One shot at surviving the darkness
By Paul Hunter
After years of remastering previous titles in the Fatal Frame series, Team NINJA and Koei Tecmo are going bigger with the first ever from-the-ground-up remake. Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake is a full reconstruction of the classic survival horror title for modern hardware and features a ton of new additions. But at its core, it builds upon the original that launched on PlayStation 2 in 2003 and has been a high point in the franchise ever since.
A new third-person over-the-shoulder perspective, an upgraded Camera Obscura (the series' ghost-exorcising camera), new side stories, and two brand-new endings are all part of the package. So, does Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake do justice to this revered title? Let's find out!
But let's back up a moment. The tale begins with Mio Amakura, the younger twin, who has been watching over her sister Mayu since a childhood accident she blamed herself for, one that left Mayu with a limp and a dependence on Mio that runs deep. Together they visit the Stream of Memories, their old childhood spot, which is about to be swallowed by a newly built dam, when a crimson butterfly drifts past and pulls Mayu into the woods. Mio naturally follows, concerned about her sister. They end up inside Minakami Village, a place sealed in eternal darkness by a catastrophe called The Repentance and completely absent from every map.
The village is overrun with wraiths, spirits tied permanently to Minakami by violent, unresolved deaths, and they want the sisters for their deadly ritual. Mio spends the game constatly searching for Mayu, who runs off whenever she's found, and seeks a way to exit this forsaken town, uncovering the village's history as she goes. At the centre of it is the Crimson Sacrifice Ritual, a forbidden ceremony presided over by the Kurosawa family that required twin sisters as offerings. The Kurosawa twins were the last pair chosen, and their fate connects directly to what Mio and Mayu now face. Sae Kurosawa, one of the Twin Maidens from the ceremony that caused The Repentance, haunts Mio throughout and always seems one footstep behind.
The supporting cast are some of the best characters in the series. Itsuki Tachibana, a young man with white hair confined to the village storehouse, calls Mio by the name Yae and guides her journey. Seijiro Makabe, a folklore researcher drawn to Minakami by the legend of a place that must never be seen, left notes full of the village's history behind him and was, as it turns out, the man who brought the Camera Obscura here. Miyako Sudo, the first wraith Mio encounters, died searching for her lost lover and wanders Minakami still. The Kusabi, a wraith the Camera Obscura has no effect on at all, is relentless and hunts survivors without mercy.
New side stories expand the backstories of characters including Itsuki Tachibana and Seijiro Makabe, giving new insights into these pivotal characters. The new endings can only be experinced through a New Game Plus playthrough, giving even more reasons to replay the adventure and providing new conclusions the original never had.
All in all, the story is dark and layered, and told with more depth than ever before.
Holding hands with Mayu does have a setback though, as both of them slow down while connected, and in a village this dangerous, speed matters. Wraiths will also go for Mayu directly during fights, and photographing them with the Camera Obscura is the only way to protect her. If her health hits zero, it's game over.
Fortunately, your Camera Obscura offensive capabilities have been greatly expanded upon in this remake. You still have the series signature Fatal Frame, which activates if you snap a shot the moment the red light on top flashes. Land it and you stagger the wraith, deal heavy damage, plus restore a chunk of your Willpower gauge. New in this version is the Shutter Chance, which activates if you delete the wraith's health below a certain point and opens a vulnerability window where one photo can hit them hard.
Land a Fatal Frame during a Shutter Chance opening and you activate Fatal Time, a brief moment to chain several shots in quick succession and deal tremendous damage, particularly useful against bosses. Powering your Camera Obscura is a range of films possessing different reload speeds and exorcism power. Swapping lens filters is also new in this game: the Paraceptual filter is long range and lets you see spirits through walls, the Exposure filter slows wraiths and reveals hidden items, and the Radiant filter is short-range, powerful and can expel powerful blood seals. All filters can be upgraded at save points via Prayer Beads, including unlocks for camera focus and zoom, or adding more damage focal points.
Wraiths can also become aggravated mid-fight, a state triggered when you attack them enough that they hit a breaking point. When that happens, they get faster and start regenerating health, and the only way to reset them is landing a Shutter Chance photo. Leer attacks are another thing to watch for. A wraith that catches your eyes during combat or a door interaction drains your Willpower considerably, and breaking line of sight is the only counter. During item pickups, there's also a chance for a Grab attack, and of course Mio takes her time with everything so grabbing items is always tense and risky.
Two wraiths in particular are immune to the Camera Obscura entirely. Against those, you'll need to turn off your flashlight, which lights dark areas and reveals hidden items but makes you easier to spot, crouch to reduce noise, and then hide under objects until they pass. Charms, found throughout the village, add passive bonuses like faster health recovery and increased damage output, and in New Game Plus you can expand the charm bag to equip more than one.
