“We have such sights to show you,” is the iconic line spoken in 1987’s unique horror film, Hellraiser. Written and directed by author/director/visual artist, Clive Barker, it went on to spawn a number of sequels, of varying levels of quality. Now, it’s the basis of a new video game, called Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival.
All of the above began with a novella, too; that being Barker’s 1986 release, The Hellbound Heart.
Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival begins with main characters and couple, Aidan and Sunny, engaging in sexual acts. Both sexual deviants, who like to stretch the limits of their sexuality, they seem to spend a lot of time in bed. Their house is a testament to this, as it’s seen better days, is littered with sex toys and used condoms, and more, as well as past due bill notices. Sunny, herself, is some sort of art collector or gallery employee, whereas Aidan is a medical school dropout who was involved with a biker gang called the Hellraisers, and spent time in jail. Both come from affluent families, though.
During this latest sexual activity, the two pull out a strange box and engage with it as they do with each other. In the process, this (puzzle) box — the Genesis Configuration — is solved, and starts to emit electricity. The two decide to further their pleasure and deviancy by rubbing it against their skin, causing shocks and cuts. Then, the wall suddenly opens and Pinhead and his fellow Cenobites come into the room. They promise Sunny incredible plateaus of pain and valleys of pleasure, and she takes them up on it. Following that, she’s torn apart by chains that appear out of nowhere, and taken into the mysterious Labyrinth by the mutated former humans who serve it, but are not true demons.
Feeling that he can’t live without her, Aidan goes after Sunny, and ends up fighting his way through environments, situations and scenarios that he never could have dreamt of. Thus begins a campaign that mixes survival horror with melee combat, first-person shooting and fleeing from danger.
Hellraiser: Revival sends Aidan into the Labyrinth, but it also has him dealing with a strange cult headed by a man named Marlowe who thinks he’s been chosen by the Leviathan, which rules the realm. Comprising a large part of the campaign, his dealings with this cult have him venturing through their headquarters, exploring a strange, BDSM, sex club, and more. Along the way, he will encounter an ‘artist’ named Bruno who likes to cut people, combine carcasses, and use his scalpel as his paintbrush; the Sister of Mercy and Marlowe.
The environments are adorned by various works of ‘art,’ both bloody and paint-based, as it seems that Bruno is also quite the painter. There are also notes, diaries, ramblings and Bible-style entries about the cult, Leviathan, Cenobites, etc. While in Aidan and Sunny’s home, the player can also find post-it notes that give some more insight into their relationship, which certainly isn’t perfect. Both are flawed human beings.
Within the Labyrinth, Aidan is completely out of his (and any human’s) element. While there, during a number of segments, players must make their way through maze-like hallways, which change and transform. In one moment, players will be moving forward, just to have the Chatterer (the Cenobite whose teeth are always chattering) appear and chase them in the opposite direction. There are a number of chases involving him, and he will appear out of the blue, forcing the player to change course quickly. These segments are anxiety-driven, disturbing and creepy.
Other times spent in the Labyrinth involve exploring it, hiding from Leviathan, timing movements to avoid moving/spinning saws, traps and spikes, and solving environmental puzzles. You see, Aidan often has the Genesis Configuration box in his left hand, and can use it to move platforms, shift the environment and move special boxes in order to progress.
The box also factors into combat, which takes the form of a mix between first-person shooting and first-person melee combat, with stealth also available. Over the course of the game, the box will be bestowed with a few different abilities, including being able to absorb (and shoot out) fire, telekinesis (to grab blades, spikes and the like, then fire them at foes to try to hurt and dismember them), and one more. The latter involves chains, and is really effective.
Using the Genesis Configuration in combat requires suffering, which is something that fills a meter in the corner of the screen. It’s pretty generous though.
When possible, it’s best to use stealth kills to take out enemies, be they human cultists wearing leather gimp suits or undead/demonic monsters. This involves sneaking up behind them and pressing A, which will use Aidan’s equipped melee weapon to do a nasty stealth kill. When he doesn’t have one equipped, his knife is used. The knife is always there, and is his base melee weapon. The others (baseball bats, machetes, saw-like knives, cricket bats and other blades) take up inventory space. They also break after a limited amount of usage, and can be repaired before they finally break and get tossed. However, repair kits are rare to find, cost money in the shop, and also take up important inventory space. There are quite a few melee weapons to find and buy, anyway.
