For years, Supermassive Games was mainly known for working on existing franchises, releasing DLC for LittleBigPlanet and porting Killzone to the PS3. But then Supermassive broke out with an original IP called Until Dawn, which defied expectations, earning surprisingly strong sales and positive reviews from critics. Until Dawn set the stage for Supermassive's future projects, and instantly made the studio one to watch for horror fans.
Until Dawn is like a big budget take on Telltale's adventure games, with players making choices that impact the narrative, watching interactive cut-scenes, completing quick-time events, and occasionally exploring the environment for clues. As far as the story goes, Until Dawn sees eight different playable characters take a trip to a secluded cabin in the winter, only for their lives to be put in immediate danger by all kinds of horrible things.
Until Dawn's cast includes Rami Malek and Hayden Panettiere, who provided both motion capture and voice work for the game. Including Hollywood stars helps Until Dawn achieve the slasher-movie vibe that it's going for, with Malek and Panettiere truly adding a lot to the proceedings. Playing the game is just like playing an interactive slasher movie, with player choice ultimately deciding who lives and who dies.
Until Dawn reviews praised the game for its story, graphics, clever use of QTEs, and for taking advantage of some of the DualShock 4's unique capabilities. It's also sufficiently scary, with Until Dawn doing a solid job of building tension and hitting players with jump scares at just the right moments. As far as cinematic survival-horror games go, Until Dawn is definitely one that's difficult to beat.
After horror fans have played through Until Dawn, they may want to consider checking out some of the sequels, assuming they have a PlayStation VR headset handy. Supermassive followed up Until Dawn with an on-rails shooter for PlayStation VR called Until Dawn: Rush of Blood, as well as a VR prequel called The Inpatient. A full-fledged Until Dawn sequel has yet to materialize, but perhaps it will happen at some point down the line on PS5.
Meanwhile, Supermassive is still producing games that mimic the Until Dawn style of gameplay. Supermassive's Dark Pictures anthology series is very similar to Until Dawn, but with some changes, like the inclusion of a co-op game mode. Between the Dark Pictures games and Until Dawn, Supermassive is becoming one of the top studios to watch for fans of the horror game genre.
Until Dawn is out now, exclusively for PS4.
