Deadly Body 2: Crimson Butterfly Remake is totally terrifying.
Crew Ninja delivers unequivocal, spine-chilling survival horror, if — and it’s a extremely massive if — you’re prepared to abdomen a couple of acquainted frustrations.
In recent times, Koei Tecmo has tried to resurrect the Deadly Body/Undertaking Zero sequence with combined outcomes. Each Maiden of Black Water and Masks of the Lunar Eclipse obtained the remaster remedy, although we weren’t notably impressed with both.
Deadly Body 2: Crimson Butterfly, nevertheless, will get the total works. This can be a correct top-to-bottom remake, and it is clearly paid dividends.
Essentially the most notable shake-up is the removing of the mounted digicam angles typical of late-’90s survival horror video games. Of their place is a contemporary third-person perspective that makes exploring Minakami village far much less cumbersome.
It’s simply the primary of many welcome modernisations from the devs at Crew Ninja. Further aspect tales provide further narrative juice for returning followers of the unique PS2 title, and an all-new unlockable ending awaits these courageous mad sufficient to try New Recreation+ on Nightmare issue.
As a result of the story explores the origins of the Digital camera Obscura, we predict this remake serves as a really perfect entry level for brand new gamers unfamiliar with Deadly Body’s distinctive mixture of survival horror, puzzles, and the famously divisive digicam fight.
Graphics and gameplay fare a lot better too, however right here’s the rub: it is a trustworthy revamping of its supply materials. It follows carefully within the footsteps of the unique, and whereas it undeniably seems and performs a lot better in 2026, it nonetheless falls sufferer to most of the similar criticisms of the previous. Which feels nearly ironic, if something in regards to the recreation’s darkish story.
The sport follows Mio and Mayu Amakura, twin sisters lured deep into the forest by a crimson butterfly. Sinister forces quickly separate the 2, trapping them in Minakami Village — a settlement lengthy erased from the map and shrouded in everlasting darkness.
Minakami is instantly creepy: an infallibly darkish environment filled with vengeful ghosts and ghoulies. These wraiths search to hurt Mio, abduct Mayu, and carry out the forbidden Crimson Butterfly Ritual. As Mio searches for her sister, she begins to uncover the village’s grim historical past and the tragic destiny of one other pair of twins whose story mirrors their very own.
Crimson Butterfly remake is constructed like a traditional survival horror recreation, and performs like a nostalgic lock-and-key shuffle by a handful of fear-inducing environments, harking back to style all-timers like Silent Hill and Resident Evil. Put together your self for loads of backtracking!
Structurally, you creep from constructing to constructing, studying notebooks, discovering keys, listening to spirit bins, and snapping pictures of some fairly rancid-looking ghosts to progress by the sport’s nine-chapter story.
We love a superb soar scare, and Crimson Butterfly Remake has loads to maintain you in your toes. We discovered ourselves bracing throughout each drawn-out door opening, and each lengthy attain for one thing simply out of grasp — moments clearly designed as the right setup for a wraith to pop up and scare the residing daylights out of you.
However the devs are intelligent sufficient to not bombard you and uninteresting the strain. As a substitute, a lot of the worry comes from what isn’t there.
In actual fact, the final time a horror recreation made us really feel this tense was once we performed 2005’s Condemned: Legal Origins. Hell, this may simply be the scariest recreation we’ve ever performed.
Early on, Mio and Mayu encounter their first wraith — an offended murder-ghost with a hankering for strangling twins. Fortunately, simply moments earlier we had been launched to a magical ghost-killing digicam, and supplied with copious text-based tutorials on kill an offended murder-ghost. Phew.
However this additionally brings us to the primary purpose we’re hesitant to outright advocate Deadly Body II: Crimson Butterfly Remake, and all of it comes right down to the sequence’ signature weapon: the Digital camera Obscura.
As you discover Minakami Village seeking Mayu (and a solution to escape) Mio can defend herself from wraiths by snapping photos to deal harm.
Taking pictures portraits of your ghoulish enemies is an effective way to get a superb take a look at their unsettling new faces, however the actual trick lies in timing your photographs. Ready for a wraith to maneuver in shut and snapping a brand new face card mid-lunge can set off a Deadly Body, countering the assault and considerably boosting your harm output.
The digicam comes preloaded with a limitless provide of Kind-07 movie, however a handful of different rolls may be loaded too, every with their very own quirks. Some reload sooner, whereas others possess increased exorcism energy, dealing way more harm when used.
Toggleable Filters additionally introduce their very own exploration gimmicks and particular shot skills. We notably favored the Publicity filter, which slows wraiths down throughout fight while additionally revealing hidden trails and treasures throughout exploration.
Battling wraiths is a tense affair, a novel and pleasing solution to take down enemies, albeit somewhat clunky at instances. Fortunately, the remake provides a couple of trendy concessions. Now you can click on R3 to auto-lock onto ghosts in body and press X to dodge incoming assaults. When you become familiar with focal factors, focus, and slap on a few upgrades to the Digital camera Obscura, fight begins to really feel way more pleasing.
Sadly, it’s nonetheless not with out its frustrations.
One mechanic we weren’t so eager on is when a wraith turns into aggravated. At any time throughout a scrap, there’s an opportunity they are going to flip purple and get correctly offended about being papped.
Managing an aggravated wraith isn’t the issue. They nonetheless transfer and assault the identical manner, just a bit faster. The actual downside is that additionally they regenerate well being and might seemingly faucet into this state each time they bloody effectively really feel prefer it.
We received’t spoil something, however throughout an enormous set-piece second in opposition to a boss wraith, we merely couldn’t exorcise it. Each time Mio had the groany git on the ropes and was able to ship the ultimate body, the wraith would sit back into its aggravated state and we’d spend one other 15-20 minutes duelling with them. What ought to have been a tense and pivotal second shortly turned a bit exhausting.
We weren’t a fan of the stealth sections both. A number of sections take away Mio’s capability to battle solely as her digicam is both misplaced, or ineffective in opposition to an enormous dangerous ghosty, forcing you to run and conceal from them.
Initially, we favored the variation it offered, however in the end discovered it relied too closely on trial and error for our liking. It typically looks like we had been anticipated to fail on the primary event, that means it will possibly take perhaps two or three makes an attempt at navigating a sequence to get it proper. Which is a disgrace, as a result of it subdues an in any other case terrifying expertise.
