Reviews
‘The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’ Video Game Review – Asymmetrical Horror Evolves to Fit a Terror Classic
Gun Interactive’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a celebration of its namesake’s franchise in more ways than one. For starters, eagle eyed fans will have noticed that its upcoming release date, August 18th, is the 50th anniversary of the events that take place in its inaugural film. You don’t need me to tell you the extent of Texas’ impact on the slasher genre and horror as a whole since then–its slew of sequels, the prominence of Leatherface, the entire population of chainsaw wielding scare actors in haunted attractions–speaks for itself. With that being said, Gun had big shoes to fill. But play one match of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and it’s plain to see: Gun was up to the task of doing the franchise justice in a fresh, unique way.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is Gun’s second asymmetrical horror title based on popular horror IP, after Friday the 13th: The Game, which was not only a hit, but one of the earlier games to capitalize on the trend of asymmetrical horror. For those unfamiliar, asymmetrical horror is a gameplay format that pits two teams up against each other, usually in some type of “victim” against “killer” format. While there’s been experimentation with the genre more recently, the typical dichotomy is that there’s one team that needs to utilize scarce resources to try and escape a match, while the other team tries to hunt them down (through deadly measures) and stop them from escaping.
Rather than just neatly fitting into the typical format of asymmetrical horror, Texas shakes it up dramatically – each match is comprised of seven players, with four taking on the role of “victims” and three taking on the role of the “family.” The cast is made up of both new and familiar faces: the fresh group of victims are a rag-tag group of young adults led by Ana Flores in search of her missing sister, Maria. The family, in addition to a couple new siblings, is where you’ll find familiar characters like The Cook, The Hitchhiker, and of course, Leatherface. The entire roster is equipped with unique stats and abilities, offering players the ability to reconfigure and find their favorite flavor of gameplay.
As I jumped into my initial matches, experimenting with both the victim team and the family team, it immediately became apparent to me not only how faithful that Gun had been to the source material, but how seamless the material seemed to matriculate into an asymmetrical horror setting. For the victims, there’s a clear progression that needs to be undertaken each match: you start out locked up in the basement, you need to find your way upstairs without being slaughtered by the lurking Leatherface, and then there’s a handful of escape options available to you. But that path always seems to be different every match: sometimes, I was able to make it out of the basement in less than a minute, and other times, I was relentlessly chased and mangled by Leatherface before barely making it out alive.
Similarly, on the Family side, the character you select will vastly dictate what your objectives are. If you’re Leatherface (who, naturally, is a required character for each match), expect to take on the role of the chaser, the one who keeps everyone on the map scrambling with the rev of your chainsaw, and typically the executioner. But if you choose someone like the new character, Sissy, you have the ability to maneuver the map in quieter, tactful ways, and even lay down traps as a saboteur that disrupts key objectives from being completed.
The myriad of gameplay options offered by both teams keeps the gameplay fresh, and it’s further augmented by an intricate skill tree and progression system that I viscerally found akin to, of all games, that of Final Fantasy X. Additional skills, stat boosters, and level ups are achieved via experience gained from each match, and you select each from different branching progression paths on a large skill tree. Sometimes you need to be strategic, as selecting one branch of perks will lock you out from any other branches. Perks can be both active and passive – for example, on the victims side, certain perks will highlight escape routes for a duration of time if you find key items, whereas others will allow you to stun members of the Family.
The skill tree and level up system really stoked my excitement for the game as a hardcore asymmetrical horror player: I’m excited to seek out the best perks and refine my style of gameplay. I wasn’t surprised to see that fellow Victims were clamoring to play as Connie, who has a perk that allows her to instantly unlock doors once every couple minutes. I’m already anticipating that players will identify the best characters/perks, the devs will become privy to that, and then implement updates down the line that will refine the system.
