Cannibal Abduction Xbox Series X 7/10 “Leatherface Upstairs, Having a Quick 40 Winks” 🏠 @selewidev @transvaalgf #IndieGame #GameDev

In Cannibal Abduction, you play as Henry - a man who has borrowed his father’s car and is looking to spend time away from his parents; let his hair down, drive the open roads etc. and all was looking good until the engine blows and he is stuck in the middle of absolutely nowhere. 

His luck picks up when a very friendly man offers to take him back to his house and fix the car. Henry agrees, and off to the house they go. Whilst the man fixes the car, he notices tools in Henry’s car and asks about them, he learns that Henry has carpentry experience and asks if he could do him a favour and fix his wife's wardrobe upstairs. It’s a fair deal - he fixes the car, Henry fixes the wardrobe.

Now, on the one hand it was nice of Henry to help, but personally I have a rule in life - if a house looks like Leatherface may be upstairs having a quick 40 winks, I refuse to enter and run as fast as I can in any direction to get as far away as I possibly can. 

I understand that Henry would have to explain to his dad what had happened to the car, but I think that any truly loving father can understand that dodging a possibly cannibalistic family is more important than his nice car. Sadly for Henry, he doesn't live by my rules and well, spoiler alert! He gets chased by a cabbalistic madman.

Usually, I leave my list of negatives to the end of my reviews but I’m going to start with my - very few - negatives first. the small one being that the analogue stick took a bit of getting use to, it felt very sensitive and I found I was running back and forth, and side to side with just a slight flick of the stick - and, when a cannibal is chasing you, this is a bit of an inconvenience.

The bigger problem for me is that I just don’t care for this gameplay loop. Running back and forth to various wardrobes every 5-10 minutes just isn't very appealing. I get that being chased is scary but this has just never been my bag as, instead of feeling fear, after about the sixth time of being chased off whilst trying to do a puzzle or explore an area, I just feel irritation. My blood pressure rises not through fear, but with “I am going to snap the disc... wait, its digital... well, I’m just going to have to snap the whole console then”.

Now, I will give this game credit - there are lots of wardrobes within close proximity, and it is a good length for this type of loop so I definitely didn’t think it felt as egregious as it can with other titles, but it still bothered me towards the end.

Whilst I had those two issues, I really enjoyed everything else, it really gets a lot right. The atmosphere is fantastic, the use of music is perfection with the creaks of the floorboards indicating when the killer is near, and silence is used to great effect, so the juxtaposition between that and the sudden burst of music when you’re being chased really did get the adrenaline pumping.

The story is another highlight, and finding notes through the house was always engaging, they paint a creepy story. Notes in horror games can almost always be skippable, but not here. Also, the puzzles were easy to follow and I never felt myself lost or struggling, they all make sense and flow nicely.

The use of VHS static on screen worsening when the killer is close was a nice touch, when he is next to you the screen starts glitching out which makes the chases even more frantic as you can see just enough to get by, but it does hinder you in your most panicked moments.

The other thing that really keeps you on edge is that there are no safe rooms you save using VHS tapes that you find around the house and even the living room in which you save your game is not immune to a visit from the killer.

SUMMARY
With Night of Scissors bundled in as well, this is certainly worth your time, though the gameplay loop isn't my favourite, I’m sure plenty of people will have no problem with it, and even with my gripe I still had a lot of fun going through Cannibal Abduction.