Basic Life

Game Rant

Game:- Fatal Frame III : The Tormented
Developer:- Tecmo

Once in a blue moon, my brother would actually manage to do something right. This time he went ahead and got Fatal Frame III : The Tormented. It’s developed and published by Tecmo, which is also responsible for the famous ‘Monster Rancher’ and ‘Dead or Alive’ series.

Main char, a young woman, Rei Kurosawa, spots her dead boyfriend roaming in a haunted mansion. After the incident she visits the ‘spirit world’ only when she sleeps. This storyline offers the player to visit both the scary place and the ‘real realm’. The more she investigates, the more her ‘Curse’ (a painful, yakuza styled, snake like tattoo) spreads on her body.

At first glance I assumed that it’s no different from it predecessor Crimson Butterfly. Perverted spooks walking about, trying to maim you or the least, try to grab the character’s chest. The only thing the she’s got is a torchlight and an old wonky ‘Camera Abscura’.

This is the original part from other survival horror games I’ve played. The camera. To fight it out with the angry spooks the char has to pretend she’s in a photo shoot where all the models sport the latest fashion seen on the catwalks of the netherworld. Blood shot eyes, missing or disjointed limbs and ‘Ju-On’ hair styles are all the rage, baby, yeah!

Take enough fab shots of the spooks strutting their stuff (especially when they come charging at the char with eyes and mouth wide open) and they will moan into disappearance. However, don’t be fooled, unlike in Crimson Butterfly where when you beat a semi-boss spook, it’s gone forever. In The Tormented, they stay tormented, so be snap ready at all times.

Throughout the game you accumulate points and find additional lens to upgrade the camera with making it easier to shoot and beat the spooks.

Another spin in this game is that you don’t stick with one char throughout the whole game. You get to play as a man and a child later on. You would even get to meet the stars from Crimson Butterfly, the twins.

Not recommended for the faint hearted, I played Crimson Butterfly with a natural fear factor like high, but this one has me making excuses to switch it off, only to go back playing it again within an hour.