With the successful launch of the remaster of Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water, Koei Tecmo got to work to remaster the fourth game in the Fata Frame game series that originally came out in 2008 in Japan only, disappointing many North American fans (Me included!), but the right has been wronged and now Fata Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse is here and I can’t thank Koei Tecmo enough for giving me a chance to review it!
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse follows three characters, Misaki and Ruka, two girls who went missing on the island of Rogetsu with three other friends when they were children, and Choushiro, a police detective who found the girls after they went missing ten years prior to the game’s story. The three are now searching for answers as to what happened on the island and the girls ten years ago, and why the girls are dying one by one.
Now onto the game itself! The controls for Mask of the Lunar Eclipse are a lot like Maiden of Black Water (if you have not already played it), it may take some getting used to the buttons but after a while, it’ll come back to you.
The game is fully voice-cast but only in Japanese which might be a problem for those who are not a fan of subtitles, at first, I was not sure how I felt about it but the more I played, I began to start getting the vibes of watching subtitle only J-horror movies. The soundtrack and ambiance are pretty good as well as they add to the tension of the surroundings.
I wish there was a way to turn down or off the film noise/grain as it feels a bit too much to me other than that the graphics are pretty good and the lighting engine is used well!
When it comes to gameplay, it’s like the other Fata Frame games, exploring is definitely encouraged as you are rewarded, especially with some ghostly encounters that if you catch them on film gets you some sweet sweet spending points on useful items.
Overall, I really enjoyed Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse. The wait was worth it in my opinion. I really hope that they do a remaster of the first two games as well but if not, maybe a new Fatal Frame could be put into development. With the exception of the film grain/noise, and being the only game in the main franchise with no English dubbing, there’s really nothing bad to say about it. On a scale of 1-10 I give it a 9.5!
Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse comes out on March 9th for PC, PlayStations 4 and 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.
