Entertainment

Games: Layers of Fear 2 more frustrating than fear-inducing, next-gen XBox launching Christmas 2020

Layers of Fear 2 takes place onboard a luxury liner laden with ghoulish surprises
Layers of Fear 2 takes place onboard a luxury liner laden with ghoulish surprises Layers of Fear 2 takes place onboard a luxury liner laden with ghoulish surprises

Layers of Fear 2 (Multi)

By: Gun Media

THE original Layers of Fear was a solid horror romp as players rambled around the mansion and mind of a madman artist, using his freaky-deaky portraits to progress.

With a bigger budget, the sequel swaps paint for lights, camera and action as an actor, waking on the high seas aboard a luxury liner, runs a gauntlet of horrific sets designed by some deranged director.

With his life-sizes diorama of doom, our insane auteur (voiced by Candyman himself, Tony Todd) scares up past memories with elaborately staged Hollywood sets and more mannequins than a Top Shop store room.

A walking sim at heart, the linear gameplay doesn’t go far beyond interacting with doors, yanking levers and light puzzling, though all sumptuously staged.

Problems arise when scratchy psycho monsters show up to chase players Benny Hill-style through the cabins. These sequences are pure trial-and-error, eventually piled on so thick as to annoy more than scare.

With its swish first-person perspective and deliberate pace, LoF2 tries hard to ape PT, the legendary Silent Hill playable demo for a game that never was. But you can have too much of a good thing, and while its first few acts are strong, this baggy sequel struggles to sustain interest over 10 hours.

At twice the original’s length, its jump-scares become tiresome and the plot overwrought to the point of nonsense. While technically ship-shape, Layers of Fear 2 is a far cry from the original’s short, sharp shock to the senses, proving that less is more in the horror game.

:: Microsoft's Study in Scarlett

It's hard to paint the Xbox One as anything other than a failure. Stillborn thanks to a 2013 reveal focusing on multimedia and an iron fist on always-online digital rights, Sony toe-poked the back of an open net thanks to its "pure" gaming creed and a slew of incredible exclusives.

But the US giant has a secret weapon – it's not short of a bob or two. Having twice Ireland’s GDP in the coffers means it can write this generation off and start signing cheques for the next battle. And so it was that last week, the next-generation Xbox got its big reveal at the E3 expo in Los Angeles.

Codenamed Scarlett, it'll land in time for Christmas 2020. The science part sounds a lot like Sony’s PS5, with a solid state drive reducing loading times and a processor four times more powerful than Xbox One X. It’ll also handle 8K and 12fps at a canter.

“This isn’t just a console launch, this is about the future of gaming”, warned Xbox head Phil Spencer, though it also keeps one foot in the past with backwards compatibility for all previous Xbox ancestors.

As tech converges, there’s little to separate the big players – it’s all about the games, baby, and while PS4 knocked its rival into a cocked hat in this regard, Microsoft has it all to play for.

A bit of healthy competition never hurt anyone, so here's hoping Microsoft can make a better fist of the next gen – though they’ll face a different landscape to six years ago, with a newly emboldened Nintendo flush with Switch success and Stadia from their 'Old Firm' rival and the similarly affluent Google.