Horror games can be very hit or miss for most people. Sometimes they can be tense and atmospheric, whereas other times they can be filled with cheap jumpscares and frustrating gameplay. But once in a while, there will be a horror game that perfectly encapsulates terror and dread without over-reliance on typical tropes. The Mortuary Assistant is one of these said games. It is an atmospheric and intriguing horror game that puts you on the edge of your seat throughout the game.
Clocking In
In The Mortuary Assistant, you play a woman named Rebecca Owens, who works at a mortuary run by a man called Raymond Delver. The player, Rebecca, will be tasked with embalming three corpses on the night shift, all the while weird and spooky things happen around them. A demon has attached itself to one of these corpses, and it’s up to the player to figure out which one, burn the body, and expel the demon. There are multiple pieces of equipment available for the player to accomplish this.
You’ll start off first by embalming the bodies using a variety of tools available and recording any blemishes you find. But there are also paranormal tools to use which will help you greatly in finding out which body the demon is bound to. You have reagents to mix with other fluids, letting strips locate symbols scattered around the mortuary, and a mark to find the demon’s name. Once you’re confident which body the demon is bound to, you put the mark on it and burn it in the retort.
While it may sound pretty straightforward, learning this is a different story. Besides a tutorial on embalming at the beginning of the game, there are very few on-screen descriptions telling you what to do. Instead, you get three voice recordings that explain the steps needed to banish the demon. While it’s not overly difficult to grasp and will take a few bits of trial and error, it can lead to you wandering around aimlessly struggling to figure out what to do. You can listen to the voice recordings at any time, but there’s no option to fast forward and skip the parts you already know or read a transcript after you’ve already listened to it. It’s not the most confusing way to learn a game’s mechanics, but a few other options would have made this less complicated.
Time to Embalm
Horror stories mostly rely on their lore and world-building over their character development and plots. Games like Resident Evil 4 will have a cut-and-dry story of saving the president’s daughter but will include hidden lore details to expand the world. The Mortuary Assistant is no stranger to this story structure. As we mentioned before, the main plot centers around protagonist Rebecca Owens, a timid but passionate young woman who has a few skeletons in her closet. At the offset, Rebecca may seem like a cardboard cut out of a character, but as the story progresses, you get to know more about her past and her regrets. She’s a troubled individual who suffered great tragedies in her life but is slowly trying to rebuild and learn from her mistakes. As far as horror game protagonists go she’s okay, but as a vessel that the player inhabits, she fits the bill well.
It’s the same thing with Delver and the mortuary. You get this sense that Delver may know more than he’s letting on with the mortuary’s paranormal activity, and as more was revealed, I started to get a feeling that I had stumbled onto something truly dark and twisted. This was extremely memorable when I found myself unlocking some secret hidden areas that were packed to the brim with lore to dive into. However, the game will have these memorable moments completely randomized every time you start a new shift, meaning that if you want to try and trigger a specific moment you’ll have to keep playing until it happens. Sometimes it may even be out of order and you’ll be left wondering whether the next scene you’re watching takes place before, after, or during the previous scene.
Whilst the random encounters may be great for replayability it does feel a bit restrictive on the player’s part, especially if you want to try and see everything the game has to offer. While there definitely is a lot more that could have been done to streamline the story, it’s still easy enough to follow which is ultimately what you want in a horror story.
Clocking Out
The Mortuary Assistant is a very well-crafted horror game. The gameplay is surprisingly addictive and its use of sound and randomized scares make it a nerve-wracking experience to play. A few confusing tutorials and clunky story moments aside, this is a horror game that does a lot of things right. It’s a tense time that will have you looking around every corner hoping and praying that the next thing you see won’t be the last.
The Mortuary Assistant is available on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, and Xbox One.
The Review
Great
