Horny teenagers need to stop going camping. That’s the primary lesson I took away from my time spent with The Quarry, a new horror adventure from Supermassive Games that aims to indulge in cliches almost as much as subverting them.
Given that The Dark Pictures anthology still has several planned games, this feels like an unusual detour from the studio more akin to an Until Dawn successor than a wholly independent experience, and I mean that in every sense of the word. The cast consists of a mixture of lovable and detestable teenagers each with their own archetypal personality traits that you’ll come to root for and despise in equal measure. The narrative of course revolves around a nostalgic vacation gone wrong as spooky monsters and other unusual threats appear to ruin the fun.
Our cast of characters this time around consists of Brenda Song, Ariel Winter, Ted Raimi, David Arquette, Lance Henrikson, Justice Smith, and a host of other names that suggest Supermassive Games pumped some serious money into its ensemble, presumably to have all of them murdered in a series of groteseque ways if we fail to save them. These names are more than enough for me to jump in, offering an initial novelty that soon gave way to a creative approach to horror that I’m curious to see develop in the full game.
I’ll start by saying that you’ll likely feel like you’ve played The Quarry before if you’ve touched any of the studio’s output in the last decade. My preview begins as the cast gathers around a campfire, ready to settle in for the night and spend a final evening together before going off to college. Drinks are poured, tea is spilt, and an impromptu game of truth of dare provide us with dialogue options to unearth the insecurities of certain characters before shit hits the fan. For example, I can ask a friend if she’s ever slept with anyone in the group or opt for a more innocent line of questioning, all while having no idea how people will respond.
Dialogue options are now narrowed down to two simple choices, each of which corresponds to a specific emotion or tone with clear consequences. I know being direct will likely piss someone off, while remaining reserved will lessen the risk of confrontation later down the line. The Quarry makes it clear when you deviate down a narrative path where there is no return, while more spontaneous and singular choices like planting a kiss on someone or deciding to kill an oncoming monster are represented by more immediate prompts.
You switch character perspectives between scenes, which feels more discordant in The Quarry than it does in Until Dawn and The Dark Pictures because of how fast the narrative appears to progress. While my preview didn’t feature the first chapter, in under an hour I meet this cast of characters for the first time and encountered the monsters in the woods without really having enough time to get to know them. I’m definitely missing some context here, or The Quarry is aiming to subvert the Friday the 13th inspired tale it initially pitched as its centrepiece. Nothing is as it seems, and that’s equal parts exciting and confusing to me.
I wouldn’t object to this being a survival horror that revels in classic tropes while effectively subverting them with fun little twists, but part of me would love to see Supermassive Games think outside the box, or to admit it’s been hiding a massive part of this game from the public eye given the star-studded cast and fairly traditional setting. Is it really just monsters in the woods and hunters with ulterior motives as our characters are killed one by one before the inevitable conclusion, or is there something more at work? I can’t tell, but the overzealous pacing and immediacy in which the monster and other such threats are revealed doesn’t work for me right now, because beyond Brenda Song’s Kaitlyn I don’t care about them.
She’s badass, and I’ve a soft spot for her performance after being obsessed with Amphibia in recent months. Kaitlyn is a smart and level-headed character who clearly isn’t afraid to have some fun with her friends. One early scene has the clichéd jock rock up to camp with a loaded shotgun, swinging it around like he’s compensating for something. This soon descends into a friendly spot of competition at the firing range where Kaitlyn teaches two clueless boys how to shoot while chiming them in on gun safety.It’s both a tutorial and a clever piece of character development for all involved, teaching us how to shoot a gun that will clearly save our lives in the coming hours while also feeling grounded and realistic.
It’s a shame The Quarry doesn’t give us more moments like this in the early hours, except a cutesy dive in the nearby lake and wayward conversations by the campfire. The best part of horror is often the anticipation, having our anxiety increase as small clues are fed to us in the form of distant imagery or subtle dialogue that tease how wrong things are going to go. From the snapshot I witnessed, this game doesn’t have that going for it like Until Dawn or even The Dark Pictures manage to conjure up. I’m convinced I’m merely missing something though, and a bunch of surprises are waiting to be unveiled.
When monsters and similar threats emerge the chase sequences are a tense delight. I took control of Justice Smith as I’m handed a shotgun and ordered to march into the woods and find our missing friend. I can choose to follow the direct path or a riskier shortcut, with the prompts increasing in difficulty depending on what I opt for. Instead of button presses, The Quarry uses flicks of the thumbstick for all actions I come across, the specific direction I need to push in only surfacing moments before I need to act. This is cool, although the prompts aren’t exactly clear at first meaning a few mistakes didn’t feel earned. Until Dawn and The Dark Pictures are so brilliant in their horror because when a character dies it really feels like you messed up, while here, even though nobody croaked it, I felt cheated. The full game will likely expand upon things, but this small slice doesn’t inspire confidence.
I’m mixed on The Quarry right now, even though I know the final product will be a cheesy, self-indulgent horror outing that me and so many other genre fans will eat up even if it fails to build upon the formula or try anything new. It has enough talent, enough potential, and a compelling enough setting to do some creative things. I just hope it takes enough time to develop its sprawling cast and doesn’t turn the monsters into lurking shadows that fail to inspire any kind of fear within us. Besides, if we don’t care about the characters and why they’re fighting to survive, all of this falls apart anyway.
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