A Found Footage Nightmare in the Labyrinth of Liminal Spaces?
Horror games have been heavily influenced by the zeitgeist of Backrooms and Liminal Spaces.
For those unfamiliar with this trend, Liminal Spaces are places that have been abandoned and unused, creating an eerie and surreal atmosphere. Backrooms expand on this aesthetic, featuring spaces that bend reality and defy dimensional logic.
Whatever, expect to find corridors, as well as vast rooms with strange, ghostly creatures or objects as common features in these games.
In The Backrooms 1998, we once again find ourselves trapped in a hellish space, trying to find our way out. Can you escape with your sanity intact?
A Found Footage Nightmare
The Backrooms 1998 is a genuinely scary game, all created and put together by a single developer. It’s a survival horror experience presented in the style of an escape room, with a story told through that of found footage, beginning with a teenager filming himself and his friends skateboarding in a skatepark. He falls and suddenly finds himself in a Backroom – a series of strange corridors and rooms with cryptic instructions, furniture, and looping areas. Behind one door lurks a terrifying monster, and you need to escape. Quickly…
Throughout my time with The Backrooms 1998, I appreciated the sense of disorientation and mystery. You, as the player, are trying to understand what’s happening alongside the main character. The environment is spooky and unsettling, and the protagonist’s shouts for his friends and exclamations about the predicament they find themselves in add to the atmosphere. And without any form of spoiler, at the end of the game, there’s a detailed explanation of the events and story. Yes, some players might find this a bit unnecessary, but others will most certainly appreciate it.
Hide and Seek with a Monster
This is a first-person survival horror experience. You navigate the rooms, taking in the shadow of yourself holding the camera visible on screen. You can run, but your stamina depletes quickly. You find a flashlight early on, but you need to scavenge for batteries to keep it powered.
You have a small inventory for items like keys and objects needed for the final escape. There’s also a paint gun you can use to mark walls and help you navigate the maze-like environment. However, it’s when the monster appears that the real survival horror begins. You can’t fight it, only hide in lockers or under tables until it passes.
To make matters more challenging, if you’re using a microphone (streamers beware!), the monster will hear your noise or breathing and come for you. It also reacts to the sound of footsteps on broken glass, adding another layer of tension. This is a good mechanic, but it does feel familiar to that found in multiple other horror games. And, for me, limited save points are another frustration, and I found myself repeating sections numerous times.
Distorted Visions and Liminal Spaces
Since most of the game is viewed through a 90’s camcorder, the visuals are often distorted by glitches and screen fuzz. This feels like it is authentic to the found footage style, but can be annoying at times. The level design is good though, with some great use of Liminal Spaces and unsettling imagery. Drawings on the walls are genuinely creepy, and, of course, the old-fashioned mannequin makes an appearance. Further to that, the lighting effects are excellent, and the monster design is scary, at least at first glance.
The audio design found in The Backrooms 1998 is fantastic. The jump scare sound effects are some of the best I’ve heard in recent times, genuinely making me jump out of my skin. The crackling and hissing score, as well as the constant, unsettling drone that plays out are incredibly effective and terrifying. The voice-over work is also very good, adding to the immersive quality of the experience.
A Short but Chilling Journey into the Backrooms
The Backrooms 1998 is a great horror game, albeit one that is pretty short. You may enjoy the earlier aspects more than those that play out later down the line, but throughout a playthrough you’ll find some excellent sound and visual designs, as a real sense of menace plays out.
My only real criticism is that the gameplay mechanics, particularly the hiding and collecting objects to escape, feel somewhat overused. But on the whole, The Backrooms 1998 is an experience well worth taking in.
The Links to Horror
Feardemic Unleashes Found Footage Horror with The Backrooms 1998 – https://www.thexboxhub.com/feardemic-unleashes-found-footage-horror-with-the-backrooms-1998/
Buy The Backrooms 1998 on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/the-backrooms-1998/9MWD9C99HGXT
