Silent but Deadly | A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead Review

WACO, Texas (KWTX) -

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You’ve heard of slow burn horror films, but have you heard of slow burn horror games? Because that’s what this is...a sloooooow...slooooooooooow...molasses slow burn of a horror game. Which is fine, nothing wrong with that. This is not a quick game though it only takes a few hours to complete the story. The game doesn’t feel unhurried while you’re playing as the added tension of being ripped apart with a wrong move is ever present.

A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead was developed by Stormind Games and published by Saber Interactive. Saber Interactive were the developers of Evil Dead: The Game back in 2022, which was the first game I reviewed. It was a great live service game, until they ceased work on it. But we’re not here to talk about the past. Time marches ever forward and times change, as death marches ever closer to us all. If you didn’t know, A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is based off the film series A Quiet Place and features its own original story in the universe. Ravenous alien creatures rain down from the sky, and within a few months have wiped out much of the life on earth. The creatures have no eyes but hear exceptionally well. The film series is known for showing the emotional bonds of its surviving characters as they fight to further persevere in this new lachrymose existence. I’m Levi from Hardwired and today we will be discussing how this game stacks up to the film series.

So first let’s talk about the sound design for the game. It was nothing short of intense. The stings of music that hit every time you made a noise that was too loud for the environment to cover sent a chill down my spine. The slight creak while attempting to open a door or a drawer or a cabinet would make me nervously freeze in place and listen to my surroundings. The creatures make little clicky noises when they are nearby, if stress had a sound, that’s the sound. If you alerted any of the monsters this intense music would kick in to basically let you know that you were about to die. There is also a feature where you can have your microphone on in the game. Basically, any noise you make in your microphone can alert the creatures. My house is loud, so I tried this feature and died almost immediately. I’m sure if you live by yourself and play in a quiet room this feature would be a lot of fun.

The monsters are authentically recreated from the films. It really gives you a chance to check out the creatures’ full anatomy as they are almost always moving very fast in the movies. The art style of the game is wonderful. The environments are immaculately detailed. The densely packed foliage created a claustrophobic atmosphere that felt primed for predatory attacks. The lighting plays into the story of the game, with many of the tensest scenes happening in oppressively dark areas, making your flashlight a literal lifesaving tool. Unfortunately, the alien monsters aren’t the only things that are ravenous as you must feed your flashlight batteries repeatedly as the game progresses. Like most survival horror games, this form of resource management-based suspense gets a bit tedious.

As I said, the world of the game is magnificent to behold. I just have one issue with the design of the world. Why? Why are there so many empty cans ALL over the place. Who is just walking around housing cans of Chef Boyardee and then immediately turning around and grabbing a can of Wolf Brand Chili and wolfing that down then dropping the cans out in the middle of the woods? I have to assume that we’ve invented silencers for can openers because there’s no way that someone is opening a can of ravioli in the forest quietly. Also, have you ever heard someone eat something straight out of the can? We’ve got two scenarios here. Either someone is just straight slurpin’ the food out of the can or they’re using a utensil of some sort and scraping around inside the can, creating a veritable dinner bell for the monsters in this scenario. In fact, there are so many cans in this game that I assume that no one turned off the production lines at the canning factory and they’re overflowing and just rolling out into the forest. I can say with the utmost certainty that this was not meant to be an environmentalist message, but through the sheer volume of cans in the world they have involuntarily painted a vivid depiction of the monstrosities that man has visited upon this planet. The monsters may be literal monsters, but it’s clear that mankind crafted its own destruction.

The character designs were pretty good. Their facial expressions conveyed the emotions they were feeling. The protagonist’s hands which are seen heavily throughout the game are exceptionally detailed. It’s a great looking game considering it was developed by a game studio that I’ve never heard of before. The voice acting performances are pretty good especially the woman who plays Alex Taylor, the protagonist of the game. The overall story is decently written, but some of the beats of the story seem rushed or convenient which undercuts the emotional tone.

Alex is dying of lung cancer throughout the game (not really, she just has asthma, but good lord does her asthma play too much of a role in the overall gameplay). But just like the movies, they’ve given us a character who you would not believe would be one of the final people left standing in a world overrun by creatures with super hearing. It’d be like finding out that the person leading the rebellion against the robot uprising has a peanut allergy. Every action you do in the game lowers your lung health. When the lung meter gets into the red it could trigger an asthma attack, making you cough and then getting you dismembered by a creature. To keep your lung health in check, you must pick up various medications scattered around the world. There are also several single use inhalers that can completely refill your lung meter and give you temporary immunity to the degradation of the meter. It’s all just extra flavor on the stealth mechanics.

A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is a solid first game from Stormind Games. Although I’m still not sure who watched A Quiet Place and thought, “that’d make a fun game,” the developers really delivered on the premise in the best way that it could be done. It’s a slow game, but it’s also a masterclass in anxiety. It is worth checking out. I give A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead seven out of ten empty cans. For Hardwired, I’ve been Levi Barner. If you want to see more content like this, be sure to like this video and subscribe to Hardwired for more gaming news, reviews, and more. Now make sure to stock up on batteries and inhalers, and don’t forget cans of ravioli and chili.

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