A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead snuck up on us, releasing amid a slew of other games and horror titles, but you shouldn’t overlook it. Stormind Games has crafted a really solid and terrifying horror experience that captures the intense fear and meticulous precision of movements the franchise is known for.
Taking place 118 days after the creatures land on Earth, you play as Alex, a young woman surviving the apocalypse like anyone else. After staying with a group of survivors, you begin to look for another place to stay safe, leading you through a variety of different locations, from a haunting forest to an old harbour and beyond.
The pacing within the story is excellent, as is the soundtrack. Jumping between Alex’s current situation and how she saw Day 1 unfold stops the game from being too oppressive with the dangers you constantly face in the present day. However, the overall plot is a little contrived. The game also intersperses some fantastic quiet moments in safe houses with excellent environmental storytelling, like being able to view drawings from a child or take a moment and pretend to play a keyboard.
When out facing the dangers of the world, the gameplay mostly consists of you finding key items to solve environmental puzzles, precariously tiptoeing around the creatures as they walk alongside you while distracting them. A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is constantly throwing new gameplay mechanics at you that keep each of the levels interesting and exciting, presenting you with a fresh challenge every 15-30 minutes.
Having to be so careful with the sounds you make is made easy with a sound tracker device Alex has that shows the sound you make in comparison with the environment. You can also see your feet as you walk, allowing you to carefully navigate areas with water or buckets that can make sounds if hit. The gameplay does sometimes buckle with a few bugs where the creatures get stuck on the environment. The insta-fail nature of the gameplay can get a tad tedious at times too, but there are a wealth of accessibility options to offset this if needed.
Despite this, the game does a fantastic job of immersing you in this terrifying and deadly world, especially with the live mic feature that captures your audio as you play, which can alert the creatures. There’s a fantastic set of features and foundation here that we’d love to see built upon in a sequel, as the A Quiet Place franchise is a great fit with games.
