Editorials
‘Martian Gothic: Unification’: A Terrible Title For a Fantastic Game
You know what you’re getting when you look at the cover of any House Of The Dead game – a house, full of the ‘dead’, which you’ll have to blast away mercilessly. Even the titles of many horror games give a general indication of what’s to come – The Last Of Us has the heavy implication of post-apocalyptic drama; Alien: Isolation suggests being stuck in space with a monster; Doom, well, suggests doom. But Martian Gothic: Unification (henceforth MGU) has a title so abstractly and mindlessly constructed, it’s enough to put players off even picking it up.
Developed by Take-Two Interactive (publishers of such varied big-hitters as Grand Theft Auto, Top Spin, and Bioshock), this third-person survival horror received average reviews upon release in 2000, pawned off as a rip-off of other popular games in the genre (namely, Resident Evil). But, if you can track this mysterious PS1 release down, it may offer a more fruitful (and frightful) experience than you think.
The central mystery of MGU is actually rather intriguing; written by sci-fi author Stephen Marley, it tells the story of three astronauts sent to investigate Vita-01, the first human settlement on Mars. For 10 months, the base has been dead silent – no communications whatsoever. Upon arrival, the crew, (Kenzo, Karne and Matlock), are given one very important instruction: “Stay alone, stay alive.” The horrific events which led to the downfall of Vita-01 unravel as you progress through the game, with one particularly haunting transmission warning: “It was a Pandora’s Box – all the evils of old Mars flew out.”
By ‘evils’, they mean a supernatural curse that has, unfortunately, for our obscurely named characters, awoken the previously dead inhabitants of the colony. So while they’re wandering the lonely corridors of the base, they have to put up with zombies, spiders and disgustingly realized monsters called Trimorphs, which vary from small pests that want to nibble at your legs, to huge body-tearing beasts.
Gameplay wise, it’s very similar to Resident Evil. There’s a fixed camera angle, a large inventory available to you and frustratingly difficult gunplay. But the key part of the game which separates this from the crop of 3D survival shooters is a good one; your characters can never meet. If you do, you’ll both ‘gruesomely merge into a Trimorph’ (you never see this happen, you just die). As such, you can take control of any of the three characters at any given time; which is handy, because to actually complete the game you need to do a lot of digging.
By a lot, I mean carrying around 100 inventory items, searching every shelf, drawer, and pocket, quizzing the in-game supercomputer à la HAL 9000 called MOOD (brilliantly voiced by Fenella Fielding), and if you care for your own sanity, taking plenty of actual written notes. In order to share necessary items with your team, you need to use vacuum tubes – a loot box-esque system that sends anything your team needs across the map. This becomes increasingly challenging when the impending threat of zombies becomes more frequent, meaning you often have to be pretty speedy.
There’s a lot to be admired for a game that blends such cerebral demand and shooting the undead. It could be argued it’s too hard for its own good, lacking on the more fun aspects you’d find in say, Resident Evil, or Silent Hill – but for enthusiasts of the genre, it’s a deeply and deftly thought out narrative, progressing much like a movie.
The cinematic comparison goes for the visuals too; considering this is a port of a PC game towards the bitter end of the PS1’s lifespan, the photorealistic surroundings and cut-scenes boast stellar graphics. The character design, however, is typically blocky, and some of the voice acting is truly hilarious, with Karne sounding like a really terrible impression of an American soldier stereotype. But just when that may be tipping your opinion of the game, the music saves the day – ominous and creepy, elevating the fear-factor of exploring the vacant corridors of this disturbing necropolis.
The opening titles are especially marvelous, evoking an immediate sense of looming dread, with a ghoulish accompanying voiceover. The game creates that crucial sensation when embarking through a survival horror outing; that sometimes you’ll feel the need to pause because you’re uneasy about what’s around the corner.
This isn’t a flawless testament to a forgotten game. MGU, like many games, has several issues – dodgy controls, a punishing disregard for how much humans can actually retain and game mechanics that eventually lose their novelty. But as far as atmospheric, in-depth, spooky space outings go, this will likely be a sorely missed treat for many sci-fi horror fans.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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