I often joke about everything in a game being out to kill you, and as you can probably guess, I am generally exaggerating. After spending around 40 hours within the world of Green Hell, I feel like the folks at Creepy Jar grew tired of my ongoing joke and set off to create something that really does intend to end me at every turn. This is by far one of the most brutal survival games (that hides behind a thin veil of horror) I have ever played, and that’s even when I turned the survival mechanics off entirely. Once you’re into the proper game, you have a wealth of gameplay modifiers at your disposal, but in lieu of sliders that allow you to maybe tone down certain aspects, everything but combat is left at a simple on or off option that gives you the option of playing the game however you wish – be it mostly straight forward survival horror, bare-bones survival, Minecraft-lite building, or anything in between. It’s not uncommon for games to wear multiple hats that blur genres as a draw to increase sales. This is an instance where many developers would have faltered in one area or another, whereas Creepy Jar has managed to balance all of the spinning plates in a way that allows the player to remove bits and pieces as they see fit in order to craft the best experience for them.

I’ve been following this game for a while, initially gaining interest when it launched in early access on PC, which was largely due to my love for the film Cannibal Holocaust, which is an obvious inspiration for the narrative. The story follows a couple of researchers who are not only romantically involved, but work together as they aspire to integrate themselves into an indigenous tribe in hopes of resolving some life or death matter that I honestly have yet to fully uncover. This is in part due to just how brutal the game is, but also because of some mild technical issues. The tutorial doubles as not only a brief snapshot of all of the games various systems and menus, which can be overwhelming, but sets up the story. We’re introduced to our protagonist and his lovely significant other, who dimwittedly decides she needs to start sleeping on the outskirts of the tribe’s camp in the hopes of being brought into the fold, taking occasional breaks to check in via radio. After a thematically strange length of time, she radios in distress and you set off with the tools you gather from your camp to rescue her. I would love to tell you how, but I really don’t know why thanks to a poorly timed full-on crash of the game; you end up getting knocked out, robbed, and dropped somewhere else in the jungle, which is where you’d begin the game if you opt to skip this narrative setup.

The story was where I really wanted to sink my teeth, and there is one, but it follows a very non-linear path that at times becomes near impossible to follow, and not because literally everything looks the same. My early runs provided me with simple bullet points within the notebook telling me what my goals were and adding them naturally. The biggest problem I experienced was a complete lack of player direction – you get a compass and a map that will update with key locations as you come across them during your run (and are lost upon death), but there is absolutely no inkling of your position or any real landmarks outside of those added. In some instances, key story elements were omitted from the game world entirely. Early into the game, you come across an empty camp that has a partially burnt backpack close to the fire that, when working properly, prompts a new objective to load. However, I’ve found the camp multiple times sans backpack with no objectives listed, and no obvious way of moving forward without starting over. Or dying. That happened a lot.

Over my many, and I do mean many attempts at this game, I’ve died from exhaustion, drowning in a small pool of water, animal attack, tribesman attacks, poison, dysentery (haven’t heard that one since Oregon Trail), food poisoning, tainted water, falling to my death, and I am probably missing a few, and am also bucketing a couple of variations under one term. The jungle is a deadly place full of deadly creatures that pretty much all either want to eat you or will kill you if you eat (or in some cases, touch) them. Just like in real life, every choice you make runs the risk of having consequences you have to deal with, and much like in real life, it’s a crap shoot how bad it’ll be.

There is a vast array of plants and wildlife that, you guessed it, mostly hate you. If they don’t, they just want to run away before you bust them over the head with a rock and eat them. I really loved coming across a new species and just taking a moment to observe them, as most seem to exhibit the behavior I would expect based on my limited knowledge absorbed from wildlife documentaries and trips to the local zoo. Since you are often unarmed and out of your natural element, it’s good to remember that you’re no longer the top-dog on the food chain, since you can and will be hunted by large predators that will strike without notice. In more than one instance I was minding my business, trying to start a fire, and out of nowhere a big ass leopard was ripping my throat out. Much like everything else of substance within this game, wildlife is something that can be toggled on and off if you wish, but I would recommend against it.

