World War 1 is a strangely underused setting for horror, considering it’s one of the most cruel and nightmarish conflicts in human history. We often see games depict its horrors in black and white, having you play as a courageous soldier fighting back against a rampaging enemy, a visceral journey of valour and blood. Only a handful of titles show the more tragic aspects of war, and even then they tend to be political and militaristic, rarely venturing as deep as Ad Infinitum. There were no winners in World War 1, and Ad Infinitum drives that home by telling a more intimate story of a German family torn apart by pride, tradition, and unwavering patriotism.
You play as Paul von Schmidt, the youngest son of a family where each member has been tormented by the ongoing war. Through notes left around your home, solving puzzles, and rifling through your family’s belongings, you piece together how each member has been affected, along with their struggles and the reasons why their relationships are so strained. Once you’ve done so, you’re then sent to the trenches to confront the physical manifestations of their demons, and can choose to either show them kindness or add to their misery.
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It’s in the trenches where the true meat and bones of Ad Infinitum lies, with each chapter forcing you to take on a variety of horrible beasts. Each one has their own weakness to exploit, such as a lack of vision or aversion to light. In the same vein as titles like Amnesia and Soma, these foes can’t be killed, but each section tasks you with using a certain tool or your environment to avoid them whilst trying to complete another goal. If you’re spotted, you either run for your life, or get munched on.
It sounds brutal, but Ad Infinitum won’t have you throwing your controller at the wall. It’s a game that delights in putting you in stressful situations rather than difficult ones, whether that be a chase sequence through some swampy trenches, or being submerged in pitch black darkness with nothing but a wind up torch for light. There will be moments where you won’t want to move forward for fear of what could be lurking around the corner, and the game builds up tension perfectly with its dim lighting, eerie music, and effective use of silence.
Combined with the game’s wonderfully claustrophobic environments, Ad Infinitum creates a tense atmosphere. In the quiet, it is one of the scarier games I’ve played in a while. Misty trenches, dark rooms, and flooded tunnels all add to an oppressive feeling of unease that you’re constantly faced with. You’ll sometimes run across a very obvious checkpoint that tips you off that things are about to get intense, slightly ruining the tension, but each environment feels carefully crafted to make you as uncomfortable as possible, even when returning to previously visited areas.
Thankfully, there are plenty of opportunities to compose yourself, with slower puzzles breaking up the dark silence. Most of them involve finding an object and putting it in the right place, and they’ll rarely have you scratching your head in confusion or frustration. There’s one particular puzzle that has you flicking through patient records in a field hospital that is a bit of a brain teaser, but they’re mainly there to help separate the game’s spookier sections. Ad Infinitum understands that horror games need moments of calm to make their scares more effective.
Unfortunately, for all that Ad Infinitum does right, it feels at odds with itself. Most of the tools you’re given work well during slow and methodical sections, but you’re often forced to use them during intense, fast-paced encounters. Smashing walls and wooden boards with your axe is a case of running up against the surface and mashing the right trigger until you hit the right spot, making one particular chase sequence especially frustrating in ways that weren’t intended. Wire clippers require you to be incredibly precise, often locking you into an animation that can be difficult to break out of if you get it wrong. Opening doors requires you to hold down the handle and use the right stick to push or pull them. It clearly wants you to panic during these moments, but it causes irritation more often than not.
There are also a large amount of performance issues that gradually build the further you progress. Enemies will often get stuck on pieces of scenery, as will you if you approach something at the wrong angle - although you won’t know it’s wrong until you’re stuck. Cutscenes and jumpscares will sometimes trigger without any sound, only for the game to realize a few seconds too late and attempt to catch up. Flickering lights appear and disappear at random too, even in areas that are supposed to be pitch black. You could easily ignore them in other games, but they severely dampen the tension that Ad Infinitum builds so well, whipping you out of your immersion.
Ad Infinitum is an enjoyable horror game for genre aficionados, and tells a compelling story in a unique setting. It has a few moments that will have even the most grizzled horror veterans whimpering in a corner, building tension to create some pulsating scares, all the while giving you enough time to compose yourself before the next one. But you’ll need to look past some frustrating design decisions and pretty glaring performance issues to get the most out of it. Beyond that, there’s just enough there to make your time with Ad Infinitum worthwhile.
Score 3/5. A PlayStation 5 code was provided by the developer.
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