The Thing Remastered Review

The Thing Remastered

Developed By: Nightdive Studios, Computer Artworks

Published By: Nightdive Studios

Date of Release: December 5, 2024

Price: $29.99

When it comes to the cult classic film franchise The Thing I have to admit right off the bat that my first experience with it was not the film by John Carpenter, but the sequel in video game form when it was released on the original Xbox back in 2002. I found it to be quite interesting take on survival horror at the beginning, but the forced mechanics became so overwhelmingly frustrating later on that I abandoned playing it, and shelved it never to play it again. or so I thought. Who would have known that 22 years later, Nightdive studios would helm a remaster of the original with their usual degree of quality of life fixes thrown in for good measure.

The original release of The Thing was a wildly ambitions project, set as a direct sequel to the 1982 film of the same name. It had some impressive mechanics such as having to deal with cold conditions, manage your teammate's fear, and running tests on them to ensure that they weren't infected. Sadly it was held back by some of the very mechanics that made it so unique, namely scripted events where your team members would turn. Thankfully Nightdive saw fit to cut out those forced events, which has greatly improved the game in my opinion, making things much gentler but without diluting the challenge.

Of course it wouldn't be a Nightdive remaster without a vault containing a crapload of goodies, and on this The Thing Remastered delivers as well. It's loaded with concept art and development materials, which IMO are always a great inclusion. All in all, it's great to be able to play The Thing in 4K with all the modern creature comforts, and anyone who was a fan of the original will find a lot to love here. It's definitely a good pickup for anyone who was a fan of the John Carpenter film as well. I know i sound like a broken record at this point, but Nightdive has just pulled yet another hat trick imo. At the rate they're fixing up these old flawed classics, it wouldn't surprise me if they even manage to fix up the likes of Blood II someday.