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The Hat Man: Shadow Ward [Game Review]

Game: The Hat Man: Shadow Ward

Genre: Survival horror

Developer: Game Mechanics

Publisher: Game Mechanics

Copy supplied by developer

The Hat Man: Shadow Ward is a first-person survival horror game set in an asylum developed and published by Game Mechanics.

STORY

You play as either the father or mother of Virginia Berry, who disappeared from the asylum where she was being treated for attempting suicide. As you go and investigate her disappearance, you find no one in the asylum and you start looking for pages from your daughter's journal while being chased by a shadowy figure.

Unlike most horror games of this nature, reading the notes and discovering what your daughter was living through is more interesting than simply looking at doodles and drawings of the monster. Unfortunately, the plot really goes nowhere and is disposable at best for the game.

GRAPHICS

As far as Unity games go, this doesn't stand out from the crowd. The environments are polished and I didn't encounter a single bug, but the rooms all look the same and it becomes really hard to navigate the environment. The design of the titular villain and the shadow people isn't really scary, and once you see them the built-up scariness disappears.

GAMEPLAY

Similarly to Slenderman: The Eight Pages, you must move through the environment looking for pages while avoiding being caught by the Hat Man. You will also need to find some objects to open new areas and further explore the asylum. The pages are really easy to find since they make a noise when you are near them, and the shadow people can be "defeated" by hitting'em with your flashlight "Alan Wake style".

CHALLENGE

The game is really easy to beat, and the antagonist showed up rarely and was really slow and easy to avoid.

SOUND

The voice acting for both the father and mother is hilariously bad, and that alone is worth playing the game. There is only one piece of music, and is the relaxing one that plays at the radio. There are also some ambient noises, and luckily no screamers or loud jumpscares.

REPLAYABILITY

After having beaten the game, you can replay it to unlock the 11 achievements that require you to beat the game as fast as possible and find and listen to all the diary pages.

The game is creepy most of the times, but the boring level design, poorly developed ghosts and short length make the game feel more boring than it needed to be. However, I recommend this game for the voice acting and really cheap price to support the developers to create a better product.

Story: 6

Graphics: 7

Gameplay: 5

Challenge: 3

Sound: 5

Replayability: 4

ENJOYMENT: 6

FRUSTRATION: 3

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