We’ve gotten to the point where Slender Man has cemented a place in our pop culture mythos. A true “child of the internet,” Slender Man was literally created before our eyes, but has bypassed our computer screens to become a thing of real horror. A thing where little girls stab their friend in his name, to herald his arrival.
That’s scary enough in its own right, isn’t it?
But that’s not enough, and his legend continues to grow. He’s become the embodiment of the unknown, and preys upon the weak, feeding off their fears, and sometimes, making them do his bidding.
He causes electronics to malfunction, hides amongst the most rural of areas, and does the most harm when you look directly at him. In today’s world, where some people live directly through the lens of their smart phones and computers, having a creature that cuts us off from our technological safety net really is the stuff of nightmares.
No, no, no, no, no…
And while all of upon is strictly made up (except for the part about the little girls), these threads tie together in a mostly cohesive way for Slender: The Arrival. A sequel to the indie hit Slender: The Eight Pages, The Arrival takes everything that was good about the first game and makes it great.
As far as games go, it’s very minimal. There are no weapons, save for a flashlight you pick up in the second stage. You wander around rural areas, looking for pages, picking them up to learn as much as you can. There is no hope of fighting back against Slender Man and his proxies…your own strategy is to run and hide as best you can before they over take you.
There is no real reason as to why they are after you; they just are. And your only job is to try to stay as far a way as possible from them. Of course, they will always be lurking around the next bend. Slender Man himself can even teleport, so there is no true escape from his tentacley-arms reaching for you.
Even after you’ve played the game once, twice, seven times, you’ll still manage to be surprised by what it throws at you. The levels are mostly dark, and are best played in a dark room. Your only real hope is a barely functioning flashlight, and even that can cause massive tension when it lands suddenly on the white visage of Slender Man’s face among the darkness and the trees.
The jump scares are plentiful here, and almost non-stop. Every creak of a branch, every blow of the wind will leave you on edge. Even when there is no apparent danger directly in front of you, you will be on the edge of your seat, afraid to look, in fear of him being there.
NOPE.
I found myself constantly in a state of stress while playing…even noises in the REAL world would cause me to jump. Over the course of a long game, this would probably take its toll on the player, but thankfully, The Arrival comes in at just over 2 hours. That seems like a reasonable amount of time for someone to have a heart attack, right?
The ONLY downside I can find to the entire experience is the new things they added for console releases. The original PC version of the game was basically a frantic, dizzying mystery. With some of the things added, some of the mystery is gone. Slender Man is established as some being from another world, and raises a few more questions, such as WHY is he doing this, where exactly did he come from, and so on. But, perhaps these things will be answered in a feature installment.
Overall, Slender: The Arrival still got under my skin with its creepy atmosphere and effective, yet minimal, gameplay. If you’re a fan of games that will surely creep you out, this is definitely for you.