I’m generally not someone to tell others what to do, but the one area I would recommend shutting off right off the rip is the sanity meter. Almost every facet of this game impacts this scale, and the further you push into going bat guano crazy, the weirder, and unfortunately more annoying the world gets. One of the game’s greatest strengths is the sound design, as the jungle sounds alive with the chirps of birds, bugs, and other creatures that go bump in the night. As your sanity dips, the jungle grows increasingly quiet, as voices and industrial sounds that would be right at home within the world of Silent Hill slowly rise from a whisper to a grating scream that you just want to end; all the while you’re under constant attack from some tribes folk who explode into a glorious fountain of blood upon death. It’s a mechanic that adds some immersive benefits, but quickly grated on my real-world sanity, and I am someone who wishes that any and all video games included some form of psychological horror elements to it. I kid you not, this is something that would be at home in Guantanamo Bay as a torture tactic, and something I will likely play as loud as possible the next time I have some visitors that overstay their welcome.

Regardless of how you choose to play, crafting and some form of combat are going to be required, since you’re going to have to beat the snot out of some trees at some point to make sticks, the foundation for almost every crafted item in the game. Crafting is something that at times is as simple as going within your notebook, selecting what you want to make, and pushing a button; however, certain items, mainly structures, require more of a hands-on approach. After following mostly the same steps, you’ll see the token outline of the item like you’d see when placing an item into any survival-based game, and then you have to pick the individual parts to snap them into place like some Lego. On one hand, this adds some immersion and really makes you consider where you’re placing the asset since you’re open to attack the whole time, but it can become cumbersome after you’ve already had to probably make multiple trips around the area to gather all the materials since you’re limited on how much you can carry, and most structures require more than you can haul. Pouring salt into this wound is the requirement to build a shelter before saving, even if you’re doing so right next to a similar structure that’s already in place with no checkpoints or auto-saves in place.

For the most part, the game looks decent, and what I would say you can expect from a survival game, as across the board they all have some form of jank. There is the occasional wonky animation when you swing some tool in a defensive manner, or when you’re bashing wood to break it down into smaller pieces, but it’s something I could live with and eventually quit noticing. More problematic is the massive amounts of trees and foliage that almost constantly flicker in some areas, almost to the point it should come with a seizure warning. Additionally, it’s very obvious that this is a game that was ported from PC – the menus are extremely clunky, requiring entirely too many menus and sub-menus to get some tasks completed, and often ask you to move a reticle around using a cursor when just toggling through them would feel much more natural. These are by far the biggest opportunities, and outside of the occasional crashes, missing plot items, and lack of a normal save feature, these are also the only things that really held me back from loving this game as opposed to just liking it.

Green Hell is far from a perfect game, but it has enough going for it and provides enough modifiers that make it an accessible experience for those that are new or intimidated by the survival games on the market. If you add the fact that this includes a multiplayer mode, that as of this writing I have yet to sample (but am eager to check out) due to either the servers not being live or a lack of a pre-release player base (I’m not sure which), this is a game that literally has something for everyone – even if that something is going to result in death almost every time.

8 out of 10

Pros

• Huge Variety of Plants and Wildlife
• Loads of Gameplay Modifiers That Cater to the Player
• Interesting Narrative

Cons

• Lack of a Proper Save Feature or Map
• Really Tough, Even With Most Threats Turned Off
• Some Bugs (Not Just Sustenance)
• Clunky Menus

Green Hell was developed and published by Creepy Jar in conjunction with Forever Entertainment S. A. and Incuvo SA. It launched on NS, PC, PS4, and X1. The X1 copy of the game used for review was provided to us and reviewed on XSX. If you’d like to see more of Green Hell, check out the official site.

 

Here at GBG we use a rating method that you are more than likely familiar with – a scale of 1 to 10. For clarification, we intend on using the entire scale: 1-4 is something you should probably avoid paying for; 5-7 is something that is worth playing, but probably not at full price; 8-10 is a great title that you can feel confident about buying. If you have any questions or comments about how we rate a game, please let us know.

 

 

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