Exploring an abandoned island that’s riddled with ghoulies and ghosties sounds pretty exciting. You’re armed with a special camera or torch that is capable of deflecting and defeating the different spooks you encounter, all while you hunt down answers to your forgotten past. Different character perspectives interlink, threading together to weave the answer to the mystery surrounding the Rogetsu Festival that happened ten years prior. But I couldn’t enjoy any of that because of how slow and clunky Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse is.
Everything is so excruciatingly glacial in pace. Despite the fact they’re being attacked by vicious spectres, the characters appear to be in no immediate hurry to get moving and just stroll around the place as if they have all the time in the world. There’s a run button, but ‘run’ is too strong a word for the slight speed increase you attain - it’s barely a power walk. Even getting chomped on by a ghost isn’t enough to make them move faster.
While I understand that grabbing items is a prolonged action, designed to increase the tension of whether a ghost hand is going to suddenly grab you , I don’t see why opening doors has to be equally as slow. Especially when being attacked happens so rarely regardless. This feeling of everything being in slow motion is further exacerbated by the clunkiness of the gameplay.
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse is a remaster of the original 2008 Wii version and marks the first time the game has reached Western shores. While parts of the game have been given a much-needed modern makeover, most noticeably in the vastly improved character models, it simply can’t hide its age. The game features terrible textures more horrifying than the ghosts that prowl the island, recycled assets everywhere you look, and grainy FMV flashbacks that appear untouched (though apparently, they have been).
Mask of the Lunar Eclipse takes place on Rogetsu Isle, where five girls were kidnapped by a serial killer. The girls were eventually found by Detective Chōshirō Kirishima in the caverns beneath the hospital, though they had lost their memories. In the present, two of the five girls have died, and the remaining three travel to Rogestu Isle to uncover the mysteries it still holds. Unfortunately, while there are a few twists along the way, you’ll guess the biggest elements. The plot is wholly reliant on your intrigue for all things horror.
The real burden from its Wii days is the clunky combination of rigid camera angles and stiff movements, makingmoving around a painful chore. Collecting items is a janky mess of trying to ensure you have the camera angle just right to get the prompt, and all too often finding it’s just out of frame (no pun intended). I didn’t realise how grateful I’d be for the blue icon that shows you there is something to collect nearby because frankly, I didn’t have the patience to waste slowly exploring to discover things for myself, especially as you need to interact with something every 30 seconds to progress the story or gain a puzzle clue.
I understand that the setting is purposefully dark to add to the suspense, but everything just seemed to bleed into obscurity. The murky surroundings and overused template assets make you question whether you’ve already been in a corridor, room, or wherever it was, as nothing impresses any real sense of worldbuilding on you. Even the three protagonists look largely the same, with their outfits being the only real giveaway. Was a short brunette bob the only viable haircut back then?
It’s difficult to even like these victims, but that’s not their fault. It’s the result of being designed with little to no personality as the team poured all their design skill efforts into a hot bod and cute girly outfits instead. Mechanics and graphics aren’t the only telling signs of age here, the tired trope of women in skimpy outfits making stupid choices that no real person would ever do is back to remind us of those terrible games of yesteryear.
There’s no willing suspension of disbelief with the protagonists because they react to events with the emotions of a peanut. How they all manage to just take it in their stride that ghosts are appearing and can be defeated by the camera they found is more shocking than any jump scare the game offers. Then again, not one of them thought to pack warmer clothes for a boat trip over to an abandoned island, so perhaps they’re just lacking all sense of reason. Detective Choshiro isn’t much better as far as personality goes, but he does seem to have more common sense and definitely has a lot more clothing.
This was the first time I’ve properly experienced the Fatal Frame series. The games have always appealed to me because of the unique concept of fighting ghosts with the Camera Obscura, rather than simply running for survival or battling back with standard weapons, as you might in other survival horror games. I also have a soft spot for mysterious supernatural narratives.
I enjoyed spotting different ghosts and getting snap-happy trying to get a photo of them before they disappeared. I feel like this might have been a little more interesting if the game was more subtle about their presence, so instead, you had to keep your eyes peeled to spot them lurking in the background.
The camera-oriented combat was also interesting, with different films, shutters, and various upgrades at your disposal, encouraging you to improve your setup to tackle the hardier spirits. The issue is you can’t really enjoy the combat as most of the time you’re confined to small corridors that make dealing with the ghosts incredibly frustrating. There is less room to back away from ghosts, and you can’t really see them coming from the sides until they’re already on top of you due to the restricted space. This is made even more annoying by a scream track that loops constantly, much like those awful soundtracks you hear in a haunted house attraction.
Mask of the Lunar Eclipse takes place on Rogetsu Isle, where five girls were kidnapped by a serial killer. The girls were eventually found by Detective Chōshirō Kirishima in the caverns beneath the hospital, though they had lost their memories. In the present, two of the five girls have died, and the remaining three travel to Rogestu Isle to uncover the mysteries it still holds. Unfortunately, while there are a few twists along the way, you’ll guess the biggest elements. The plot is wholly reliant on your intrigue for all things horror.
At its core, the story and staple Fatal Frame Camera Obscura aspects are the silver lining of an otherwise disappointing experience, but unfortunately, the bad far outweighs the good. I’m left questioning who this remaster is for. As a newbie to the series, I find there’s too much to overlook to tempt new players into the fanbase, but would this slow tale with painfully obvious dated aspects be any more appealing to fans of the original?
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse is a disappointing remaster that fails to hide its age under the pretty mask of shiny new character models. While the concept and story are intriguing, they’re impossible to enjoy when you have to wade through the awkward, clunky gameplay at such a snail’s pace. This one was better left on the Wii.
Score: 2/5. An Xbox Series X|S code was provided by the publisher.
