Like Friday the 13th or A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a horror staple in cinema. Its influence can be seen in a lot of horror since, and lately it has been a fairly big proponent in the success of Dead by Daylight. The asymmetrical horror game has added The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s Leatherface alongside many other iconic slasher antagonists who have all added their own unique stamp on Dead by Daylight. But in 2023, Sumo Digital and Gun Interactive are set to launch their own asymmetrical horror game based directly on The Texas Chain Saw Massacre from 1974.
Only few other asymmetrical horror games have debuted in the last while, including PropHunt, Propnight, Video Horror Society, and Evil Dead: The Game. Gun already has experience in this niche genre with Friday the 13th: The Game, which was developed by IllFonic, and therefore may have a foothold in what makes an asymmetrical game worthwhile. There is no telling how successful or popular The Texas Chain Saw Massacre will be when it eventually releases, but if any game has the opportunity to dethrone Dead by Daylight as the reigning asymmetrical horror game, this could be it.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre May Outshine Dead by Daylight in Gameplay
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre understands that to make a simple gameplay loop dynamic, it needs more mechanics available. This is underpinned with a unique 3v4 asymmetry to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s gameplay, where three players control the cannibalistic family while four players control survivors.
Dead by Daylight has survivors working on generators and killers hooking survivors exclusively, while some perk mechanics entertain the idea of interacting with totems throughout the map. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s gameplay loop is somewhat similar, but the survivors’ goal is instead to find creative ways to escape the house they start in. This is seemingly achieved in different phases, where survivors must find their way out of the basement before they can find a way out of the house itself, and then make their way to the road past the estate’s grounds.
How survivors choose to escape the house may be its most interesting gameplay predicament, and it will be interesting to see how future maps other than the rural family house implement these strategies. Each character also has unique abilities; for example, the Cook is able to lock doors and listen intently to survivor players who are not mindful of how stealthily they move around.
Likewise, Leatherface players can choose to have the chainsaw fully revved and prepared to carve into survivors, or they can shut it off to move around quietly for a stealthier approach at the cost of instant damage. These kinds of decisions could make for exciting 3v4 gameplay in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and with so many mechanics its gameplay could arguably be more engaging than gameplay in Dead by Daylight.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s Content Limitation Could Hurt Its Longevity
The most concerning part of a game centered exclusively around The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is that it is restricted to that IP alone. Evil Dead: The Game has the same issue in terms of content, where there has not been much post-launch content released at all, and it only has a handful of franchise installments to draw from that will eventually run dry. Content in a live-service multiplayer game needs to be near-constant in order to satiate players, which is what Dead by Daylight has been able to achieve with licensed IPs and its own original material.
There are several more movies that Sumo could pull from for its asymmetrical adaptation, but a time will come when there is no longer any source material to add, and if that content is not pushed often fans will likely lose interest in the meantime. If this is the case, then The Texas Chain Saw Massacre may still fall short of Dead by Daylight even if its gameplay is much more elaborate.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is scheduled to release in 2023 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.