Most of us are familiar with the world of Friday The 13th – the movies that entranced us, the sequels that ruined it, the Freddy vs. Jason crossover that we actually kind of liked, the ’80s NES game that made us want to go all Jason right up in the developers’ faces. And despite the occasional let-down, you thought that after the 2009 remake, which had mixed reviews, the Friday The 13th franchise was finally able to rest in peace.
HAHAHAHAHAHA! No.
Because, as is well known by now, Friday the 13th: The Game is due for release in October, and it is, as its official website says, “one of the most highly anticipated horror games of all time.” And they are most certainly correct.
Will Friday The 13th: The Game live up to the hype? Will it be enough to revive the franchise, or will it get similar reviews as the 80s game (God forbid)?
Blood and Gore Are a Staple of the Franchise
One thing is for certain – if the game is to match any of the qualities of the original films, it must be soaked in blood. Drenched in it. It must match the gore and brutality that made it the Mortal Kombat of movies before Mortal Kombat was even a thing.
Blood and gore are as much a staple in the franchise as Jason’s hockey mask. It’s what makes the films different from the rest because, as much as they try, there aren’t many franchises that match Friday The 13th in terms of blood and gore. The same must be applied to the game itself. No matter how good the game may be, it still needs rivers of blood and tons of brutality if it wants to match the films.
Shows Promise
As of yet, the only way we can predict this is through the trailers and gameplay videos. And so far, things look promising.
Some of the first footage revealed at E3 2016 shows you playing as Jason, which is a new and exciting feature of the game. Jason is in a graveyard where he’s hearing the voice of his mother, Pamela, in his head. She’s telling him to find and punish the teenagers. Jason advances through the woods of the infamous Camp Crystal Lake until he comes across a camp counselor. The poor woman is lost, scared, and running for her life. Jason, being a kind-hearted fellow, breaks her spine against a rock. As you do.
Again hearing his mother’s voice, he proceeds to a log cabin, which, as one of the on-hand game developers said, is actually a house from one of the movies, carefully replicated. Outside Jason meets another camp counselor, who’s stumbling around just feeling lucky to be alive. So Jason smashes her brains out against the cabin’s wall.
This teaser video ends with the player taking control of the last remaining counselor because in the game you have the option to play as Jason or as counselors — to hunt or be hunted. After escaping from Jason once, the counselor flees to a smaller log cabin where he attempts to trick Jason. The counselor turns on a radio and opens a window to make it seem like he jumped out the window. Meanwhile, he hides under the bed. Jason soon enters, smashing down the locked door and proceeding to break the radio. At first, he seems to be fooled by the window and goes to leave. However, in the doorway, he turns and looks around the room. He approaches the bed. And, without even checking to see if the player is underneath, he stabs the counselor through the bed.
New Abilities, New Ways To Kill
The video also features some of Jason’s new abilities. These include short-distance teleporting and a new vision that allows him to seek out the counselors faster.
Another shorter video gave us a view from inside a log cabin with the player playing neither as Jason nor a counselor. It showed Jason as he drags a helpless counselor to the doorway, placing her head on the doorframe. He then slams the door repeatedly into her head, causing a painful, bloody, and all-out brutal death for the counselor.
And that’s only the start. In other videos, Jason kills a young man by pushing his thumbs through his eye sockets and into his brain. In another scene, Jason shoves a dagger down the throat of a counselor, who takes several slow, painful, bloody moments to finally die.
Speaking of slow deaths, what about a counselor having his arms ripped off as he struggles in the dirt and a pool of his own blood until Jason finally puts him out of his misery? Yep, they’ve got that.
And not all the deaths are gory. No, when Jason’s in a particularly good mood (which isn’t often) he might decide to let someone keep their innards (and us to keep our dinners) inside their bodies. So he puts their head in a fire and lets them burn to death instead. That’s just the kind of fun, caring fellow he is.
Jason’s a busy guy, though, he’s got a full schedule, so some of the deaths have to be quick. If your character is lucky — and I mean really lucky — Jason will end it quickly, perhaps with a pitchfork in the head or simply crushing your skull with his bare hands. There’s also a clip of him throwing a man to the ground, and then swinging his axe into the man’s…
Look, if you’re a guy, just imagine the most painful place to have an axe embedded.
Yep. That’s the place.
There Will be Blood
I think it’s safe to say that Friday the 13th: The Game will certainly match the gore, blood, and utter brutality that the franchise is famous for.
Does this new game open things up for a continuation of the franchise? Perhaps another game, or even a new movie? I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. One thing is for sure, though, this game will not be the end of the Friday The 13th world.
Because, like a certain hockey-masked killer, that franchise just doesn’t know how to stay dead.
Take a step back in time and check out our look at the old Friday the 13th game for NES.