes, it gets worse. 

So, these mascots are kids in spirit, so they end up connecting with the child and the father just kind of goes along with it. We see these animatronics kill other people, especially some strange sideplot where the man's ex-wife is trying to get him fired, so some people come and try and sabotage the entire pizza place. We know they're dangerous, but I suppose the father doesn't really know that. 

There are just so many horribly built story elements in this movie and the worst part is that they take the scare factor out of Freddy and his gang. We see entirely too much of them and they stop being scary after we see them chum about with the kid. There's something about some drawings being linked to their connection to being controlled by Springtrap, who turns out to be the guy who hired the security guard. Did I say contrived? I meant fated by the gods. 

So, the guy who hired the security guard turns out to be the man who kidnapped his brother. He also happens to be the guy who made the animatronics murderous in the first place. He kidnapped kids and put their souls into these robots. This whole time, these kids were speaking to the security guard in his dreams because they were kidnapped by the same guy as his brother. They didn't think this story through on several elements. They overthought the areas where they should have thought less and vice versa. They could have come up with a more stable plot than this. Thinking that a guy can relive the same dream over and over for so many years is just beyond suspension of disbelief. The stars align a few too many times for the taste of the story. The Freddy and crew kills are somewhat entertaining, but they are just not menacing enough to be considered scary at all. 

This movie has some good points in it. Matthew Lillard is good as the hiring manager, and there are some good scary scenes here and there. It's just a problem of too much exposure to the so-called scary entities. If they could make it more geared toward actual scares and maybe get out of the PG-13 comfort zone, it could be done. Why they decided to do away with the blood is a conundrum for a franchise that has such an obviously more mature demographic. This movie isn't terrible, but it certainly didn't impress FNAF fans. Even as a normal horror movie, it fails to turn any heads.

This article begins the Virtua Month of Ghostly SPOOOOOOOOOOOOKIES! Happy October, everyone! Get ready for an entire month of Halloween Mayhem!

Doom 3 (PS3 BFG Edition) - Darkness and Demons and Cubes. Oh My!

You're going to hear a lot about Doom 3 from a lot of people. What you can expect is, it's going to get very dark. Now, whether you prefer a flashlight or not is up to you, or the version of the game you're playing. Among the other Doom titles, this has always been seen as a black sheep, and for good reason. Where Doom began with fast paced action, heavy weaponry and tbe goriest blood, Doom 3 hiked up the franchise in a few ways, but it certainly wasn't the fast pacing. 

Doom 3 was obviously a showcase of ID's power. This was a peak in graphics technology. Not only was it fully 3D, but the detail was now brought to limits we never thought possible. Now, the problem with this at the time of its initial release was that conventional PC's in normal homes did not have the power to run this bombastically huge game. Not only did it take hours upon hours to load into the computer but loading up the game for the first time was the equivalent of suddenly pushing your computer into a 10K run. 

The graphics have aged quite well, especially for a game that wanted to remain very creepy and full of sudden attacks in shadowy spots. The pacing was brought way way down, and while the light was very limited, the flashlight was originally only selected as a separate weapon. You literally could not use another weapon with the flashlight, but we will be playing the BFG edition on the PS3. It is shoulder mounted and can be used with any weapon. A lot of people took issue with this, saying that it wasn't as hard and the mechanic was a good challenge in strategy and hand-eye coordination. I don't care, I like to see with flashlight, so flashlight good.

Doom 3 starts outs like Half-life did, with the day-in-the-life approach, like you're going to work. Only this time, you're reporting to a new station on Mars. After you go through some talking sessions and report to your new station, you start to see that things are wrong. Pretty soon, someone who talks very suspiciously opens a portal to Hell and demons begin to invade the entire ship. Sadly, this invasion involves lost souls. They're rather weak in this version, but they are equally as annoying. Imps in this version go well with the horror element. They gave them a very detailed monstrous form. The Mancubus is given a new, very body-horror inspired design. 

People will argue whether they like the new slow mechanics, where there aren't so many monster closets and there's more sneak attacks and small things coming to claw you or shoot you with fireballs. Pinkies are probably the ones that got the most sinister appearance among the others. Navigating your way through the space station, having to go outside airlocks and into the dead of Mars space, while occasionally taking on one or a small pack of demons. 

Your guns are up and down. The shotgun in Doom 3 is notoriously disappointing among its peers. The shotgun is a proud heritage to the franchise that originated the FPS awesome shotgun heritage. The missile launcher and the chaingun, they're both good and up to par with Doom's standards. The plasmagun is not among my favorites but it's not bad, especially when you first get it and have a whole new pocket for lot's of ammunition. Ammo is kind of scarce, especially at the beginning of the game. You need to be able to melee some of the demons or even just count on the pistol, which is a hard ask, I understand. The BFG is back and this time you need to power it up. If you power it up too much, it will explode and kill everything, including you. 