Melee combat involves pressing the right trigger to attack, then stepping away from incoming attacks by pressing the left thumb stick and a shoulder button to evade. One can go in for a couple hits, evade, and then repeat.
There are also a surprising amount of firearms to be found within Hellraiser: Revival, but seemingly only one of each type. Aidan gets a pistol early on, then comes across a shotgun. Other types of guns can be purchased from the otherworldly, but human presenting vendor, and those are an SMG, an assault rifle and a magnum. However, since this is a survival horror game and not a first-person shooter, at least first and foremost, ammunition is limited. It can be found in boxes that can be broken, in locked cabinets (which must be manually picked, provided one has a breakable lock pick), crafted, and purchased, but buying it is pricey. Guns are also loud, so they aren’t always the best option.
Each of those bullet-based weapons can be upgraded, using ones found through expiration and (many) that can be purchased with discovered coins and money earned by selling discovered artifacts. Said upgrades can increase the amount of ammo in a clip, provide extra damage or change the makeup of the fired cartridges, as in the case of the shotgun. The best upgrade I bought made it so that my shotgun shells had a fire effect, which damaged enemies more than just shooting them did. It was very helpful.
The melee combat found within this game is decent and effective, but imperfect and occasionally frustrating because of that. The same is basically true of the stealth and gunplay, which do the job but aren’t great or without issues. It’s all fine, but there were times where it didn’t seem like my bullets hit, and it was sometimes difficult to know where enemies were and where they were shooting from. Thankfully, they aren’t very good shots, and Aidan has a good amount of health. He can upgrade it late in the game, and can manage it by using bandages or med kits. These can be crafted (like ammunition), which requires ingredients found within the environments. They can take up a lot of inventory space too, because — much like any kind of animation box — med kits are quite large. Bandages aren’t, though, and only take up one small square.
Before we move on, and continue talking about the gameplay, I need to talk about the inventory, which I’ve hinted about too much to not have explained. That’s because Hellraiser: Revival features a Resident Evil style inventory system, where there are limited slots to house things of varying sizes. Guns are big, and take up a lot of room. The same is true of some melee weapons. As such, the player must use the auto sort option, or manually move things around to make room. It’s possible to rotate things, drop things and move things to a storage box that can be accessed every so often (usually when the vendor is nearby). I spent a lot of time organizing my inventory, to try to fit one more thing in, and had to store some weapons because I didn’t have room for them.
I can’t say I’m a big fan of this inventory system, but it is familiar to me as a fan of the genre. It’s also nice that Aidan can find upgrades that expand its size. I found maybe four of those, if not more. They weren’t too, too, difficult to find, but I also took my time and tried to thoroughly explore the game world.
Crafting materials do not get stored in the main inventory, but there are unlisted limits regarding how many of each type (cloth, chemicals, gun powder, etc.) can be held at one time.
Progressing through this game involves defeating enemies, finding keys (some of which are quite odd) and finding items that are missing from puzzles and doors, be they skulls, hearts, a bell or puzzle pieces. At times, puzzles will have to be solved, things will have to be put in order and stuff like that. None of it is all that difficult, and hints are often available within the environments. However, there are certain times where the player must change the design of the Genesis Configuration box to make it fit into different shaped holes. This involves pulling the two sides apart, moving pieces and changing its size and shape. This includes making each side different, and then putting them back together and hoping it will fit. I found this to be a bit difficult, and wasn’t a big fan of the controls. It often boiled down to trial and error. Thankfully, these puzzles were limited.
Over the course of this twelve or thirteen hour-long campaign, players will encounter about four different bosses, one of whom is repeated. They’ll also do battle against a bastardized creature that is made up of a mishmash of parts, and this acts as a mini-boss of sorts. It appears three or four times, and takes quite a bit to down.
The boss battles, as a whole, are solid but unspectacular. None of them are bad, but they aren’t great either. Certain aspects of them can be frustrating, and they can also use up a lot of your resources. I had an issue during one, where I kept getting stuck in a run animation, fell a small distance and lost a surprising amount of health. The final boss also may have glitched, as I ran out of ammo and couldn’t gain any suffering to use the chains afterwards, despite using the knife on it. I had to restart that fight.
