The Quarry is a collection of horror clichés. The camp is the kind of place where you can take the scenic route and skinny dip in the old swimming hole, only to be dragged down to swampy hell by someone else. The protagonists of the game are the same as they were when it was first released. The stock formulas are broken down into their algorithmic core by this being a game. There's a shy man and an obsessed person on social media. There's the jock who says things like "we'll see about that" when he sees a no- swimming sign and "my beerdar is beeping" when he finds alcohol. Everyone is good looking, even the "nerds," and in typical slasher movie patter, they bicker about going back to school and who they want to get with.
The Quarry's writers are definitely in on the joke and the game drips in irony. This is not "elevated horror," if we take that term to mean anything, but a traditional slasher, even less shocking than recent creations. The film was a big influence on Until Dawn and Friday the 13th, but The Quarry is probably less that and more Friday the 13th. Will Byles cited Sleepaway Camp as well. Considering the protagonists face threats from ghosts, hillbillies, and bat creatures, you can choose your influence.
Everyone is good looking, even the "nerds," and in typical slasher movie patter, they bicker about going back to school and who they want to get with.
The Quarry is not a film, but there is a fixed perspective walking a la Silent Hill, some aiming of guns, and some collecting of items, like tarot cards, in the game.
That doesn't make it compelling. We're here because of the decision trees. Bandersnatch is a filmic analogue that is a bit different on this front, but there is something very Final destination about this unfolding sense of possible scares and deaths. Are you going to kick the door open or pick the lock? Do you stay on Mr. H's chair or go down a dark path? Jump over the boulders of a lake or hold your breath to escape a bat creature are some of the decisions that take the form of quick-time events. When you make a big decision, the shuddering screen shows "Path Chosen", which indicates a big problem in the story.
The Quarry's use of an antique mode, called a couch co-op, may go under the radar. The best place to play the game is when friends pick a teen and pass the controller around. My housemates, who think gaming is a pathology, settled in with some beers after I connected my PC to the projector. Everyone was playing a game of truth or dare. A character smashing their face into a low-hanging branch is always funny. She asked her followers if she should open the trap door and die. I opened the trap door when she said goodbye.
The game's rendering of faces still falls foul of the valley with characters' mouths sliding over toothsome grins. It is a game that is funny but not frightening, and it leaves me wanting a non-ironic slasher, something genuinely nasty and frightening, that puts the same format to use. The quarry is a great game to play. It reminds us that violent and scary fiction is good for bonding us together.
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