All in all, the gameplay is tense, smart, and rewarding from the first encounter to the last.
The new free third-person camera certainly helps, as you can look around at all the nice visuals without being constrained by PS2 original's fixed angles. Minakami Village has been rebuilt completely on Koei Tecmo's latest engine, with the textures, lighting, backgrounds, facial expressions, and wraith models all representing a genuine step forward from anything the series has shown before.
The lighting keeps everything dim and eerie throughout the game. Not dark exactly, more like a permanent low haze has settled across the whole village. You see the rotting wood, the paper screen doors, the candle-lit shrine offerings, the overgrown grass, and so much more. It all adds up to a constant uneasy feeling, and that unease never fades over the nine-chapater experience. I particularly liked the new wraith models, which have redesigned shroud surrounding them that make them look unstable and partially absent from the physical world.
Turning to audio, new spatial 3D sounds tracks every spirit directionally, so you hear what is in the next room or around the next corner before you reach it. The Kusabi boss-like wraith has a specific, harrowing cry that gets louder the closer it gets, and there is no getting used to that sound. Sudden sound effects fire when non-hostile spirits are nearby, with no warning and no pattern. You'll also hear constant creaks, or sounds of objects falling, all around you and reinforcing this place is just as alive as it is dead and forgotten. Full voice acting in both English and Japanese is available and it's strong throughout. Performance on PS5 mostly ran smoothly across the whole game, although it is set to 30fps and there's no 60fps performance toggle even on PS5 Pro.
All in all, the presentation is one of the strongest in the genre, on par with the recent Silent Hill 2 Remake.
Final Score: 8.5/10 - Great
Developer: Team Ninja
Publisher: Koei Tecmo
Genre: Survival Horror
Modes: Single-player
A key was provided by the publisher.
By Paul Hunter
After years of remastering previous titles in the Fatal Frame series, Team NINJA and Koei Tecmo are going bigger with the first ever from-the-ground-up remake. Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake is a full reconstruction of the classic survival horror title for modern hardware and features a ton of new additions. But at its core, it builds upon the original that launched on PlayStation 2 in 2003 and has been a high point in the franchise ever since.
A new third-person over-the-shoulder perspective, an upgraded Camera Obscura (the series' ghost-exorcising camera), new side stories, and two brand-new endings are all part of the package. So, does Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake do justice to this revered title? Let's find out!
Story and Narrative
Two sisters walk into a cursed village, but only one of them did it willingly, led by the titular crimson butterfly.But let's back up a moment. The tale begins with Mio Amakura, the younger twin, who has been watching over her sister Mayu since a childhood accident she blamed herself for, one that left Mayu with a limp and a dependence on Mio that runs deep. Together they visit the Stream of Memories, their old childhood spot, which is about to be swallowed by a newly built dam, when a crimson butterfly drifts past and pulls Mayu into the woods. Mio naturally follows, concerned about her sister. They end up inside Minakami Village, a place sealed in eternal darkness by a catastrophe called The Repentance and completely absent from every map.
The village is overrun with wraiths, spirits tied permanently to Minakami by violent, unresolved deaths, and they want the sisters for their deadly ritual. Mio spends the game constatly searching for Mayu, who runs off whenever she's found, and seeks a way to exit this forsaken town, uncovering the village's history as she goes. At the centre of it is the Crimson Sacrifice Ritual, a forbidden ceremony presided over by the Kurosawa family that required twin sisters as offerings. The Kurosawa twins were the last pair chosen, and their fate connects directly to what Mio and Mayu now face. Sae Kurosawa, one of the Twin Maidens from the ceremony that caused The Repentance, haunts Mio throughout and always seems one footstep behind.
The supporting cast are some of the best characters in the series. Itsuki Tachibana, a young man with white hair confined to the village storehouse, calls Mio by the name Yae and guides her journey. Seijiro Makabe, a folklore researcher drawn to Minakami by the legend of a place that must never be seen, left notes full of the village's history behind him and was, as it turns out, the man who brought the Camera Obscura here. Miyako Sudo, the first wraith Mio encounters, died searching for her lost lover and wanders Minakami still. The Kusabi, a wraith the Camera Obscura has no effect on at all, is relentless and hunts survivors without mercy.
New side stories expand the backstories of characters including Itsuki Tachibana and Seijiro Makabe, giving new insights into these pivotal characters. The new endings can only be experinced through a New Game Plus playthrough, giving even more reasons to replay the adventure and providing new conclusions the original never had.
All in all, the story is dark and layered, and told with more depth than ever before.
