“Clive Barker’s Jericho” didn’t scare me. Of course everyone knows it is my psychiatric problem that no horror movie ever scares me, but that wasn’t the deal here. I think there is something genuinely wrong with this new breed of horror games. And that’s “wrong” in the wrong way.
The main attraction of horror movies comes from extraordinary events happening to ordinary people in mundane settings. The settings and the people should be ordinary because the audience itself is ordinary. We, as the viewers, identify ourselves with the protagonists and instinctively imagine ourselves having the same experience. That is why “Jaws” is so frightening. It’s not the giant shark. It’s the fact that it attacks you when you are swimming. And anyone could be swimming really. “A Nightmare On Elm Street” is great because Freddy attacks only when you are asleep. It is something we all do at least once a day.
In a regular horror movie there is usually an ensemble of these ordinary people, in order to keep us guessing which one will die first (and optionally how that person will die). Counter intuitively, the alpha of that group usually dies before the end of the story. This is necessary because if there was only one main character in the movie (see Silent Hill) it would stop being exciting. Whenever the main character is in trouble you’d only have to look at your watch. If it’s not the end of the movie there is no way she can die, because the movie cannot go on without her.
Video games, though, are different. You don’t need that many characters in video games because of their non-linear and/or interactive nature. The main character is usually the character you control and can easily identify with. Unlike the movie character, a video game character goes exactly where you want him to go and consequently commits her mistakes because of you. A video game character is essentially you. And unlike a movie protagonist, a video game protagonist can die even if she is the only protagonist of the story.
Now, the problem with “Jericho” is not its story. In fact Mr. Barker’s story is one of the more video game friendly and coherent stories lately written in this medium. Sure it has cliché dialog, run off the mill characters and an unnecessary amount of blood. And there is the fact that the game does not really have an ending. It doesn’t end, it just stops. But all this doesn’t change the fact that it has a logically progressing story, unlike its recent brethren “Bioshock” or “F.E.A.R.”. The problem is something else entirely. And that problem is shared by “Bioshock” and “F.E.A.R.” too.
In “Clive Barker’s Jericho”, you play a 7 man team, a special supernatural task force. Your protagonists are Ross, who is a spirit, able to possess his friends, making them regenerate their wounds and bringing others back from death. Sweet, eh? There is also Father Rawlings. He is a priest who carries not one but two modified .50 caliber automatic pistols and can suck the life out of his enemies to invigorate his friends, not to mention the resurrecting thing which can be performed from afar. There is a ninja with an Uzi, and she can burn people who get close to her. There is a sniper who can guide her bullets in slow motion and blow up the skulls of a potentially infinite number of enemies. Hell, there is even a kid who can slow down time, or rewind it just at the ammo belts so that the squad never runs out of ammo. That’s good because there is also a huge guy who has a chain-gun in one hand and a huge pistol in the other, due to the unfortunate fact that his right arm is possessed by a fire demon who can fly in the air to incinerate people. Clearly, these are not ordinary people.
In contrast, Alyssa in “Clock Tower 3″ is a 15 year old girl, who is slower than most of the psychotic murderers chasing her, cannot wield any weapons, and has to keep the panic bar low or else she freaks out.
Here is the question: Would you be afraid for Team Jericho, or little poor Alyssa?
Did “Bioshock” really made you experience fear as your protagonist was shooting around with six different heavily modified guns, hacking security bots and all sorts of murderous devices and launching tornadoes, thunderbolts, fireballs, ice spikes and killer bees from his hand? Killer bees! For God’s sake…
Let me answer the rhetorical question: No. I didn’t experience any fear. I didn’t feel any fear when “F.E.A.R.” teased me with the evil things that may be just around the corner, simply because my character is a super commando who can shoot several targets at the same time with a variety of different guns, healing himself with instant med packs, while drop kicking people to death. And the best thing is that he doesn’t have to do all these very quickly because he can… wait for it… that’s right: slow down time.
In every single dark corner of the repetitive, grey levels of “F.E.A.R.” you are supposed to say “Oh my God, what am I going to do now?” Instead I ended up saying “Bring it on bitch!” That is not exactly horror material.
Of course the shock value of the gruesome visuals should help with the horror the developers want to create. The monster and environment design in “Jericho” are appropriately sick. There is blood, flesh, skin and vomit all over the place. Even a single enemy is a horrifying sight when viewed separately. And precisely that is another problem.
Gore is a very common tool in horror. But when it’s gore everywhere your senses become dull. It is okay when you see a gory scene every now and then. It contrasts with the world you see all the time and is therefore shocking because of its abnormality and the implications contained within that perversity. But the walls of “Jericho” are literally made of gore. It is shocking the first time you see it. But then, after a while, all you see is red wallpaper. It is no different than the dull, grey textures of “F.E.A.R.” They are both boring. And horror isn’t supposed to be boring.
I am not saying the aforementioned games are not good games in their own right. That’s an entirely different story. My problem is with the lack of horror in these stories. That is assuming these games have “horror” as theme of course.
On the other hand, who am I to teach Mr. Barker, whose job is writing horror stories , how to write one? I’m not trying to do that. My problem is simply this:
If these games are supposed to be horror games, then I have to say they are not scary at all.
And I think there should be something seriously wrong with the world if horror is not scary.