Reviewed on:
PlayStation 5
Platform:
PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PC
Publisher:
Saber Interactive
Developer:
Saber Interactive
Release:
Rating:
Mature
Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival lives up to the horror franchise’s name by delivering indescribable suffering. Unfortunately, it’s inflicted on the players, and there’s no ecstasy to be found in what’s often a miserable experience. Despite boasting an alluringly dark, faithfully gore-filled presentation and borrowing from a successful first-person survival horror blueprint, the game stumbles both intentionally and functionally thanks to a litany of bugs.
Aiden Lynch is the uninteresting lead at the center of this tale. He must rescue his girlfriend, Sunny, after she unlocks the series’ dreaded puzzle box and is whisked away into the hellish Labyrinth by the Cenobites, led by the iconic Pinhead (with Doug Bradley reprising the role and unsurprisingly killing it). To restore Sunny's mortal body, Lynch must navigate the Labyrinth's dangers while battling a Cenobite-obsessed cult in the human world. This decent story is one in which the bland protagonist is the least memorable part, and has interesting things happen to and around him; he reminds me of an edgier version of Resident Evil's Ethan Winters.
The story is propped up by a few solid scares and plenty of unsettling moments, plus neat callbacks for fans while remaining an accessible entry point for newcomers. Hellraiser: Revival commendably doesn't skimp on the franchise’s disturbing gore and sexual content while never crossing a truly problematic line for the latter. Unfortunately, any entertainment the story elicits is hampered by cinematic and in-game cutscenes that frequently suffer from poor lip syncing, subpar audio mixing that muffles quieter voice lines, and subtitles that sometimes don't match the dialogue or fail to appear at all.
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