On that note, however, I do get the impression that Texas may be more inclined towards hardcore players than casual players. For both teams, there definitely appears to be a learning curve to fully take advantage of what each match has to offer. If you’re playing as a victim against even slightly experienced team of family members, it’s not surprising that you find yourself in corpse mode in less than 5 minutes. And on the flip side, adept victims against a family that’s still trying to find its footing can end up running through the escape gates in 2-3 minutes. For the casual player not very accustomed to asymmetrical horror, it may not be the most forgiving game to get a handle on the genre.
Naturally, with any asymmetrical horror game, Texas will surely need some balance updates in the future. At the moment, I’d say matches seem a bit in favor of the Family. As a victim, even during my most calculated and stealthy moments, if I found myself ganged up on for even just a second, it was typically a wrap for me without much option for escape.
In spite of that, the chases are intense and genuinely frightening. With other asymmetrical horror games, the thrill of the chase becomes a bit diminished over time, but with Texas’ close gritty and dark corners and countless escape options, I find myself always trying to balance strategic and visceral decisions. It’s not as simple as running in circles – you need to crawl, shimmy, sometimes gambit making loud noises that give away your position in exchange for a quick getaway, and all of it feels not only like a success of asymmetrical horror, but an homage to the feeling I get when I watch a Texas film. I can’t say that I’m surprised either – Gun has proven in the past that it has a pulse on how to evolve this niche genre in ways that other games can’t while doing justice to its source material. If you’re interested in the future of asymmetrical horror, picking The Texas Chain Saw Massacre up is a necessity.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre will be available on most modern systems, and include cross-play on day one, on August 18th, 2023.
Reviews
‘Cape Fear’ Redefines A Cutthroat Classic & Turns The American Dream Into A Psychological Nightmare [Review]
Hollywood has been stuck in a trend where a recognizable property — any recognizable property — holds more value than an original idea. This has led to a trend where a slew of acclaimed films have transitioned over to television and become limited series, because why not?
Which has led to a very mixed bag of results that’s usually viewed as a hollow exercise in IP renewal that’s become a growing cliche that’s something to mock. Dead Ringers, Fatal Attraction, Presumed Innocent, and even The Birds are just some of the most recent titles in the movie-to-limited series pipeline. Admittedly, this formula can still work. It just needs to actually have not only a point of view, but a point, otherwise it’s destined to disappear into the vast streaming abyss.
Cape Fear definitely has a point of view and is well aware that it’s the fourth proper adaptation of this story — fifth if The Simpsons’ masterful “Cape Feare” parody is included. It’s an adaptation that’s not only aware of its past’s baggage, but intentionally embraces it and uses it to its advantage. Nick Antosca’s Cape Fear is so exciting because it functions as a remix of every version of this story — the ’60s film, Martin Scorsese’s ’90s remake, and John D. MacDonald’s original novel, The Executioners — to create this glorious amalgamation of the narrative. It’s not unlike what was done with Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal series and how it remixed the breadth of Thomas Harris’ works and their cinematic adaptations.
This approach is most effective when certain iconic scenes from the ’90s film are recontextualized and given to different characters in order to make grander thematic statements. It’s a really striking approach that reflects the generational ripples and overlap between these adaptations, yet it’s never distracting or ostentatious to anyone who is experiencing this story for the first time. It helps this series feel different from the deluge of forgettable adaptations that are flooding the market.
On paper, Antosca is the perfect showrunner to tell this story. He has an impressive body of work to pull from that includes horror series like Channel Zero, Hannibal, and Brand New Cherry Flavor, but also lots of true-crime titles like The Act, A Friend of the Family, and Candy. This series falls squarely within these two extremes as it blurs the lines between these genres and styles of horror storytelling. It’s Big Little Lies on bath salts. Cape Fear perhaps doesn’t need to exist, but it’s still a hell of a terrifying experience that has something timely to say.
Horror is full of stories in which one bad day is all it takes to break someone and turn them into a completely different person. Cape Fear isn’t doing exactly this. It’s more of a psychological waterboarding until the target’s sense of self is eroded to rubble. However, it takes the kernel of this idea and expands it onto the pristine ideal of the picturesque American family. It plays with the self-aware realization that the stories we tell are not necessarily what we think they are.
