Jason DittonThis is one of those situations where I’m not happy with myself more than anything. She’s Leaving is a quite pretty, tense, and fair in terms of balance and nerves horror title. I was uneasy for the entirety of my playtime, and had no real issues with the game itself. The concept of the game and its setting interested me, and I’m genuinely grateful for being given an opportunity to review it before release, as I always am. So, what’s this odd feeling I can’t quite shake?
Cold… So Cold…
In She’s Leaving, the player starts the game by stepping into the shoes of one Charles Dalton, a forensics expert that specializes in blood spatter analysis. You find yourself in the midst of what I presume to be a fairly typical English winter, in a cold open — a turn of phrase I immediately regret and find I must apologize for — in which Charles, and his contact, Annabella, get familiar with the outside area, and, well, take a genuinely lovely, if quite nervous, if you’re familiar with the genre, walk through the countryside for a bit as you look to find your way to House Haywood, as you get familiar with the basics of the game, walking, being informed that you have the ability to sprint, which is never a sign of good things to come for the character you’re playing as in a title like this, and finding the key for the gate to House Haywood, where you will spend a fairly good amount of the game.
Ah… That’s… Oh. That Is Both Better And Considerably More Concerning.
Upon entering the house, things get a bit warmer for Officer Dalton, both literally, as he’s just come in from the cold, and metaphorically, as the reason he came here to begin with starts in earnest. As you can imagine, an officer of the law does not come out to an area like this without a reason, and in this case, Dalton is entering an active crime scene in order to find evidence in a matter of concern to him.
Ignoring the story, however, you do get a fairly okay sense of what to expect from the game in the next set of rooms, and an immediate reassurance both inside and out of universe from the house’s staff, on a bit of paper letting you know about what to expect in case of an emergency and the safety of green rooms in said emergency, albeit it is reasonable to assume that the writer of the note in-universe did not expect it to be necessary for the current circumstances. The good officer then proceeds to have to deal with a matter of contrast, as you step past some yellow police tape into an extraordinarily red room, where you handle your first bit of evidence, in a decently straightforward matter that I managed to get wrong my first time playing the section, because I, personally, am a moron.
Such a mistake leads to not being able to take a picture of the scene, an issue for later down the line, and a more immediate problem in that you move considerably slower out of professional guilt, or brain fog, out of failure to do the job properly. As I left the room upon my failure, I then noticed a concern. The yellow police tape was now on the ground, and that meant that the crime scene is active in more than one way… Dalton is not alone in the house.
Well, Time To Get To Work, Regardless
As you can undoubtedly tell from the trailer earlier and the screenshots, She’s Leaving takes inspiration from a number of sources, which is covered in more detail in the exclusive interview released last week, which you should read if you haven’t already. I am wholly unfamiliar with the more cinematic influences that the the co-founder of Blue Hat brought up, having largely fallen away from media that’s based in live-action in these last few years, and titles that go into the realistic side for “immersion” reasons. I’ve also never played any of The Last of Us games or watched the show, but you can tell that they took some very good lessons in their other influences to heart as you play, especially since House Beneviento was the best part of Resident Evil 8. The house is nerve-wracking to traverse, and the writing is pretty good. Charles in particular is a genuinely interesting man as you get to know more about him and how seriously her takes his work, and he plays off Annabella fairly well in their interactions throughout.
I shall not comment on certain gameplay sections too deeply, as I’d loath to spoil things at the best of times, but the general play is perfectly good! I discussed a decent bit of the main deal above, but I didn’t get into two bigger parts of the game, the puzzles and the other obvious problem that Charles has to deal with, that as unassumingly enters the story and house as Charles did, a tall, white-masked Welshman in a trenchcoat that will be your stalker for She’s Leaving. He’s a largely fair antagonist, although there were a few occasions I heard him muttering in the Faespeak of Ys and excessive Ws that the Welsh call a language (affectionately, of course), and could not tell how his voice was coming from that direction. His footsteps didn’t have that problem, and you can generally tell which way to go, and if you’ve made a mistake in the hiding spot you’ve chosen before it becomes fatal. He also once appeared in the hallway in front of a saferoom. He very clearly was not in the area when I’d entered the saferoom to begin with, only appearing about fifteen steps or so away upon my exiting the safe room. He promptly vanished to an area elsewhere, upon my turning around, entering and then leaving the saferoom for a second time, but it was a skosh rude of the man that was trying to murder me.
Then again, your only real way of dealing with the man is the taser that you also use to overcharge powerbreakers, which, as in any good horror title, you can only carry a certain amount of charges for, although the batteries of said charges are, admittedly, but somewhat oddly for realism reasons, in decent supply in the house. That and running and hiding, the latter of which is what you’ll spend doing while trying to avoid making notable noises that he can hear. Such as overcharging breaker boxes. It’s a fairly delicate balance that the game handles well.
The forensics sections, the selling point of the game, the searching for evidence and figuring out what the blood splatter that Charles analyzes in the course of his job can get a little tedious, particularly if you’re a bit anxious and are too busy looking around for a murderer to look for what you’re here for, as you honestly should be… a bit basic at points, too, but looking at the situation and figuring out the situation around it… it’s interesting, and brings to mind a part of the Condemned games that didn’t get anywhere near as much play as it should’ve in those games.
Beware The Welsh
Do I put it up there with the big releases in the indie scene, especially with as wide and varied a scene as both the AAA independent horror is? Not quite, but that’s more of a statement towards the strength of the genre than any problem with the game, especially these last few years. See: Neobard’s Silent Hill f, a la mode game’s Sorry, We’re Closed, or J. R. Hudepohl’s Labyrinth of the Demon King, to name just a few from this year alone. I’m hesitant to speak for more than myself, but… I have this gut feeling that She’s Leaving will be one of those games thought of along the lines of something like Condemned 2: Bloodshot, or even the first Condemned, if my bringing up the forensics sections earlier meant anything. It’s an excellent horror title in it’s own right, worth the $16.99 price tag on PSN, Blue Hat takes feedback to heart and there are moments and segments that I suspect will stick in the mind of certain folks that play it.
This is just me speaking, but I just kind of doubt that I, personally, will remember this game in the next couple of years, positively or negatively. I do not think that She’s Leaving, as Blue Hat’s debut title, is a particularly special or memorable title overall. Is that the game’s fault? Absolutely not, it, like the Welshman that chases Officer Dalton throughout the House, just didn’t really grab me, is all.
I, in short, have no real issues with She’s Leaving, and like it a decent bit. There aren’t much in the way of faults; the game is something the devs clearly cared for, having been working on it from before the pandemic started and the basic premise of the game, as someone that originally went to college to get a degree in criminal psychology before a lack of self-confidence led to my turning to a slightly more generalized psychology degree, is one that’s interesting to me on a personal level, which is how it caught my attention to begin with, as is its location as someone with a fascination with that general area of the world. It’s a wholly worthy addition to the genre, and do suggest it if the genre is one you’re fond of or if you like it’s inspirations.