The Quarry review: Does the new horror narrative game live up to Until Dawn?

It was only supposed to be a summer camp. A holiday camp on the edge of a lake surrounded by a forest, a large chalet, here is a dream postcard for a moment of escape. Laura and Max are instructors there, along with seven other students. But the young couple decided to hit the road a little earlier than expected and arrived early, on this full moon night. They never should have.

For the seven other members of the team, the summer camp is going wonderfully and the month goes by without trouble. Until the last day. The groups of children left, but the car broke down, the monitors had to stay another night. To celebrate this extra evening together, they decide to organize a big campfire near the lake, on this evening of full moon. They never should have.

Who will come out of the Hackett’s Quarry camp alive? It is up to your choices and your reflexes. Developed by Supermassive Games, The Quarry offers a horror narrative experience in line withUntil Dawn.

The cold sweats are there in The Quarry

While paying homage to slashers 80s-90s, The Quarry emancipates itself a minimum by proposing its own story and by getting rid of some not very famous springs, like the jump scareswho were very present in Until Dawn. The story even manages to surprise with its quality of writing, reinforced by a catchy narrative framework and elaborate cinematography – aided by impressive graphics of realism (except for the water).

The result is an atmosphere that is certainly oppressive, but not excessively unhealthy, enough to give the feeling of living a form of adventure, more than a pure meaningless horrific experience. Moreover, we have all the more “fear” during certain sequences thanks to this well-established context.

We also find meaning in the experience thanks to a system of choices that generates real impacts, paths “. So yes, the lives of the characters are in our hands, and yes, those moments of decision can put real pressure on us. The cold sweats are there. Especially since a good part of the instructors have enough sympathy to be endearing – special mention to Kaitlyn (Brenda Song), Laura (Siobhan Williams) or Dylan (Miles Robbins).

A rhythm problem

Despite the real consequences of the choices, we can regret that the decisions remain very limited throughout the game. Where narrative experiences like Life is Strange, Detroit Become Human Where Syberia distill the feeling of participating at every moment in the unfolding of the adventure, The Quarry only involves us at very specific times. We must therefore accept to be very often a simple spectator of long cutscenes. By playing on words, we could speak more of a film whose course we can influence than of an interactive story. Moreover, there is a “cinema mode” in The Quarry.

If this succinct presence of the interaction is an assumed choice, it is not without causing an overall lack of rhythm. It takes time — a bit too much — to get into the game. QTE sequences can be boring. Being able to decide who to kiss, but not being able to act at a moment that would have been decisive, can also be exasperating at times. Not to mention that the protagonists sometimes have absurd and unbelievable behavior (no one seems to feel pain, in this universe). These weaknesses are to be deplored as they lower the skill of the whole.

Despite its notable flaws, Supermassive Games’ game remains of high quality. Several years later Until Dawn, The Quarry constitutes the new horror experience of reference, because clearly essential for fans of the genre.

The verdict

We liked

• A well-managed narrative that’s engaging enough to play
• Several endearing characters
• Photorealistic graphics
• The music
• Tribute to slashers

We liked less

• We are too often mere spectators
• Sometimes unbelievable behavior
• Aesthetics abuses the penumbra, sometimes you can’t see anything

The Quarry is a quality and unmissable horror experience for fans of the genre. The promise of the legacy ofUntil Dawn is held, the result is even better. Supermassive’s new game pays homage to slashers, but also offers a catchy story that regularly surprises. It is in particular the staging that impresses, the realistic graphics put at the service of a real cinematography.

We regret, however, sometimes not very credible behavior and too few choices (with QTE sequences that are a little boring). The number of endings is largely satisfactory on the other hand, since they depend above all… on the number of characters dead or alive, and there are a lot of characters.

Despite flaws that sometimes lower the pleasure, The Quarry will remain the reference horror game for several years – and it will be deserved.

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