Gameplay and Mechanics
Fatal Frame II Remake introduces new gameplay mechanics that greatly expands on the original. For starters, Mayu is not just a story element, she's also a gameplay system. By holding her hand when she's nearby Mio's health recovers and her Willpower gauge restores faster. Willpower is an all-new resource that is used to unleash special, powerful new camera shots. Taking hits, touching wraiths, and sprinting also drains Willpower, and once it deplete you'll get stuck in a crisis state where wraiths inflict extra damage.Holding hands with Mayu does have a setback though, as both of them slow down while connected, and in a village this dangerous, speed matters. Wraiths will also go for Mayu directly during fights, and photographing them with the Camera Obscura is the only way to protect her. If her health hits zero, it's game over.
Fortunately, your Camera Obscura offensive capabilities have been greatly expanded upon in this remake. You still have the series signature Fatal Frame, which activates if you snap a shot the moment the red light on top flashes. Land it and you stagger the wraith, deal heavy damage, plus restore a chunk of your Willpower gauge. New in this version is the Shutter Chance, which activates if you delete the wraith's health below a certain point and opens a vulnerability window where one photo can hit them hard.
Land a Fatal Frame during a Shutter Chance opening and you activate Fatal Time, a brief moment to chain several shots in quick succession and deal tremendous damage, particularly useful against bosses. Powering your Camera Obscura is a range of films possessing different reload speeds and exorcism power. Swapping lens filters is also new in this game: the Paraceptual filter is long range and lets you see spirits through walls, the Exposure filter slows wraiths and reveals hidden items, and the Radiant filter is short-range, powerful and can expel powerful blood seals. All filters can be upgraded at save points via Prayer Beads, including unlocks for camera focus and zoom, or adding more damage focal points.
Wraiths can also become aggravated mid-fight, a state triggered when you attack them enough that they hit a breaking point. When that happens, they get faster and start regenerating health, and the only way to reset them is landing a Shutter Chance photo. Leer attacks are another thing to watch for. A wraith that catches your eyes during combat or a door interaction drains your Willpower considerably, and breaking line of sight is the only counter. During item pickups, there's also a chance for a Grab attack, and of course Mio takes her time with everything so grabbing items is always tense and risky.
Two wraiths in particular are immune to the Camera Obscura entirely. Against those, you'll need to turn off your flashlight, which lights dark areas and reveals hidden items but makes you easier to spot, crouch to reduce noise, and then hide under objects until they pass. Charms, found throughout the village, add passive bonuses like faster health recovery and increased damage output, and in New Game Plus you can expand the charm bag to equip more than one.
All in all, the gameplay is tense, smart, and rewarding from the first encounter to the last.
Presentation and Audio
Visually, the remake is absolutely gorgeous. I spent more time than I should admit just standing in rooms taking in the detail.The new free third-person camera certainly helps, as you can look around at all the nice visuals without being constrained by PS2 original's fixed angles. Minakami Village has been rebuilt completely on Koei Tecmo's latest engine, with the textures, lighting, backgrounds, facial expressions, and wraith models all representing a genuine step forward from anything the series has shown before.
The lighting keeps everything dim and eerie throughout the game. Not dark exactly, more like a permanent low haze has settled across the whole village. You see the rotting wood, the paper screen doors, the candle-lit shrine offerings, the overgrown grass, and so much more. It all adds up to a constant uneasy feeling, and that unease never fades over the nine-chapater experience. I particularly liked the new wraith models, which have redesigned shroud surrounding them that make them look unstable and partially absent from the physical world.
Turning to audio, new spatial 3D sounds tracks every spirit directionally, so you hear what is in the next room or around the next corner before you reach it. The Kusabi boss-like wraith has a specific, harrowing cry that gets louder the closer it gets, and there is no getting used to that sound. Sudden sound effects fire when non-hostile spirits are nearby, with no warning and no pattern. You'll also hear constant creaks, or sounds of objects falling, all around you and reinforcing this place is just as alive as it is dead and forgotten. Full voice acting in both English and Japanese is available and it's strong throughout. Performance on PS5 mostly ran smoothly across the whole game, although it is set to 30fps and there's no 60fps performance toggle even on PS5 Pro.
All in all, the presentation is one of the strongest in the genre, on par with the recent Silent Hill 2 Remake.
The Verdict
Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake is one of the best horror games you can play right now on PS5. The Camera Obscura combat is the sharpest it's ever been, Minakami Village is completely rebuilt and larger than ever, the story is even more involved with new side stories and brand-new endings, and the presentation is the best the series has ever produced. This is the remake fans deserved, and it delivers on every front.Final Score: 8.5/10 - Great
Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly Remake details
Platform: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC, Nintendo Switch 2Developer: Team Ninja
Publisher: Koei Tecmo
Genre: Survival Horror
Modes: Single-player
A key was provided by the publisher.