In 2015, Sony released Until Dawn on the PS4 with little fanfare compared to most of its other releases. Originally announced for the PS3 specifically for use with the Move controller, the game ended up getting some critical acclaim and quite a fan following that was rewarded with a VR spin-off and a short prequel. A film version is scheduled to come out in April 2025, so Sony felt it was time to get the hype train rolling by releasing a remake of the game on both the PS5 and PC.

Until Dawn takes place in the snowy peaks of Blackwood Mountain in Colorado. Several friends are in a private lodge partying it up when a prank gone wrong causes one of the friends, Hannah, to run off into the woods in embarrassment. Her sister Beth gives chase, and even though they find each other, the two end up falling off a cliff and are presumed missing, possibly dead. A year later, their brother Josh decides to invite everyone back to the cabin to try and party it up again in hopes of healing. Everyone ends up going, but things go horribly wrong. They call for help, but no one else will be able to make it there until dawn.

This is a horror game and, as such, the story adheres to the genre's many tropes, which will be very familiar with those who enjoy the teen slasher variety of the genre: bouts of terror that could be supernatural, secrets are hidden away for the safety of the group but end up backfiring, and the lack of help in a timely manner. The characters all fulfill their typical roles, from the nerd to the jock to the stuck-up queen bee — and the one destined to be the final girl. What elevates the game is how these character stereotypes get fleshed out more to make everyone feel multidimensional. It's a likeable cast, even though you already know not to get too attached to anyone.

From a gameplay perspective, Until Dawn is an adventure game in the same vein as a Telltale Games title. A good chunk of the game is spent watching things play out as if it were a movie. You do a good deal of walking around, and you'll examine items to get more lore and other information. The game is littered with moments where you need to make a decision that'll change how the story plays out, and some of those moments come with quick time events (QTE) that will also shape the situation and the story.

What makes this title stand out is the breadth of choices and available story paths. The game keeps track of almost every little thing you do, so there's always a nagging feeling that a scene would play differently if you made a different choice. More importantly, the game feels more fluid because it has no real fail states. If you think about the game's contemporaries, there are moments where failing a QTE means the game is over because a character dies before they're supposed to. That isn't the case in Until Dawn, as failing any event never ends the game. You can get someone killed, and the game will keep going as if it were part of the intended script; you'll only realize this once you go for another playthrough and make a different series of decisions that causes someone in the cast to be OK. However, the game really wants you to commit to those decisions and failures, as there is only one save file and no way to save scum your way to a better ending. You'll either have to see things through to the end or decide to restart the journey at the beginning.

It's a neat system, since it feels like there's more than just an obvious outcome to work toward. However, it is a system that works much better than another mechanic: each character's various meters. These meters symbolize how good or bad your relationships (and other traits) are with others in the game, but they seem to make no difference in the game. You can get one character to be absolutely disgusted with another, but it won't change their overall outcomes. It's a mechanic that is largely ignored to the point where only a few people will notice its existence before promptly ignoring it.

The remake takes the opportunity to change a few things from the original game. Some scenes, such as the prologue, are extended to provide some more context about what's going on. A few new areas are present to give players a little more to look at, even if it doesn't lead to anywhere important. Looking at totems means having to find a hotspot before their visions can be seen; the mechanic can feel like a step backward when the original game simply activated the scene without the need for hotspot hunting. Perhaps one of the more important changes is the addition of a few new ending scenes that leave the series open for some real sequels instead of spin-offs. For longtime fans, this is pretty good news.

One of the more welcome changes has to do (partially) with the controls. Picking up and flipping over objects is much easier, since you don't have to find the sweet spot. Without a gyroscopic controller, the sections where you need to stay still are translated well with a bar that moves periodically, forcing you to move to keep it within a certain area. Button prompts for choices and conversations are responsive, but there are a few moments where movement can feel sluggish. There was a camera change to make the perspective more in line with a typical third-person game instead of something that mimics the camera used in the old Silent Hill and Resident Evil titles. Luckily, that only seems to happen in calmer situations, so it isn't a hindrance for the game's more important moments.

The original title still looks good today, so the graphical upgrade acts more as touch-ups rather than a full revamp. Skin shows more detail. The environments sport some better lighting and ray tracing, but the game is often dark enough that the use of the technology feels gratuitous. The animations are mostly good, but mouth movements can still feel exaggerated. The game moves at a high frame rate, with only a few cut scenes going down to 30fps due to their pre-recorded nature.

The audio also remains superb. The voice acting is excellent, and the same can be said for the effects. The score is perfect for the genre, while the licensed songs feel like a throwback to 1990s teen slasher films, which featured rock and pop bands of the day. It's good if you never heard the songs in the original game, which did a better job of setting up a somber mood when appropriate, and that soundtrack is more in line with what modern horror fans may expect.

The problem with the presentation lies in the numerous bugs. We're checking out Until Dawn before patch 1.06 is set to drop, and some of the issues from launch still linger, such as body parts and clothing mysteriously snapping into place once a camera change occurs. The opening movie that explains the butterfly effect frequently goes silent. Some animations have awkward transitions, while some QTE prompts remain visible for too long and some subtitles for long sentences show up for a split second. When you consider that this occurs often since the game is mostly an interactive movie, the whole thing feels like it was rushed out the door to meet a deadline. The game is receiving technical patches at a decent pace, though.

Steam Deck users will find that the game's page shows an Unsupported badge. If you try to run the game on the Deck, you'll be met with several errors referring to libScePad not being installed on Windows. Keep going, and you'll go through a shader cache phase before reaching the Accessibility options. However, you'll be stopped by the prompt to log in to the PlayStation Network with no way to actually log in to PSN (even if you've previously done so with another game). The mandatory requirement for a PSN login for a game that has no multiplayer component or even Trophies is starting to actively hurt Sony's games. Users on Linux PCs are reporting that they can do some tinkering to get the game working well enough.

Players are going to have mixed feelings about the Until Dawn remake. The story remains as cheesy as ever, while the characters and performances elevate the experience. The changes are mostly good, with the better camera and touched-up graphics winning out over the changing of the soundtrack. However, the game really needed more time to polish out the bugs, especially since there's still plenty of time to get things before the movie hits. It's still a good title, but it could've been so much better if it weren't for the technical issues.

Score: 7.0/10