Sony and Ballistic Moon have announced that the Until Dawn remake will officially launch on October 4 for PlayStation 5 and PC.
This version of the 2015 interactive horror game from Supermassive Games has been rebuilt and enhanced for PlayStation’s current gen console and PC. It features overhauled visuals rebuilt in Unreal Engine 5, among other improvements.
In a new PlayStation blog post, creative director at Ballistic Moon Neil McEwan highlighted some of the many enhancements coming to Until Dawn when it launches later this year.
McEwan revealed that the team has updated all character models, environments, interactable props, visual effects, and animations with Unreal Engine 5, thus improving all textures, rendering, and animation performance. This will all contribute to “higher fidelity characters who we hope will resonate with both new players and existing fans of the game.”
“We have completely relit the game to take advantage of Unreal Engine 5’s rendering features, including raytracing and enhanced materials, focusing on a more atmospheric and ‘modern horror’ experience,” the developer said.
Until Dawn is one of the best horror games of recent years and is known for its immersive movie-like atmosphere, impactful decision-making and quick time events. In the remake, it seems as though all of these have all been improved upon.
According to McEwan, the remake will blend the cinematography of the original with a modern third-person camera to bring the characters and locations to life.
“The camera’s flexibility allows us to place new emphasis on important moments and tell the story from a view closer to the characters,” he said.
Some minor story changes have also been implemented. McEwan explained that although Ballistic Moon were committed to Supermassive’s original narrative vision “we felt the Prologue would benefit from some adjustments to its narrative pacing”.
So, the game’s memorable prologue has also been reworked, giving the Washington sisters extra screen time and reframing some original scenes by giving the infamous prank some more context.
New collectibles have also been introduced, including ‘Hunger totems’ which are a special type of totem that “holds a different kind of vision to the others”, along with new interactions and context sprinkled throughout the world.
Players will can expect new accessibility and usability settings, too. One of the main gameplay features of Until Dawn is a mechanic called ‘Don’t Move’ that will force the player to keep still while confronted with danger.
With the remake, Ballistic has created an optional alternative to this mechanic called ‘Stay Calm’, designed for third party peripherals “that do not feature a gyroscope or for players who prefer a different challenge.”
Pre-orders for Until Dawn on PS5 and PC go live on August 21.
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