The recent attempt to reboot the Blair Witch franchise with a new movie wasn't a rousing success. While the movie was probably still profitable thanks to a microscopic budget, it made less than $50 million globally, but if you thought that meant the franchise was dead, think again.
Blair Witch is coming back as a video game. This morning the game's story trailer was released, and for those people who are fans of this franchise, it looks like it will likely deliver all the chills and jump scares that you've come to expect. Check the trailer out below.
The story for the game appears to be entirely original, but it certainly plays off the mythology created by the films. A boy goes missing in the same woods that have claimed so many throughout the franchise. One man, the character you play as, appears to be obsessed with finding him, even after others seem to have given up hope. Of course, then the woods begin to mess with him as well.
It's an interesting looking game, if only because, from this, it's difficult to tell what the actual game is. The game is done in a first-person perspective, which makes sense considering the first person perspective of the films due to the found footage concept. Usually, in games, that means shooting things, and while we see our character holding a gun, he never fires it in the trailer.
In fact, like the Blair Witch movies, a lot of what makes the game look scary is what we don't see. There are a few moments here and there in the trailer that show us creepy things happening, but for the most part, there's simply an ominous feeling that something could happen at any moment.
Of course, the other element the trailer provides here is that it's implied that the player character might not be entirely sane, so everything we see might not even be real.
It also looks like it might very well be the perfect game for fans of the franchise, even if you don't play games. It's unclear what the gameplay mechanics even are, it's possible that Blair Witch the game might be a horror focused "walking simulator," a game that doesn't actually have gameplay beyond moving the character between points to continue the story, as such, it would essentially be another Blair Witch movie, just one that moves at your pace.
As somebody who actually enjoyed the recent Blair Witch reboot movie, and liked the original when it came out (though I admit it hasn't aged well) I have to say I like what I see here. Having said that, horror games are rarely my thing, mostly because, when they work well, I literally dread starting them up because I don't know what fresh terror awaits.
The upcoming Blair Witch game will be out on August 30 for the Xbox One and PC.
