Hellraiser Revival Review: Faithful Horror, Clumsy Combat

Hellraiser Revival review: the facts at a glance

You play Aidan, using a puzzle box called the Genesis Configuration to survive a bargain with Pinhead. Doug Bradley voices Pinhead again. The content warning on the store page is long, and it means it.

BESTPRICE: Want Clive Barker's Hellraiser: Revival? These stores list it: Buy on Eneba → Buy on Green Man Gaming →

Why players and critics disagree

That split is the story of this launch. On Steam, more than nine in ten reviews are positive. On Metacritic, the PS5 version sits in Mixed or Average territory, with more than half its critic reviews in the mixed band, while the PC version scores seven points higher with zero negative reviews.

Two things seem to drive the gap. First, who is reviewing: Steam buyers chose a Hellraiser game, and many of the top-voted reviews are fans thanking Saber for not toning it down. "I don't think I've ever seen a better video game adaptation of horror source material," one player wrote three and a half hours in. Critics review the whole package, and the whole package includes the shooting.

Second, the platform. Hardcore Gamer's PS5 review notes: "Performance-wise, the game struggles," though performance mode holds up on a PS5 Pro. The PC version got the first patch a week after launch, while console players were told their version was "coming soon."

If you've played other licensed horror this year, the pattern is familiar. Our Halloween: The Game review had the same tension between fan service and play.

Screenshot: Steam store page (Saber Interactive)

What works

It respects the source. This is the part nobody argues about. GamingTrend calls it "a career-capping return from Doug Bradley." GameSpot says it "feels like a statement piece in both sex and violence." A Steam reviewer with ten hours put it simply: "This game is exactly how a legacy horror IP should be handled."

The Labyrinth looks the part. In gameranx's Before You Buy video, Pinhead stands in a blue-lit stone corridor at 8:30, and the Labyrinth sections around it are cold, enormous and geometric. The Steam screenshots match: brutalist stone, chains, and a lot of skin that shouldn't be outside a body.

The puzzle box is the best tool you have. At 9:00 in the same video, the Genesis Configuration opens as a 3D puzzle with "Rotate," "Change Configuration" and "Confirm" prompts. At 10:45, the box is on fire in the left hand while the right hand aims a pistol. Saber's own overview says the box lets you hurl objects and scorch enemies; it's the part of combat that feels like Hellraiser rather than like a generic shooter.

What doesn't

The guns. GamesRadar+ scored it 80 and still wrote that "combat can be weightless." DualShockers was harsher about its "lousy combat system and excessive number of trial-and-error chase sequences." On Steam, the negative reviews say the same thing in plainer words. One player who finished it in about sixteen hours complains that "ammo is too scarce to find, to expensive to craft and too expensive to buy," and says he needed mods for extra ammo to reach the end.

It doesn't know whether it's stealth or action. Saber's marketing promised a brutal fight with Cultists, Runners, Bursters and the Unworthy. The game leans on sneaking and scavenging. "A deeply confused game that seems like it doesn't really know what it wants to be," one reviewer wrote, while praising the art in the same breath.

Launch bugs. Game Rant's review calls it "currently hampered by immersion-breaking bugs, enemy AI issues, and uninspired boss fights." A Steam player less than an hour in said he "cannot continue progression due to constantly falling through the map." That one, at least, has a fix.

GAMINGbible's advice is worth repeating: "knock it down to the story mode" if the fights wear you down. Nobody is grading you on difficulty.

Screenshot: Steam store page (Saber Interactive)

What update 1.1 fixed

The October 15 patch is short and targeted at the worst progression blockers:

• Falling through the floor after climbing the ladder out of the sewers.
• Falling through the world in the Labyrinth after Sunny's pillar teleport.
• A collision bug that could stop you finishing the Charlotte chase, and Charlotte getting stuck on a ledge in her boss fight.
• The Flooded Room lever not spawning after a save and reload during the corpse puzzle.
• Less pop-in when backtracking, plus a startup warning when your GPU driver is out of date.

Nothing in it touches combat feel or ammo economy. If those are your complaints, 1.1 doesn't answer them. If you were stuck, it probably does, and that's one more reason the PC version is ahead for now.

For a first-person game that's dealing with similar launch-week fixes, see our Valor Mortis review, and for a heavier combat focus, our Mortal Shell II review.

Screenshot: Steam store page (Saber Interactive)

Hellraiser Revival review verdict: who should buy it

• Hellraiser fans: yes, now. The story, the Cenobites and Bradley's Pinhead are what you came for, and they're what the game does best.
• Survival horror players who like Resident Evil-style scavenging: yes, on story mode if the ammo gets to you.
• Anyone who wants a satisfying shooter: wait. The combat is the part reviewers on both sides call weak, and the first patch didn't touch it.
• Console players: wait for the console patch if you can.

Eneba had a Global Steam key for roughly a fifth off the Steam price when we checked; prices move, so compare before buying. If you want more horror on the list first, our October Next Fest horror demos and the BOOMER preview are good places to start, and the wider Next Fest demo roundup has more. Our piece on why the uncanny valley works in horror games explains part of why the Cenobites land. And if you're weighing first-person horror on a mid-range PC, our Valor Mortis requirements breakdown is a useful comparison.

Our take

We'd buy it for the world and put up with the fights. That's the short version of this Hellraiser Revival review: Saber got the hard part right, the tone, the body horror and the respect for Barker's mythology. The easy-to-patch parts are the ones still broken. The next question is whether a combat pass is coming, or just more bug fixes.

How we checked this

We haven't played Hellraiser Revival. We read the Steam store data, the update 1.1 notes and Saber's announcements, pulled Steam review totals and the most helpful positive and negative reviews, read the Metacritic PC and PS5 critic pages, and stepped through gameranx's video in 15-second steps for the timestamps above. Saber's own trailers are age-restricted on YouTube and won't play embedded.

References

1. Clive Barker's Hellraiser: Revival on Steam, Steam
2. Patch Notes: Update 1.1, Saber Interactive on Steam
3. Clive Barker's Hellraiser: Revival critic reviews, Metacritic
4. PC critic reviews, Metacritic
5. Hellraiser Revival: Before You Buy, gameranx on YouTube
6. The Demo is out now + Scarlet Church Trailer, Saber Interactive on Steam