It’s a story about forgiveness, salvation, and revenge that blows up the Bowden family when a violent offender, Max Cady (Javier Bardem), is released from prison and systematically sets his sights on the people he holds accountable. Anna and Tom Bowden (Amy Adams and Patrick Wilson), the married couple who represented his case in court, receive a rude awakening when Cady’s psychological torture tour begins. Cape Fear, as a property, is most famously known for being the ultimate cat-and-mouse psychological thriller. This rendition culminates in such an explosive climax that’s right out of a slasher film.
Antosca was involved with an unproduced Friday the 13th reboot draft back in 2015, and there are certainly moments in which Max Cady moves with the hulking intensity of Jason Voorhees. So much of what makes all this work rests on Bardem’s complex performance. He’s very careful not to just copy Robert Mitchum or Robert De Niro’s versions of Cady, while he also taps into a terrifying intensity that feels completely different from what he brought forward with No Country for Old Men’s Anton Chigurh.
Apple TV’s new series also introduces a mental injury to Cady that adds psychological fractures that pull him between different versions of events as he struggles to grasp the truth. It’s an element that’s not exactly necessary and often feels like a convenient obstacle that can be activated whenever necessary. However, it allows for some creative visual flourishes and more opportunities for Bardem to get lost in Cady’s complexities.
Opposite Bardem’s Cady, Adams and Wilson do some of their best work as Anna and Tom. Anna is much more front and center than Tom, and Cape Fear is really Adams and Bardem’s time to shine. Wilson still does amazing, understated work, especially whenever the rug gets pulled out from under him regarding someone in his family. The visceral, brutal violence that Cady introduces to the Bowden family hits hard and highlights the anger and intensity that’s fundamental to this story.
What Cape Fear does best is its enlightening deconstruction of the ideal American family, how much work it takes to preserve such a pure thing, and the lengths that people go when they feel like the sanctity of this union is under fire. All it takes is for one of these foundational pillars to weaken before the whole unit becomes compromised. It moves the damage and pressure from one family member to the next as everyone struggles, and it’s unclear what will be left of this family when all is said and done.
This dynamic makes Cape Fear’s story so much more layered and interesting than if the series were just focused on Cady, Anna, and Tom, rather than making their children as much of a priority. Each member of the Bowden family experiences their own obstacles and arcs, although Natalie (Lily Collias) and Zack’s (Joe Anders) storylines are often the most grating. It all boils down to forgiveness, identity, and wanting to be perceived as the person we think we are, versus how we’re viewed by the public, and the dangerous dissonance that can exist between these separate selves.
These ideas are at their most potent when Cape Fear taps into the growing paranoia that bubbles up to the surface and becomes unbearable, so that even the littlest action is triggering. These moments are usually captured through a more erratic filming style that ramps up the tension for both the characters and the audience, unsure of what will strike and when.
Cape Fear never struggles to create uncomfortable setpieces where the anxiety just crescendos and hangs over the scene. On this note, the series’ musical score really captures the perfect aesthetic. It immediately evokes the suspenseful power of the previous Cape Fear films whenever Bernard Herrmann’s virtuosic original theme kicks in. It’s magic every single time.
Antosca delivers an exhilarating update to a classic thriller that pushes its source material to exciting, new places that justify its existence. It’s an exciting story that’s full of terrifying performances and cataclysmic consequences. Admittedly, Cape Fear could have been shortened to eight episodes rather than ten. There are a few plot threads that feel unnecessary and artificially expanded upon, but every episode is still an adrenaline-pumping experience.
If nothing else, it reminds audiences why Cape Fear is such an evergreen story that’s lasted the test of time and will continue to unnerve and get under the skin of whole new generations.
The 10-episode series will make its global debut on June 5 with a two-episode premiere on Apple TV, followed by new episodes every Friday through July 31, 2026.
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