A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead Review
Release Date: October 17th, 2024
Developer: Stormind Games, Saber Interactive
Platforms: Xbox Series X|S (Reviewed), PlayStation 5, PC
Price: $29.99
Horror has an unfortunate stigma for the uninitiated that it is "unoriginal" and "usually not very good". Regardless of how one may feel, however, one cannot deny the staying power horror has and how it affects us before, during, and after experiencing a film that very few other types are capable of. It's this exact reason that I have such a deep-rooted love for it, as it delivers messages while also giving a chance to reflect on what it is that scares, surprises, and triggers us.
The year of 2017 leading into 2018, moviegoers saw the releases of Get Out, Split, Happy Death Day, The Ritual, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and Hereditary to name a few—all original material with unique premises—before A Quiet Place would eventually release and help propel the genre forward once more, cementing its place as not only one of the greatest horror movies of all time, but one of the most compelling and highest-grossing, accruing nearly $350 million on a $17 million budget.
Following the success and critical acclaim of A Quiet Place, two more sequels in the form of A Quiet Place: Part II, and A Quiet Place: Day One replicated its acclaim and success for a hat trick, proving that A Quiet Place is as innovative as it is captivating. It would make sense then that eventually, yet tastefully, John Krasinski's brainchild would find a way to expand its world even further, and now we're doing so in the form of A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead, a horror title that puts us face to face with the death angels and what life would be like experiencing it first-hand.
Truth be told, as one can imagine, it's not easy, but Stormind and Saber have done a fantastic job creating the essence and soul of A Quiet Place in video game format that also proudly wears it inspirations on its sleeve. Saber Interactive is no newcomer to adaptations, as the incredibly fun and still ongoing World War Z (based off of the 2013 film of the same name starring Brad Pitt) took the world by surprise as a genuinely entertaining and gratifying zombie shooter that would rival some of the greats like Left 4 Dead, Zombie Army, and the immensely popular zombie modes in Call of Duty.
Through the eyes of Alex, players will put themselves in various moments throughout the time the death angels made their arrival on Earth. Though it mainly takes place around Day 119, the game will go back and forth as we witness Alex's story of survival, and how she's coping with her asthma, pregnancy, and losses on the way. As the story goes on, the game eases you into new mechanics and scenarios that will test both your patience and silence, and these two will arguably be the most important aspects of seeing The Road Ahead through to the end. For those that don’t have any patience and feel the need to "Rambo" their way through the games that they play, death is guaranteed as the aliens are simply too fast and powerful to make any meaningful method of escape. Stormind and Saber have done a wonderful job at incorporating new mechanics throughout the game in ways that make sense for the environments Alex will find herself in, and in doing so it opens up the repertoire for players to strategically make their way around the looming death angels as virtually every sound from any given object, no matter how light, will impact the presence of the death angels roaming around, even if they're offscreen.
At the start, you'll get used to Alex's movement and how to take in your surroundings, from the safe areas of waterfalls and streams which give a natural loud ambiance keeping everything else drowned out, to the reaction of twigs, bushes, broken glass, and more when walking, running, and crouching over them. This will eventually expand into having to deal with stray objects like cans, bottles, bins, trash cans, drawers, lockers, doors, floorboards, and more. Its opening chapter will quickly get you acclimated, and once it's over it'll throw you to the wolves where you're either going to have to learn the ropes of survival quick or die trying. The basis stays the same throughout, however: STAY QUIET. As the game progresses, you'll quickly understand how to manage Alex's asthma and when to take pills or use your inhaler as to not have an attack and give away your location. The opening chapters do a really incredible job in their design with being not only immersive and creative but cleverly intertwining mechanics both old and new for the player to utilize and take advantage of during their survival, always staying alert and making sure that no matter where the location is that the player is aware of their surroundings at all time, taking survival seriously with heart-pounding moments and cutscenes that bring the experience to new heights with each passing hour and chapter.
Speaking of its cutscenes, The Road Ahead keeps its cinematic upbringing intact as both the motion capture and voice acting are extremely convincing, especially that of Alex herself, particularly during those moments where the stress gets to her and she's overcome with emotion, breaking down and contemplating how she can keep going when the world has become enraptured by certain death. Cutscenes are mostly done in-game and have excellent dialogue play out between as well, making for an organic relationship between its characters, settings, and the turmoil that happens between everyone as trust is difficult to come by and love is all too precious. The characters you'll meet throughout will all play a part and have a great sense of character development that keeps them multifaceted, with realistic reactions and decisions being made no matter how tough. Just like many other portions of the game, the developers continued to do an exceptional job in this department, and the atmosphere remains true throughout, leaving moments that make you want to hold your breath alongside Alex, which you'll likely have to do anyways if you're playing with the super sensitive (understandably) microphone detection mode enabled, making it so the real life noises around you are picked up in-game and impact the creature's detection as well.
