The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

I came into this one skeptical, because the asymmetric horror genre has a long track record of exciting launches followed by slow, painful population collapse. Texas Chain Saw Massacre does a lot of things that actually surprised me. The shift from the standard one-killer format to a 3-vs-4 structure, three family members hunting four victims, is not a gimmick. It fundamentally changes how both sides play. The family has to coordinate roles: Leatherface is a slower, map-controlling tank who can physically destroy shortcuts and funnel victims toward his kin, while characters like Johnny bring tracking capabilities and Sissy can squeeze through the same gaps victims use to slip away. That role diversity on the killer side makes the family feel like a team rather than a relay race of one player having all the fun. On the victim side, you are essentially powerless in a fight. Most of the cast has no offensive tools at all, aside from one character carrying a stun gun. Survival comes down to reading environments, managing a blood-drain mechanic that punishes hiding too long, finding items to unlock doors or cut power, and communicating with your squad. The fear meter that forces you out of hiding spots after a set duration is a smart fix for the camping problem that plagued Friday the 13th and Dead by Daylight for years. Matches run around 15 to 20 minutes when both teams are competent, though early matches as a victim can end inside three minutes if the family plays coordinated and you don't know the map. The onboarding is rough. There are dozens of tutorial slides and none of them are playable, which is a real problem in a game with this much mechanical depth. Expect a painful first few hours if you haven't touched the genre before. The presentation is where Sumo Nottingham clearly put serious effort. Audio in particular is strong, atmosphere-wise. The team reportedly sourced the same vintage chainsaw model used in the original film for sound reference, and it shows in how the audio lands during a chase. At launch the map pool was limited to three locations, all built around the same basic layout logic: a dark basement feeding into a decrepit structure feeding into open ground outside. That repetition wore thin fast. The bigger concern now, though, is what happened in May 2025: Gun Interactive announced the game will receive no further updates or new content. The playerbase on Steam has declined sharply from its 2023 launch peak. The community is still there, but you are buying a finished, frozen product. For shooter-focused players crossing over to see what the fuss is about, the movement is deliberate and third-person, not a twitchy experience. Mouse precision matters less than map awareness and audio cues. Netcode at launch had real problems with laggy hits and disconnects, and there is no guarantee those issues have been fully resolved given the support situation. If you want a game to grind competitively long-term, the population trajectory and dead development pipeline make that a risky investment. If you want a horror-flavored co-op experience for a group of friends who enjoy the genre, especially if anyone has nostalgia for the 1974 film, there are genuinely tense and memorable moments here that the bigger asymmetric titles have not managed to replicate.

Fred · Scout Team

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