A Gripping Cooperative Horror Undermined by Repetitive Gameplay
‘’The Blackout Club’’ invites up to four players to assume the roles of clever American teenagers who band together to uncover the eerie happenings in their hometown. Why do they awaken in strange places with blood on their clothes? Why are their parents sleepwalking through the streets at night? What is the source of the strange music emanating from beneath their homes? It’s like a mix of ‘’Thie’’ and ‘’Left4Dead’’, but with its unique flair.
Setting up their headquarters in an abandoned rail carriage, the teenage team embarks on nightly missions into the neighborhood to investigate the mysterious entity invading their dreams. These missions typically involve two randomly selected objectives, ranging from putting up Blackout Club recruitment posters to following a trail of blood. While the missions begin in the neighborhood, they often lead players into “The Maze,” a warren of white-walled tunnels beneath the houses.
Developed by Question, whose team has a strong background in immersive sim design with credits including ‘’Bioshock’’, ‘’Neon Struct’’, and ‘’Thief: Deadly Shadows’’, ‘’The Blackout Club’’ reflects this heritage in its style and systems. The neighborhood is painted in a rich, saturated palette reminiscent of Rapture’s architecture, where the sky is a deep ocean blue and every light glares brightly, emphasizing visibility.
The whitewashed timber houses have gothic undertones, harking back to Question’s lineage. The Maze and its shuffling denizens evoke the supernatural elements of the ‘’Thief’’ series, particularly levels like the Haunted Cathedral and the Shalebridge Cradle. This DNA is evident in the way Sleepwalkers shuffle zombie-like through the night and in the eerie audio that mixes music and ambient sound.
At its core, ‘’The Blackout Club’’ is a stealth game, refined but requiring adjustment to its slightly slippery movement. In the early game, the main opponents are Sleepwalkers, the town’s adults who wander in a state of somnambulism. Though blind, they have keen hearing, following players who walk or run past them or even sneak on certain surfaces like concrete or stone. It’s a rare stealth game where the surface you’re stepping on matters, delighting long-time fans of the genre.
As players progress, they face additional challenges like security cameras, speed traps, and faceless Lucids who hunt with flashlights. Players can fight back to some extent, using tactics like pinning enemies down, deploying distractions, or knocking out enemies with tranquilizer darts. However, these are temporary measures; evasion is crucial, as each alert increases the likelihood of invoking the Shape.
The Shape is The Blackout Club’s ultimate threat, an invisible creature that can only be sensed by closing in-game eyes. If the Shape appears, it relentlessly chases one player. If caught, the player becomes “Shaped,” wandering the map under the Shape’s control and avoiding other players. If all players get Shaped, it’s game over.
These elements create thrilling procedural horror. New players will hold their breath when a Sleepwalker approaches, while experienced players will dread the Shape’s appearance. The game is at its best when things go slightly wrong, yet remain manageable. For instance, one memorable session had me leading the Shape on a merry chase, only to be cornered by a Sleepwalker in a garage, repeating “I’m trapped” into my microphone as the Shape closed in.
While the atmosphere and mechanics of ‘’The Blackout Club’’ are compelling, the game’s structure leaves much to be desired. Levelling is painfully slow, and new mission types and areas are unlocked through levelling. This means replaying the same objectives repeatedly, which becomes monotonous. Playing with a full team and uncovering “Bonus Evidence” can speed up levelling, but it still requires completing multiple missions per level.
Additionally, the game has bugs, with frequent crashes to the desktop that cost hours of playtime and valuable XP. These issues are fixable, but the game also lacks a sense of occasion. The piecemeal world-building and repetitive objectives undermine the rich atmosphere and story. Unlike ‘’Left4Dead’’, which combined procedural elements with memorable missions, ‘’The Blackout Club*’’could benefit from a set of fixed missions to capture players’ attention.
Ultimately, while ‘’The Blackout Club’’ offers moments of intense, nerve-wracking gameplay, its repetitive grind and technical issues diminish its appeal. It’s a game I’ll return to occasionally, but it’s unlikely to haunt my nightmares as much as it could.
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