Meeting point between the specialist studio Supermassive Games and the Dead of Daylight universe, The Casting of Frank Stone is a narrative horror game that forgets to be exhilarating. Our review.
Formerly attached to more minor projects, Supermassive Games has become in the space of a video game (Until Dawn in 2015) a specialist in narrative horror games. Since then, the studio has made it an obsession. It has become infatuated with Bandai Namco to produce an anthology — the American Horror Story video game — and take the reins of Little Nightmares. He also approached publisher Behaviour Interactive to explore the potential of the asymmetrical multiplayer game Dead by Daylight — in his own way, of course.
The result is The Casting of Frank Stonea meeting point between developers who love to scare people and a universe that has attracted a huge number of people since 2016 (40,000 players on average in recent months, just on Steam). This marriage seems a priori reasonable, yet the honeymoon is ultimately far from idyllic. Indeed, The Casting of Frank Stone is deeply boring.
Points forts
- Dead of Daylight, in a different light
- The story worthy of the genre
- The ability to replay scenes
Weak points
- Technically behind the times
- Bite in interactions
- Gameplay bancal
The Casting of Frank Stone would have been a good series
“Action” scenes
When Frank Stone finally shows up, you have to fight him. But these action scenes are just pointing a camera at him and filming him… We’ve seen more thrilling stuff.
In itself, the story of The Casting of Frank Stone is not uninteresting. It is even mystical enough to captivate for a few hours. It revolves around a serial killer, who cursed a film made by teenagers several years after his death in a macabre place (which attracts a little too many crowds, of course). We then follow the destiny of several characters through different eras, destiny on which we can act according to our choices (and our ability to react in certain decisive moments).
We are too often passive when playing The Casting of Frank Stone
In addition to a slow and choppy pace, the problem lies in the multiplication of scenes where ultimately not much happens. Supermassive Games plays happily with this latent feeling of tension, keeping the player in suspense, often for nothing. It abuses this subterfuge a little too much, so we are far too often passive while playing The Casting of Frank Stone. Several passages even feel like missed interaction appointments — those famous QTEs that require pressing a button at a precise timing. Oddly enough, The Casting of Frank Stone in need.
Added to this is a rather heavy gameplay: as soon as you have to perform contextual actions, it’s a bit of a struggle. There is no fluidity that emerges from The Casting of Frank Stonesince you sometimes have to position yourself precisely to validate a choice. When you don’t bump into an invisible wall for no valid reason… The rare moments when you play, the Supermassive Games title hams it up a bit too much to make you want to explore the settings in search of collectibles that feed the understanding of the story. However, the studio has a hell of a legacy to refine its proposition.
The Casting of Frank Stone is not helped either by its glaring technical deficit, even on PlayStation 5. The debt is quite significant, with too many bugs for such a short lifespan (barely six hours) and textures that are painful to see. We even had the character who suddenly turns into chewing gum and ends up with his head upside down (see screenshot below). This is unworthy of a game that relies heavily on atmosphere and immersion to plunge us as close as possible to the horror. Here, we tend to laugh rather than scream with fear. There is no excuse for the unity of place, since Supermassive Games relies on fairly narrow areas, with a mastery that should be infallible.
The goal of the game is to finish the adventure with as many survivors as possible. This is not an easy task, when you know that the consequences of your choices are quite difficult to guess. Never mind, the developers thought of offering the Editing Room, a place where you can see all the available branches. This allows, ultimately, to redo certain scenes by taking another path to see if the changes are really drastic. Spoiler: it is often illusory.
The verdict
We liked
- Dead of Daylight, in a different light
- The story worthy of the genre
- The ability to replay scenes
We liked less
- Technically behind the times
- Bite in interactions
- Gameplay bancal
What happens when horror studio Supermassive Games delves into the horror universe of Dead by Daylight? Well… not much. The Casting of Frank Stone had all the makings of a dream wedding. But, this narrative game turns out to be far too soft to captivate, despite a story worthy of the genre.
The Casting of Frank Stone also has its share of fatal flaws, both related to its shaky gameplay and its lack of technical solidity. As it stands, it is difficult to recommend this game, which proves that Supermassive Games is getting bogged down in a sub-genre that has been running out of steam for many titles already. For the next Halloween party, we will rather relaunch Until Dawn.
Source: www.numerama.com
