Like the best splatter art, Carrion comes across as angry – claustrophobically so – and everything that you mete out feels justified in the context of it being an exercise in pure fury.
That’s part of it, but the sheer energy and force that you can navigate the world is a kind of pulsing, rhythmical violence into itself. It’s not just that there’s a lot of blood and screaming. The monster is fast and so, so precise to control, and that’s part of why Carrion is so visceral.
I cannot wait to see what talented players can make of it. I say that despite being terrible at these kinds of games, too. The intensity with which you can turn this monster into a dervish of destruction is extreme, right from the opening moments, and as the game goes on, enemies become more frequent in number (and more dangerous), and the monster accumulates more power and abilities, the gruesome ballet only becomes even more mesmerising. You do that by having it scream into a room, which will send doors and girders flying everywhere, and then tearing up anything organic in the vicinity with a whirlwind of gnashing teeth, spiderweb-like ropes and claws… very, very sharp claws. In execution, it’s a bit Metroidvania-like, in that your way forward will often be blocked until you find particular abilities to flick switches and reach new areas, but this game’s focus is anything but on the exploration.Ĭarrion’s focus is on unleashing the monster. At the start of the game, the monster breaks free of the research coffin that it’s being trapped in, and immediately sets about exploring a labyrinthine network of tunnels and facilities, chewing down on anything in its way. The monster is fleshy mess a red blob of tentacles and entrails, along with a furiously sharp mouth that it’s going to make great use of, and frequently. In context it can be very artful, and Carrion is one gorily effective canvas.Ĭarrion is a horror game where you play as the monster a thoroughly mundane “twist” that led the publisher, Devolver Digital, to do a very silly thing and dub the experience “anti-horror”, when it is anything but subversive to horror. I often criticise extreme violence on this here Website, but it’s games like Carrion that demonstrate that I’m not inherently against violence. Carrion is exquisitely violent, evocatively malevolent, and simultaneously grotesque and beautiful. I’m actually tempted to leave my review at that, because that describes the game’s core motif and aesthetic, its principle appeal, and it’s the perfect word to describe whether the game is right for you or not.
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