The followers of The Dark Pictures know it: the script of each episode is articulated around myths or real events having fed the various facts of the last decades, even of the past centuries. After the SS Ourang Medan (Man of Medan), the witches of Salem (Little Hope) and the Curse of Akkad (House of Ashes), Supermassive Games opted for the serial killer HH Holmes. Considered by many to be the first American serial killer, he committed many crimes within his "Castle of Murders" - a hotel in reality - which opened its doors in 1893 on the occasion of the Chicago World's Fair. . We won't reveal anything about the plot so as not to ruin the element of surprise, but among the written and audio elements scattered throughout the levels, a few surreptitiously refer to anecdotes concerning HH Holmes, which should no doubt be of interest to fans of the genre. In The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me, Charlie (played by actor Paul Kaye), the boss of the production company Lonnit Entertainment, is contacted by Granthem Du'Met, a wealthy architect who has inherited a hotel located on an isolated island with rather special characteristics. Indeed, some of his rooms would be exact replicas of the "Castle of Murders". The offer from the wealthy man is simple: allow Charlie and his team to produce a report on the famous murderer. With business in decline, Charlie finds this proposal the perfect opportunity to revive his small business and so accepts the invitation. Of course, once there, things will not really go as planned.
Where The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me is very effective, however, is in the choice of certain shots that magnify the presence of the serial killer. The strings are big, the jump scares very greasy, but we take it willingly because that's precisely what makes the charm of the slasher.
In addition to Charlie, Lonnit Entertainment has four members who all respond to stereotypes that The Dark Pictures has a hard time breaking away from. First of all, there is Kate (played by actress Jessie Buckley), the star host who wants to fulfill herself in her job, even if it means putting her love life aside. The one who pays the price is the cameraman Mark (Fehinti Balogun): his self-esteem is in pieces but he tries to put on a good face. As for the lighting technician Jamie (Gloria Obianyo), her assertive character allows her to brave all dangers. Quite the opposite of Erin (Nikki Patel), the newly recruited sound engineer, who is unable to put one foot in front of the other without shaking with fear. We quickly understand that Charlie has a conflictual relationship with some of them, in particular Jessie who no longer supports his working methods. However, unlike The Quarry, which takes the time to develop its characters, The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me does not care and places more importance on how they will eventually die. In the end – and even if it is one of the great principles of slasher – we learn more about their executioner, and when they have the misfortune to fall into his hands, we feel absolutely no empathy. It's still terrible for a game whose concept is based precisely on choices whose consequences can be dramatic for the protagonists. Moreover, at the end of our first run, which lasted about seven hours, only Jamie and Mark were still standing. We see roughly how we could save the other members of the group, except for one who, regardless of the decision taken, systematically dies. His fate is probably played out a little earlier in the adventure, which makes it possible to remember that there is a way to restart a session from a chapter already played, and thus try to change the course of the story.
ELI ROTH'S HOSTEL
Supermassive Games had sworn that the handling of The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me would be more flexible, and it is true that compared to the other episodes of the series, the controls have been expanded. It may seem surprising, but it took three years for the developers to see fit to integrate the race. It's still more comfortable to explore the places, especially since they are full of secrets and other premonitions. We have the possibility of accessing areas that are usually inaccessible by moving boxes before climbing on them, or by entering narrow spaces. Jumping over holes is also part of the new mechanics, just like walking in balance on a beam. These controls, which do not completely erase the rigidity of The Devil in Me, make it a bit more varied in terms of level design, although the approach remains quite interventionist overall. Regarding the camera, which has not been fixed since The Dark Pictures: Little Hope, it sometimes has difficulty following the wanderings of the characters, as if Supermassive Games had forgotten to stall it on the freshly added sprints. Among the other innovations thought up by the developers, there is the fact that each member of Lonnit Entertainment has their own items. Addicted to cigarettes, Charlie can, for example, light up dark places with his lighter and even unlock drawers with his business card. Erin, she has an inhaler to calm her asthma attacks and is also able to identify the source of a noise by pointing her microphone in the right direction. Kate, for her part, has a pencil thanks to which she makes messages invisible to the naked eye appear. As for Jamie, she can count on her multimeter to repair the fuses and her flashlight, while Mark never separates from his monopod and his camera.
Do these objects really add value to the gameplay? It depends. If their use remains classic (Mark who deploys his monopod to reach a notebook placed in height), even anecdotal (one still wonders what the multimeter of Jamie is used for), certain events make that they can turn against us. Here again, we prefer to leave the pleasure of discovery to you. On the other hand, given that we have not yet explored all the branches of the game, questions remain, especially with regard to Erin's inhaler. Ditto for Mark's camera which is suspected to have an impact on the final outcome although we have not been able to verify it. No doubt the various alternatives imagined by Supermassive Games will be disclosed on YouTube once the game is available, including the deaths. Moreover, The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me does not escape the usual capillotractées issues, including one that amazed us as it comes out of nowhere. Naturally, the QTEs are not lacking, the action window being more or less tight depending on the level of difficulty selected (it is possible to modify it on the fly). Thus, when one is hidden behind a wall or under a table, the heartbeat is more intense and the keys to press change along the way. And when it comes to puzzles, don't expect miracles. Picking up keys, turning on switches, retrieving codes to access this or that room in the hotel: it's not with this kind of puzzle that we're going to rack our brains. There was clearly better to do.
If Supermassive Games has refined the sound design to make the moments of tension unbreathable, we cannot say that the dubbing is the most convincing. Whether it's the VO or the VF, the studio has indeed offered us much better in the past – The Quarry, for example.
Where The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me is very effective, however, is in the choice of certain shots that magnify the presence of the serial killer. The strings are big, the jump scares very greasy, but we take it willingly because that's precisely what makes the charm of the slasher. It is much more difficult to forgive the mediocrity of the facial animations which will never have evolved throughout this first season. They literally take us out of the game, the characters' empty gaze creating a discrepancy with the emotions they are supposed to feel. We are right in the valley of the strange, clearly. For the rest, The Devil in Me displays both the same qualities (mastery of lighting, nice interiors) and the same faults (the rigidity of the animations, the slightly less neat exterior levels) as its predecessors. If Supermassive Games has refined the sound design to make the moments of tension unbreathable, we cannot say that the dubbing is the most convincing. Whether it's the VO or the VF, the studio has indeed offered us much better in the past – The Quarry, for example. Finally, let's not forget to mention the presence of accessibility-oriented options (both for subtitles and for QTEs) and the traditional multiplayer mode. The program has not changed: either we decide to campaign with a comrade online, or we find four friends and we turn the controller locally to play a character in turn.
