JOURNEY’S END

While relatively problem-free at the time of the fifth episode’s publication, Song Of Horror gets off to a rough start. Its first episode is marred by a bug that causes severe framerate drops, forcing us to play on an easier difficulty in order to perform the QTEs. We’re then locked to this difficulty during our initial playthrough. The difficulty settings mostly determine the frequency of the Presence’s appearances, though you’ll always encounter it at certain points in each level. Besides steaming out the bugs, Protocol has now added a permadeathfree mode for those who can’t bear to sacrifice any characters. We’re not sure the cast are quite as collectable as Pokémon – in any case, those claimed by the Presence may linger on in sinister ways.