I played briefly with the microphone detection for the first bit of the game but eventually had to turn it off. While I appreciate the immersion involved in bringing the real world into the virtual, it admittedly took away from the experience rather than enhancing it. This will vary from person to person, obviously, due to a variety of headsets that are all going to come with their own sort of noise-cancelling technology, and thankfully the accessibility settings have also allowed for fine-tuning the sensitivity of the microphone and threshold in which the gate will open and close for sound detection, but even with optimizing these settings I ultimately found it doing more harm than good, especially since I was worrying about double the sound now that the ambiance and noises around me were affecting Alex's survival where she has her own noises and ambiance to worry about. After what felt like a bunch of easily avoidable deaths, I had to stop being stubborn and admit that the experience, while neat, simply wasn't for me and didn't work anywhere near as effectively as Alien Isolation has before it.
The game requires you to be quiet. Very quiet. Barely pushing the stick up to move Alex, an object, or whatever will take up about 90% of the game, and even with areas that have a loud ambiance, Alex will still have to remain cautious as walking faster than normal (not running) will still potentially trigger the creature to become alert of Alex. Thankfully, the game is forgiving in quite a few ways despite its brutality and reliance on pure silence. Cleverly designed and great audio cues make it so eventually you can get used to everything the creature is doing even though you sometimes won't be able to actively see them on screen, as they may be around a corner hunting or simply far in the distance in a forest doing its own thing. Playing with headphones is obviously highly recommended as positional awareness will also increase the chances of survival, but these audio cues, however similar, will change in timber and gain depending on the situation and environment, where everything interacts and plays into each other, creating reverb for some objects that may have not had it before or being able to be blended, drowned out, modified, etc. depending on where sound is bouncing from and to. As someone who has a background in sound design, I immediately fell in love with the audio engineering here, as it is the invisible shining star of the show since sound - and the lack of it - is such an integral part of A Quiet Place.
Where this plays a problem, unfortunately, is that sometimes it feels like the AI of the death angels can be a bit sporadic and erratic, and even with Alex's hand-built noise monitor indicating the surrounding sound versus the sound being emitted directly from Alex herself, it still seems like cheap shots can be taken where death angels will find your position and eventually corner you, where a simple touch will eventually trigger a death sequence. Running is also pointless as once your position is found and you make enough noise, the death angel will find you regardless. Even if you make enough noise to trigger a chase sequence to your position of the loudest noise, walking away from said position even with enough time to do so still won't matter as the moment it's triggered the death angels can all of a sudden miraculously see where you are rather than going to the location where the noise occurred. This isn't simply a matter of sonar or echolocation, but straight heatseeking to Alex even if she moves away or goes into a different room or location entirely. These triggers are exacerbated even further as - even if you think you're safe in a small corridors with no windows or point of entry - moving fast enough will still automatically trigger a death sequence where a quick cutscene will occur of the creature killing Alex similarly to other horror games that chase a main character and eventually get caught, with a close up of the killer's face heading straight for the camera before cutting to black and a game over screen.
A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is far from perfect, but it's still a solid adaptation of a beloved franchise that respects, honors, and expands upon its lore in a way that's more interactive and immersive now with players putting themselves in Alex's shoes. For such a budget price of entry also, it's hard to say no to an otherwise great horror game even with its dents and imperfections front and center, as the game does provide a genuinely fun time that will be sure to please horror fans of all kinds, however casual or hardcore. Especially for fans of the films, it's a must-play as the game will span anywhere between 7-11 hours depending on how successful you are and if you're looking for all of the collectibles or not. Achievement hunters will be able to squeeze out a few more hours as a lot of the achievements outside of the main story ones will require difficulty challenges, unlockables, and certain scenarios to be done a certain way in order to get them all. A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead shouldn't be missed, especially this Halloween season, and it's an enjoyable trek through the world of silence that clearly loves the source material.
PROS:
With elements of Alien: Isolation and Maid of Sker, to name a few, The Road Ahead replicates the intensity of these stealth-horror classics, all wild adding an extra strenuous element of having to stay extremely quiet as you deal with an alien with ultra-sensitive hearing.
The environmental design as The Road Ahead goes from location to location in each of its chapters are incredibly detailed, with no cut corners and deeply creative thought put throughout.
Mechanics and gameplay loops continue to grow all the way until the end, always introducing something new as you have to adapt to each new environment you're in and work around the quick-learning death angels.
Playing the entire game in Cinema Mode (2.40:1 aspect ratio) brings a level of depth to the experience that truly feels like a feature film.
CONS:
Optimization is not the best here, though it's nothing game-breaking.
Frustrations can build and will vary from person to person when needing to be extra quiet, as movement of any kind will alert the death angels, and deadzones and sensitivities on controllers will likely need to be modified for each person to create the most optimal experience.
A huge thank you to Saber Interactive and Paramount Pictures for providing us a copy of A Queit Place: The Road Ahead for the purposes of this review!