The Devil In Me is the fourth instalment in Supermassive Games’ The Dark Pictures Anthology and the conclusion to the series’ first season. Like other titles, the game sees you make decisions for a group of people as they attempt to survive a mysterious threat. Learn all about the game and find out if The Devil In Me is worth it with our review right here.

Story

The Devil In Me is loosely inspired by American serial killer, Henry Howard Holmes or H. H. Holmes as he’s otherwise known. The game follows the five crew members of the near-collapsing Lonnit Entertainment (Jessie Buckley as Katherine Wilder, Paul Kaye as Charles Lonnit, Nikki Patel as Erin Keenan, Gloria Obianyo as Jamie Tiergan, and Fehinti Balogun as Mark Nestor), a documentary film making company, who are invited to a modern-day replica of Holmes’ “Murder Castle” that is located on a small island.

While there, the group discover that their host who organised the trip – Granthem Du’Met – has fled the island and left the group with a mysterious stranger who they quickly discover has been watching and manipulating them. Now trapped, and with their lives at stake, you’re tasked with helping the crew of Lonnit Entertainment work together (Or not) and survive the night (Again, or not).

Graphics And Performance

Like previous Supermassive Games’ titles, The Devil In Me features lifelike graphics based on real-life people. The majority of the game’s character models look good, with the exception of a few like Charlie that look fantastic. Unfortunately, The Devil In Me still suffers from the uncanny valley feeling present in other games, as the character models’ facial expressions occasionally do not line up with their tone of voice or their eyes stare away from whoever they’re interacting with. Still, this isn’t a big issue and it didn’t have an impact on our enjoyment of the game.

Where The Devil In Me truly shines is its environments. The replica of Holmes’ Murder Castle was a joy to explore, particularly the endless, shifting hallways, which you’ll follow in both light and dark, with only a torch or lighter to illuminate the few feet ahead of you. The range of environments present in the game help keep the title from becoming mundane, whether you’re exploring the hotel’s lobby, bar or library, encountering secret rooms, investigating the abandoned spa resort or medical wing, or getting lost in an outdoor maze – there’s plenty here that keeps the game fresh.

Each location is also gorgeous to look at, with plenty of small details to notice like blood-stained door knobs, a single person’s handwriting within the hotel’s check-out book, or a book thrown to the floor at the beginning of the game acting as a waypoint against the ever-shifting building. There’s plenty to spot, and anyone searching hard for clues and environmental storytelling will not be disappointed.

Next-gen consoles provide you with the choice of two graphics modes; Performance that runs at 60 frames-per-second or Resolution that runs at 30 but with bolstered visuals. At release, we played on a PlayStation 5 console and found the Resolution mode to be somewhat unstable and laggy, and switching to a Performance mode made the game much more playable.

Unfortunately, many other players have reported serious glitches, particularly when playing online with friends, such as characters falling through environments and more. Supermassive Games has confirmed it’s working on bug fixes for these issues, but it’s frustrating to see such issues arise in a game anyway.

Gameplay

The Devil In Me plays just like all previous narrative-based titles from Supermassive Games. Gameplay primarily consists of you walking and exploring environments – the game does introduce a new jogging ability for faster movement – to search for clues towards the game’s overall mystery.

Throughout the game’s short thirty-plus chapters, you’ll need to select dialogue for characters to unlock various dialogue branches and impact relationships, and will need to make decisions that can carry through the rest of the game. Although some are minor, many of these decisions can lead to the death or survival of certain characters – our walkthrough can guide you through saving every character in the game.

The Devil In Me manages to differentiate itself from previous Dark Pictures games by providing you with more action-based gameplay. There are puzzles to solve, and mini-games to complete, and the title provides you with more movement options; jogging as already mentioned, jumping, crawling, hiding from threats, balancing, and more.

Alongside the above, the game also introduces an inventory system with items that can be acquired, lost or given to other characters to help their survival. Each character also has a tool related to their profession; Charlie can use his business card to unlock drawers, Kate can use a pencil to shade over torn paper and uncover clues, Mark can use his camera to photograph clues and with flashes illuminate the environment, Jamie can rewire electrical circuits, and Erin can listen through walls with her microphone.

The majority of the characters’ tools are only used in specific situations, but they, along with all the new additions in the title, add some variety to The Devil In Me’s gameplay loop and help make the game feel a little more like a video game.

It doesn’t always work and can sometimes feel very slow, but fans of the cinematic, interactive movie genre shouldn’t be disappointed in the changes as the core gameplay of the Dark Pictures Anthology is still there, just with some extra gameplay mixed in.

How Long Is The Devil In Me?

The Devil In Me took us just eight hours to complete with a single playthrough, taking our time to explore, find collectables, and any clues related towards the game’s story. With several endings available and the unlikelihood of you saving everyone on your first playthrough, you can easily extend the playtime to up to 20 hours and more if you’re looking to platinum the game or grab all achievements.  

Is It Worth It?

The Devil In Me is worth it for anyone that enjoyed Supermassive Games’ previous titles – Until Dawn, The Quarry or the other Dark Pictures Anthology games – or for anyone that enjoys tropey horror stories and classic slasher films like Friday The 13^th and Scream, which The Devil In Me draws light inspiration from.

The core gameplay of The Devil In Me remains the same as previous Dark Anthology games, requiring you to make decisions and explore environments for clues and collectables. However, the added gameplay mechanics and puzzles heighten the game above the others for us, as it simply adds more game for you to do.

The story is engaging, although some of the decisions made by characters outside of our choice was frustrating (Kate commanding everyone to remain together before abruptly running off and separating the group, for example). However, unravelling the mystery behind the killer’s identity through clues, watching the characters develop (Or not) through your choices, and attempting to avoid prophesied deaths was incredibly fun.  

One of the high points of the game was the sheer terror experienced while exploring the Murder Castle, and the realisation of how the killer was manipulating the group both mentally and physically.

Although the game doesn’t get everything right, and it certainly has its flaws – the character facial animations, the shoddy performance, and the sheer bugs reported by players. However, The Devil In Me is still a fun experience, particularly if you enjoy other Supermassive Games or horror, and it’s well worth a purchase.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil In Me is available now for PC and all PlayStation and Xbox consoles.