These bugs can be fixed, though. I didn’t encounter many others, but received the game at launch, meaning I likely used the day one patch. There were no crashes, but there was a small amount of slowdown at times, though so little that it’s almost not worth mentioning. I also reloaded a save, because it seemed like two rooms were glitching together at one point. Thankfully, this game has a number of save points, where Aidan sticks his hand into a hole in the wall, and it autosaves frequently.
Those who’ve watched Hellraiser, and any of its sequels, will know what to expect from the content in this game. However, if you aren’t familiar with this somewhat niche horror series, then be warned: Hellraiser: Revival is a dark, gruesome and — to put it simply — disgusting game. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen such gore, visceral content or nudity in any other game. There’s tons of all of the above, including scenes where people are pulled apart, their skin is flayed, and where limbs are cut off. This game is not for those who don’t like blood, gore, and severe adult content. The themes found herein are not for children, or for the squeamish or easily bothered by blood, guts, violence, drugs, sex and nudity. If any of this doesn’t appeal to you, play something else. Hellraiser is a unique beast and, while Boss Team Games and Saber Interactive nailed the look, feel, atmosphere, storytelling and unique content, the result is a game that will absolutely disgust a lot of people.
I’ve been watching horror movies, playing the games and reading similar books for decades. I’ve also likely seen all of the Hellraiser films (Inferno was a nice surprise that has stuck with me, and Bloodlines was a decent direct-to-video sequel, too). Hell, I even had the pleasure of meeting Clive Barker and Doug Bradley approximately twenty-two years ago, at Toronto’s Fan Expo/Rue Morgue Festival of Fear. They were both incredibly nice, and Clive even took my friend’s screenplay. I got a copy of Abarat (one of his fantasy series) doodled in and signed, and Doug Bradley (Pinhead) signed my Hellraiser 1 & 2 DVD collector’s tin. I’ve been a fan of this series since high school, but am not a gorehound by any means. Gore does not need to be a part of a horror movie for me to like it, and some have too much. I’m also squeamish when I watch certain things like plastic surgery TV shows. This game didn’t bother me, but it’s extreme in every way.
Playing through Hellraiser: Revival feels like playing through an interactive reboot of the film series, and it’s wonderful for fans like me. It’s a very cinematic experience, which looks rather great, thanks to fantastic art direction and effort put into both the models and the varied environments. Things are detailed, bloody and unique, with lots of nice touches, including the art and sculptures (some of which were made out of corpses).
The writing found herein is strong, and the story goes places that I didn’t expect it to. The trailers were kind of misleading, but in a good way. I’m also glad that they got Doug Bradley to reprise his role as Pinhead, because he is the character and does a wonderful job yet again. I wasn’t positive that it was him until the credits rolled the first time (I reloaded my last save to get the other ending), but thought to myself that — if it wasn’t — whoever had voiced Pinhead did a great job making him sound like I remembered.
The main characters aren’t unique or standout people, in terms of personalities or designs, but they fit in well here. They’re flawed, well acted and really suit this franchise. I liked their voice actors. Furthermore, the music (including a couple of fitting licensed tracks), sound effects and other noises were all very well done. The atmosphere is great.
That said, I did notice that the final cutscenes sounded lower in volume than others, especially in terms of dialogue.
With all that having been said, I likely don’t need to state that I recommend Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival. It’s a quality game, but one that is rough around the edges and doesn’t have the best combat. It absolutely nails its source material, though, and does a great job of rebooting one of horror’s strangest major series. Fans of Hellraiser are sure to love and appreciate it, but those who aren’t may want to consider things before buying. After all, this game has such sights to show you, and they feature a lot of blood, guts, sex, nudity, and violence.
Surprisingly, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival also released as a budget title, with a retail price of $40 USD or around $54 Canadian. That’s another positive, and another reason why it’s so easy to recommend this game, including at full price. I would have felt like it was worth it if the price had been the average for new releases, but it’s not. That’s awesome!
This review is based on the XBOX Series X version of the game, which we were provided with.