Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Director's Cut

"Enough frustration to last a lifetime"

Mio and Mayu are teenage twin sisters who one day decide to go back to a place in the forest that they used to play in as kids. While Mio is reminiscing, Mayu sees a crimson butterfly and begins to chase it. Mio then chases after her sister and keeps asking her where she's going, but Mayu doesn't respond and continues to chase the butterfly as if in a trance. Mio becomes lost in the woods while chasing after Mayu and they become trapped in this old village that was said to have disappeared on the day of a festival, many years ago.

Game Play:
In the beginning, you can choose whether or not you want to play in FPS mode or third person mode. People say the FPS mode adds scariness to the game, but I didn't think it did. It did, however, add even more frustration since you can't see when there's a ghost behind you. I preferred the third person view, but even then it isn't a great view of what's going on. You play as Mio, and Mayu just follows you around. To kill a ghost you take a picture of them with your camera (yes, you battle ghosts with a camera) because according to some culture's you steal someone's soul when you take a picture of them. But, to get the most damage possible you usually have to wait until they're just about to grab you then the reticule on the camera turns red and you'll get a lot of damage if you take a picture then. The camera really just tests how fast your reflexes are because you have to wait and wait until the reticule turns red for only a split second.

So many people say this game is scary. I was shaking...with anger. The game just gets so incredibly frustrating at times. Then when there's a slightly creepy moment, the mood is quickly lightened by how unbelievably slow Mio is. I found myself bursting out laughing when I'm fighting a ghost because when they get too close you have to lower your camera and walk away to get more distance so they don't grab you. As you see Mio walk away at a snail's pace, it really lightens the mood. The only creepy part in the game was during the first five minutes of play when you're about to enter a building and your sister, Mayu, is behind you when suddenly a hand reaches out and touches Mio's shoulder, but then you see Mayu walk in front of Mio and the hand is still on Mio's shoulder. Then you hear in a scary voice “Are you leaving me again?” …Creepy.

You're probably wondering what's so frustrating with this game, I'll tell you. First, camera views. Not all are bad, but some you seriously can't even tell what the hell you're doing. You could argue that first person mode would fix this, but then you have the disadvantage of not being able to see behind you (a lot of the ghosts can teleport behind you).

Then sometimes, things simply won't trigger in the game. I had to restart this game 6 times in the beginning because things weren't triggering even though I'd do the same thing before and it worked. An example, about 15 minutes into the game when you find the camera, a ghost is outside of the door and you can't open it so you need to take a picture of the door so it'll open. First attempt, took a picture, door opened. Later another thing wouldn't trigger which by the way was 3 frickin‘ hours into the game, but I'd spoil the story for you if I explained it, so I started the game over and this time I took a picture of the door exactly like I did last time and it wouldn't open. Continue this a few more times and you'll get the idea.

Another frustrating thing, the level design. Everywhere looks identical so when you're supposed to go to a specific area, you get easily confused. They give you a map, but it doesn't help much because when you look at the map and go "Okay, so I'll have to turn right and take the next door to the left" when you lower your map and start moving, you get a camera view change so you get disoriented and don't know where the hell you are now. It doesn't sound that bad, but continue this throughout the entire game, and you'll see where I'm coming from. And also, it's really hard to get into this games story because you have a hard time feeling any sympathy for the twins because, quite frankly, they seem rather messed up in the head. They're just really weird and they don't really react to being in a haunted village where ghosts are trying to kill you, like you would expect a normal person to react. This quickly turned into a rant, let's move onto sound now.

Sound:
The voice acting, is really laughable. When you defeat a spirit, you'll sometimes pick up a stone that holds their thoughts (yeah, I know) and you'll listen to it on your radio and it'll sound something like this. "Why (awkward pause) did he (odd emphasis on word) leave... me?". Mio and Mayu's voice acting is really just average. Nothing great.

You pretty much have a constant "Creepy" background music. It sounds pretty good, though. You also have spirit's saying thing's like "Why do you kill?" while you're fighting them, but again, the bad voice acting breaks the mood.

Graphics:
The in game graphics are better than the cut scene's…granted, most of the cut scene's in the game (except for the endings) use the in game graphics. Did you ever play Resident Evil 2 for N64? Do you remember at this one point in the game this one guy is talking about how this beautiful lady will now turn into a zombie and he was commenting on her "beautiful" skin, but because of the graphics her skin looked like she had burns marks on her face? That's what Mio and Mayu's skin looks like in the cut scenes that use the in game graphics engine. It just looks like the colors didn't blend and it creates this weird pink/white/red marks on their face.

Should you buy this game?
Unless you are really into survival horror games, I'd suggest you just give it a rent first. If you enjoy this game, then it does have quite a bit of replay value. There's a ton of extra costumes you can unlock as well as new camera functions, new accessories, Mission Mode, Survival Mode (ghosts can kill you with one touch), trailers of the game, and new difficulty modes. Though, the only way you'll get challenge with the game is if you play it in Fatal mode. I mean, you know a game is easy when you play it in Nightmare mode (the mode you have to beat to unlock Fatal) and you finish the game with 26 extra health power-ups. Overall, it's not a horrible game, just incredibly frustrating. The sad thing is, if they would have put more time into the game, all of the problems with it could have been fixed and you would probably be left with a great game.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 09/06/05