maid of sker
includes
- dlc: maid of sker soundtrack
developer: wales interactive
genre: survival horror
multiplayer/co-op: no
release date: july 28, 2020
price: a review copy of the title was provided by the publisher for review purposes
msrp: $24.99
platforms: pc, playstation, xbox
reviewed on: pc
- visual: 8/10
- audio: 8/10
- gameplay: 8/10
- narrative: 8/10
- challenge: 8/10
- replayability: 6/10
- value: 8/10
- personal grade: 8/10
- was it scary? not really so -1
total score: 7.63/10
buy at full price, sale, never: sale
hours spent on the game: 10 hours
platinumed? no
Maid, short for maiden, is a girl or young woman, especially an unmarried one.
Maid of Sker is a first-person survival horror game that utilizes elements of stealth, puzzle-solving, backtracking, and no-weapon survival and is set in a remote derelict hotel. This game is heavily inspired by the popular British folklore legend of the Sker House and the original Maid of Sker. The original Sker House, still standing to this day, dates back to the 12th century, and has a reputation for being haunted by two ghosts: a captain of a shipwreck near Sker Point and Elizabeth Williams, the original Maid of Sker. The house was made popular by R. D. Blackmore’s book The Maid of Sker, written in 1872.
In the 18th century, Sker House, actually located in Kenfig, South Wales, was owned by a farmer named Isaac Williams. His daughter, Elizabeth Williams, fell in love with a local harpist named Thomas Evans. However, Isaac forbade Elizabeth from seeing him and imprisoned her in a room in the house until she agreed to marry another man of “better” financial status. Even after the unwanted arranged marriage, Elizabeth still yearned for Thomas, so much that she eventually fell ill and died. Some claim that she died of a broken heart, others that she starved herself to death. Nonetheless, her spirit is said to haunt Sker House to this day. Perhaps she was coined the Maid of Sker because she was never truly married to the person she loved.
The game Maid of Sker takes these real-life characters — Isaac Williams, Elizabeth Williams and Thomas Evans — as well as fictional characters and creates a tale of forbidden love and supernatural mystery that haunts the grounds of the Sker Hotel. You play as Thomas Evans, the musician, on a quest to save your lover Elizabeth, who is locked inside the confinements of the hotel. Though the initial premise of the story is based on real British folklore, there really isn’t much character development in terms of the main protagonist. You are silent across the entirety of the game. Maid of Sker possesses most of the tropes of a typical survival horror game. It has maze-like maps, locked areas that you need to come back to later, ominous ambience, and, of course, jump scares. The jump scares do not feel cheap but instead make the environment around you feel alive. There are also refreshing and unique elements including sonic weaponry, which stuns enemies using sound waves but does not kill them, and a particular entity that knows your exact location and stalks you relentlessly. Perhaps this particular entity, whom I will not name, is inspired by a popular tyrant from the Resident Evil series. Both elements contribute to the balance of hopelessness you feel in the game, a pivotal element in any horror game.
The visuals for this game are quite appealing, as they pay much attention to detail and fit in with the theme of the story and lore. You are able to make out the descriptions on a wall, the facial features and words in a painting, and even the designs of a beer tap. This game has very little cutscenes, and facial features are nearly nonexistent, as the enemies are always wearing sack masks. Aurally speaking, the voice acting in the scenes containing phonographs and telephones is well-done and not awkward. Load times for this game were also very quick and seamless.
This game offers 3 different difficulties: Easy, Normal, and Hard. I completed my playthrough first on Normal and am currently working my way through Hard. This game is by no means easy, nor is it unreasonably hard. I already thought Normal mode was decently challenging; I can only imagine how the difficulty would pick up on Hard! Though you are given enough healing items, ammunition and save points, you still can’t help but feel like you need to be strategic and smart with how you use them. Gameplay wise, the mechanics are simple to understand but hard to master. The gameplay is also very realistic and I admire the developers for that! The overall gist is that everything is sound-based. Enemies cannot see you but they can hear you. Running and bumping into things in your environment make noise. Coming too close to an enemy alerts them of your presence. You mitigate this by holding your breath while you walk. You cannot hold your breath while you run and sometimes you cannot hold your breath at all after running for a long time or holding it for a long time, as you need time to recover. There is an added element to this gameplay, which is coughing. You cough when you walk through dusty or cloudy areas, obviously making noise and alerting nearby enemies of your presence. The puzzles in this game are refreshing, quirky, and fun to complete, and a lot of them revolve around music, a major theme to this game. They aren’t simple to the point that you don’t need to think at all but they aren’t ridiculously tricky either. The uniqueness of each puzzle really picked at my deduction and memorization skills. There were many times in which I felt pressed for time while doing a puzzle in fear that an enemy would notice me or be alerted. Aside from all this, there are also diaries, letters, and notes to pick up that help provide insight to the events that led up to the current story.
Though there are collectable items to look out for in the game, I am unsure whether there is enough incentive to collect all of them. As such, my outlook on the replayability of Maid of Sker is a little skeptical. The only reason to play through the game again is to challenge yourself with hard mode. The game markets itself as one that has multiple endings. Though this is true, it does not require you to replay the entire game again. Under certain conditions, you can just reload your save file and pick the other option. I had originally expected that there would be multiple dialogue options throughout the game that would work together to dictate what ending you get. I was a little disappointed that it was so easy to unlock the other ending. Another gripe that I have is that if you start a new game, it will overwrite your previous playthrough. Though this is not a big issue, I am not sure what the purpose of this is.
My first playthrough of the game took around 6 hours. Given that I have played many survival horror games in the past, I will assume the average gamer would take around 7-8 hours to complete the game in their first playthrough. Since this is a survival horror game, I can definitely see this game being used by hardcore gamers to speed-run. However, during my playthrough of the game, I experienced frame drops during certain areas of the game. Fortunately, no bugs nor crashes occurred during my playthrough. For reference, my PC setup runs on a GTX1070.
Maid of Sker is very big on audio cues and music. Heck, if you pre-order the game you get an entire soundtrack of folk hymns to listen to. Much of the story is driven by music sheets, instruments, and singing that are woven into the narrative. The music itself is tense, terrifying, immersive and beautiful. As you venture your way through the hotel, the floors creak, the winds chime, and the footsteps of nearby enemies can be heard, never making you feel truly safe. The only sort of solace you will find is in each phonograph room, always located behind a familiar green door. One thing I really enjoyed about each save point was that it takes the form of a phonograph, and plays a snippet of dialogue that adds to the overall development of the story. You will discover the truth behind all of this music after you play through the game for yourself!
Maid of Sker was an overall delight to play, even more so considering that this game is not a Triple-A game and set at a very reasonable price. It is very much well worth the price tag if you are into stealthy survival horror, and enjoy figuring out the lore and mystery behind a well-known British folk legend. I greatly enjoyed the music, the narrative, and the unique gameplay elements that this game introduced.