Should Have Left It In The Ice?
HIGH Original creature ideas, interesting blend of action/RTS, quality-of-life updates.
LOW Monotonous level design, bland color palette, awkward menus and dated animations.
WTF Guy who says “we’re screwed!” then “it’s alright, I’m OK” a second later.
20 years after the release of the 1982 cult classic film, John Carpenter’s The Thing, Computer Artworks’ eponymous videogame served as an example of what the medium can do to both honor the source material and expand on it with an immersive experience for fans as they confront the same ancient horror that stalked an isolated Antarctica lab onscreen. More than 20 years after that release, Nightdive Studios has put out a remastered version with modernized graphics and quality-of-life updates.
The gameplay is best described as a third-person squad shooter, allowing the player to order squadmates to hold positions and carry out tasks while blasting enemies with a diverse arsenal of weapons and items. Since the player controls the leader, their decisions and actions have consequences that affect others — in this case, their levels of fear and trust.
Early on, the player is taught this mechanic and given a stun gun to use on a NPC as an example of how characters will become distrusting whenever the player hits or shoots them. The player must also take the sanity of characters into account, which is most often affected by enemies, but also the sight of blood and gore. The only way to restore their sanity is to give them shots of adrenaline, which are few and far between.
My first impressions were good. I had just rewatched the film before I started playing the game, so I was more than ready to explore the now-familiar locales and various references while giving it space to stand on its own — and it did just that, albeit with mixed results.
It began with a cutscene of my character and his squadmates who were dropped in with orders to eliminate whatever caused the deaths of the scientists featured in the film. The dialogue was rife with expletives and manly-sounding voice actors, as if the writers were trying to impress teenage boys with raunchy asides and constant ribbing. However, this did feel consistent with the film, as well as countless other ‘80s action-horror flicks.
That said, much of the writing felt cliché to the point that I tuned out during almost every cutscene, even when a squadmate or NPC died. During play, I never learned anything about them as people, just that they were scared, crazed or both. Unfortunately, the psychological element of managing these aspects never amounted to much, so it all just became a nuisance.
The graphics mostly hold up thanks in part to Nightdive’s facelift — but speaking of faces, some of the animations (and the facial expressions of fear-stricken soldiers in particular) are downright comical. I understand that there’s only so much that can be done without remaking a game from the ground up, but I wish Nightdive had done more to improve the soldiers’ puttylike faces and hideous, flappy mouth animations.
The levels were consistently atmospheric, although there’s not a ton of variety. Scenes go between desolate outdoor areas (where the cold will eventually force the team to find shelter or suffer damage) and claustrophobic indoor areas. The viewpoint can be varied between third-person and first-person, although I saw no benefit to either beyond personal preference.
Ordering teammates to complete certain tasks reminded me of action-RTS games like Pikmin, but unlike others in this genre that mainly focus on giving orders, The Thing also asks the player to manage several things for each soldier including ammo and, as previously mentioned, their level of trust/fear and sanity. The wheel menus used to make teammates do things, assume different positions, swap weapons and use items feel clunky and unintuitive. There were also unnecessary submenus, like one just for using keys.
The Thing itself doesn’t appear for a while, which builds up suspense leading to the first encounter, and this tension is supported by worldbuilding like bodies scattered throughout the labs and seeing sections of the world that were devastated by events from the film.
Once the player reaches the part of the campaign that takes place in a new location, a Norwegian lab, things start to heat up and the team’s resolve will be truly tested as they start to get paranoid about their friends and comrades becoming the Thing due to the creature’s ability to mimic other life forms — one soldier goes so far as to make everyone take blood tests lest they get a taste of his flamethrower, just as Mac (Kurt Russell) did in the film.
As readers who have seen the film will know, the Thing was originally unearthed and researched by the Norwegian scientists, so it follows that it would have had more time to evolve there without needing to conceal itself. As a result, both the difficulty and volume of enemies increased considerably, but there were issues.
I didn’t try combat in first-person so I can only speak for third — it’s not the most fluid, but otherwise fairly standard for a shooter as the player has a reticle which can be controlled with the right stick while strafing with the left and wheel menus for weapons and items. On the plus side, the developers graciously allow the player to auto-lock as they lay into enemies with shotguns, SMGs and pistols. On the other hand, the devs seemed to have some blindspots in other areas.
For example, the pacing of enemy waves. In some areas enemies would stop coming for a while until, all of a sudden, the next wave would be triggered as soon as I went out and re-entered a room, almost like a switch flipping. Similarly, enemies would sometimes go completely still and I could easily pick them off until I moved toward them just a little, reactivating their enemy AI and triggering them to attack again.
Pacing and AI aside, I appreciated that whoever was responsible for creature design on the original development team didn’t just rely on the film for ideas. I encountered a plethora of horrifying enemies, the highlight of which was the fleshy, wet-looking Rupture boss. The fight itself was also a highlight for me, as the towering beast had a wide array of lightning-fast attacks that were difficult to evade, but I soon remembered that — just as in the film — it was especially vulnerable to fire.
However, after that high point I was disappointed to find that the next area was as visually indistinct as much of what came before — gray was the dominant color inside the labs, and outdoor areas were primarily blue and white. This wouldn’t necessarily be a problem (it is set in Antarctica, after all) if it weren’t for the fact that many of the labs were structured in a similar way, leading me to ask myself: “Haven’t I been here before?“
Honestly, the most challenging about The Thing for me was knowing where to go, and it began to feel like a chore by the time I got further in… I was opening cookie-cutter doors in cookie-cutter areas only to find items that I didn’t need, eventually losing motivation to find a way forward.
Ultimately, The Thing: Remastered is mostly successful in recapturing the essence of the film, but it just didn’t give me good reasons to care about the characters, nor did it offer gameplay that was engaging enough for me to want to spend more time in such a dreary world without Kurt Russell there to fire things up. Even after being remastered, The Thing may have been better off left in the ice.
Rating: 6 out of 10
Disclosures: This game was developed by Nightdive Studios and Computer Artworks and published by Nightdive Studios. The game was obtained via publisher and it is currently available on PC, PS4/5 and XBO/X/S. It was obtained via publisher and reviewed for PC. Approximately 8 hours were devoted to the campaign mode. The game was not finished. There is no multiplayer mode.
Parents: This game is rated M by the ESRB for Blood and Gore, Language and Violence. The official description reads as follows: This is an action-adventure game in which players assume the role of a rescue team leader investigating the deaths of a science team in Antarctica. As players search for clues and survivors, they use machine guns, explosives, and flamethrowers to battle enemies (e.g., aliens, enemy soldiers). Combat is highlighted by realistic gunfire, explosions, screams of pain, and blood-splatter effects. Grenade blasts can result in enemies blowing up into chunks of flesh; some scenes depict mutilated corpses lying amid splatters of blood. One cutscene depicts a character shooting himself in the head. The words “sh*t” and “a*shole” appear in the game.
Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.
Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game features subtitles for dialogue during both cutscenes and gameplay, but there are no visual cues to accompany incoming enemy attacks. Therefore, it is ultimately not fully accessible.
Remappable controls: The controls can be remapped.
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