The imps have a nice visceral character design this time around, and seems much more like a horror movie monster. This is probably why this is the design the Doom horror movie leaned into this look for their imp. The pinky also has a much more organic look, even having a much more sickly, gangly look with a whiter color to it. Everything in this title has been shaped more into something that would come out of Clive Barker. The gore gushes much like the original, only this time it's much more realistic and running with a hot new engine that allows some very interesting shredding of demon meat.

Might we also take a moment to appreciate the design of the Hellknight. This is the time that the game separated them from their Baron of Hell roots. It made them into more like a gorilla and has them leap at you and punch you. In Doom 3, they are pretty deadly, and usually require a good rocket at a distance and a chaingun up close. The fact that Doom 4 used the same character design for their game is a statement of good taste. 

Dr. Betruger has come out as the one who summoned the demons onto the base and used its human souls to fuel the demon's take over. Basically, now you need to kill all of the demons on the base and you need to go to hell to make sure they stay dead. You come across what is known as the Soulcube, and you use it to kill monsters and get their souls. Once it is fueled, it is the most powerful weapon and the only weapon that can kill the Cyberdemon. Oh, yes, the Cyberdemon has made a return and he's... not great. Honestly, I consider this one of the lesser Cyberdemon designs and the Soulcube makes the final battlle way too easy. 

Going through the science labs throughout the game and opening the safes with all of the medical and ammunition stuff you could need is a lot of fun, for a while. This game isn't overly long, but with the pacing, it does seem to deag in some areas. Some people will say that this is a great game, just not a great Doom game. The levels in Hell are much more Doom focused, and there's more demons to fight with more ammo, but that's basically at the end of the game. This is good when you consider it an offshoot rather than a full on Doom game. Many consider Doom 64 more of an installment to the franchise than this one. Now that computers and consoles can handle the game better, it's far more manageable and good for a small bit of FPS survival horror. 

This is especially true when you're entering the season of the virtua SPOOOOOOOOOOKIES and Ghosties and Boo!!! It's always fun to bring Doom into the fray, and now the Halloween season continues. Now, spread the season and the thrills! Just be careful who you startle from the shadows, some people carry chainsaws. Virtua VROOOOM!!!! 

Warcraft (2016) - Bring an Axe or Something!

This movie deserved better in many ways. The real problem lied within the writing. Warcraft is a household name ever since its successful runs of Realtime Strategy games, while hitting everyone with an MMORPG that is still successful during the time of writing this article. The lore was already enormous, but once World of Warcraft came out, the storyline was wide and expanding into more intimately detailed world building. This was one of the real problems when it came to making this franchise into a movie. 

The film was a little more ambitious than it should have been. It tried to tell the story while shoving as much lore and backstory of the world at the audience as they could. The exposition dumps and overly complicated conversations happened far too often in this movie. The actors are fine, especially when it comes to the orcs. The orcs have a very compelling story, in fact, they were the more sympathetic plotline rather than the royally political human plot. The fact that the orcs were twice the size of the humans also painted a very inconsistant picture when it comes to combat ranking characters. 

The fighting is a little too embellished as well. Battles seem to take long amounts of time without a great deal happening. The use of CGI for magic and creatures was very well integrated into the movie. This became part of its downfall, as the money spent on this movie gave it the mantle of one of the highest grossing movies of the year, and still being considered a failure because the budget was so far inflated. 

A lower budget with a smaller scope would have helped this movie immensely. This is something that should have been built up to and then fleshed out over a longer period of time. Keeping the story and the setting simple could have given them a way to introduce new characters in a new world without having to make the audience think that they're being assigned homework. The story of Lothar was an interesting one to tell, but not enough to justify the budget and the level of detail. This should have looked further back to the story of the first Warcraft game and just built up to a much larger conflict. The war in the movie we get just makes us wish they went solely with the orcs rather than showing us how a troll is gaining favor for a king in the human plot. 

There was some good material here for hardcore Warcraft fans, but it just didn't translate into dollars for everyone else. The fighting is lackluster and the story is just so bloated, it feels like they wanted to cram an entire season of a TV series into one film. You know, like what they did to the Last Airbender. Let's just be happy that they actually did a better job on the CGI and acting than that. The wasted potential of Warcraft as a new medium is a shame. This story could have gone somewhere, but it was too much, too fast. 

Something like this could work in a much longer term. An HBO series with a bit better of a plan with the CGI could have very easily worked. If they had a good plan for how the lore plays out, this could have had a lot more room to breathe. The storyline of the games could have easily been translated into a TV series and we could have gotten a lot more time to meet other races like the Night Elves or the Pandarians. That's right, I want to see the drunken panda fighter. Even Frozen Throne in Warcraft 3 was able to add him into the story in some small way. Either way, it's a shame this didn't work and we can only hope they'll have another go at it, hopefully with more focus on story and less on trying to build the entire world in one go. Virtua Bloodlust!