Eight Years Later And P.T. Is Still Survival Horror At Its Best

thegamer.com:

P.T. celebrates its eighth anniversary this week. It’s been almost a decade since the playable teaser arrived on PS4 and ushered in the future of survival horror. Well, that was the plan until Konami decided to set fire to everything and leave behind video games for good.

I remember downloading the demo as it dropped, believing it to be not much more than a curious little thing that aimed to spook unsuspecting players. Everything about it was exaggerated on purpose, with the reveal trailer featuring a bunch of paid actors in a dark room screaming their lungs out at the smallest thing. Konami wanted millions to download this unusual experiment and put their all into uncovering its secrets. Most of us didn’t, and that’s so damn brilliant.

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Survival horror is at its most effective when we are forced to ponder the unknown. Being placed in an environment that feels both real and alien, able to bury itself under our skin as we’re forced to entertain what potential dangers await us around the next corner. P.T. does all of those things while trapping us in a claustrophobic space that is constantly shifting and changing in response to our actions. The whole thing is one giant, morbid puzzle.

Helmed by Hideo Kojima and Guillermo del Toro, the teaser’s purpose was to announce Silent Hills. The cancelled game would have seen much of Team Silent reunite to create a horror title starring The Walking Dead’s Norman Reedus in a deep, personal, and utterly haunting jaunt into a cursed town hiding so much beneath the surface. We only caught disparate glimpses of what this final product might have been - including a concept trailer featuring myriad designs from manga artist