My review of 'Friday the 13th: The video game'

If you have ever seen a "Friday the 13th" movie then you know how fun and scary those movies were when you were a young kid growing up in the 80's. If you were like me you might have also had a weird fantasy of wondering what it would be like to be the hockey masked killer himself stomping the grounds of Camp Crystal Lake.

There was a horrible attempt at making a video game based on the movie franchise in the late 80's.

However it was simply too corny and cheesy to be taken seriously. Finally, we now have a real chance to be that infamous hockey masked killer hunting his prey.

'Friday the 13th: The video game' is the premier asymmetrical multiplayer experience

"Friday the 13th: The video game" is a one of a kind asymmetrical multiplayer experience developed by newcomer indie company Illfonic and published by Gun Media. This incredibly addicting survival horror game starts off as seven camp counselors witnessing a fellow camp counselor named Rob gets brutally slaughtered in front of them by Jason Voorhees. This, of course, takes place during the 1980's after Jason witnessed his mother being killed by one of the counselors who didn't watch Jason when he drowned as a child.

You then play as one of the camp counselors who has to find a way to survive the night while cooperating with the other six counselors. There are five ways to survive the night.

The first way is to find different items like a gas can, car battery, and keys to repair the car to escape in it. The next way to escape is using the boat to cross buoys to safety. Once again items like a gas can and a propeller are needed to repair the boat first. You can choose to look out for yourself and repair the items and escape by yourself or help other counselors to escape with you. Or you can escape by finding the phone fuse and then finding which cabin has the phone fuse box so you can repair it to call the cops.

It takes at the most five minutes for the cops to be called and less than that if you have a special perk to reduce the cops' response time. We'll get to the special counselor perks later. Another way to survive is to simply avoid Jason Voorhees as much as possible by either hiding under a bed, in an outhouse, closet, or a tent or fight him off until the time limit expires which is 20 minutes per match.

The final way to survive is to kill the King of Horror himself. All you gotta do is have a female counselor find his mom's sweater which is inside Jason's shack. Finding the shack can be pretty tricky at times since it spawns at different locations each round. Then another player has to either be killed or escape to come back as Tommy Jarvis, Jason's longtime nemesis.

That is if a counselor is lucky enough to find the cabin where the radio tower is so Tommy can be summoned.

After all that trouble, if you can knock Jason's mask off then he will become vulnerable to Tommy's death blow with a sharp weapon like a machete or an ax. Don't forget the female counselor has to first enchant Jason with the sweater by pretending to be his mother while ordering him to put down his weapon. If that works then one hit will bring him to his knees where the final blow can be delivered.

Playing as one of the camp counselors

There are so far to date 13 playable camp counselors to choose from with their own strengths and weaknesses, not including the hero Tommy Jarvis. It's your job as a counselor to find different items in cabins and around the maps to increase your chances of survival.

Items that are scattered about are first aid sprays, pocket knives, firecrackers, and weapons such as bats, pipes, fireplace pokers, axes, machetes, pots, tree branches, bear traps, shotguns, and even flare guns.

You get to play on five selected maps from the movies. Camp Crystal Lake is taken from part one. The second map is Packanack Lodge taken from Part two. Higgins Haven is taken from part three. The Jarvis House map is taken from Part four and Pinehurst is taken from part five. The latter two are the biggest ones. Rumors have it that they may add a part six and seven maps in the near future.

• The first counselor is the rocker chick named A.J. Mason. Her strengths are high stealth, high composure, and high repair. Her weaknesses are low speed, low strength, low stamina, and luck.
• The second counselor is the edgy guy named Adam Palomino. His strengths are high strength, high composure and high repair. He also has average speed. His weaknesses are low stamina, luck, and stealth.
• The third counselor is the sports jock named Brandon "Buggzy" Wilson. His strengths are high speed, strengths, and stamina. His weaknesses are low stealth, luck, and repair.
• The fourth counselor is the preppy guy named Chad Kensington. His strengths are high luck, speed, and stealth. His weaknesses are low strength and repair.
• The fifth counselor is Deborah Kim who is the nerdy girl. Her strengths are high repair and high stealth. Her weaknesses are low luck, strength, and stamina.
• The sixth counselor is Eric "J.R." Lachappa who is the other nerd. His strengths are high repair and high stealth. His weaknesses are low strength, speed, and stamina.
• The seventh counselor is Fox who is the biker chick from Part three. Her strength is high strength. Her weakness is low luck. Everything else is average.
• The eighth counselor is the girl next door, Jenny Myers. Her strengths are high composure, luck, and health. Her weaknesses are low speed, repair, and strength.
• The ninth counselor is the head counselor Kenny Riedell. He has a jack of all trades with an average for everything.
• The tenth counselor is the hippie, Mitch Floyd. His strengths are high composure and repair. His weaknesses are low luck, speed, and strength.
• The 11th counselor is prankster named Shelly Finkelstein from Part three. His strengths are high stealth and strength. His weaknesses are low luck, speed, and stamina.
• The 12th counselor is Tiffany Cox who is the flirty girl. Her strengths are high stamina, speed, and stealth. Her weaknesses are low composure, strength, and repair.
• The 13th counselor is Vanessa Jones who is the athletic girl. Her strengths are high speed, stamina, and luck. Her weaknesses are low composure, repair, and stealth.
• Tommy Jarvis is the hero of the game. His strengths are maxed out with no weaknesses.

The perks

There are a total of 45 perks to choose from which gives an extra edge to increase his or her chances of survival.

30 perks can be held in your inventory at a time. You can spend CP which are points earned for every match completed. You can buy a perk by randomly selecting one each time you roll it. There are five types of perks ranging from poor to epic and are color coded. You can also sell back a perk depending on how rare the perk is. Poor perks are worth 100 CP and epic perks are worth 500 CP. There are positive and negative effects to each perk. A few examples of the perks that I use are medic which gives two first aid sprays, swift attacker which increases your swinging speed, thick-skinned which allows you to take more damage, and melee which increases the strength of an attack on Jason.

Playing as Jason Voorhees

Let's face it playing as Jason Voorhees is the main focus of this game and boy is it fun. Your objective is to stop the counselors from escaping, surviving the night, or attempting to kill you. Jason has a set of strengths and special abilities that allow him to do so. His special abilities are morphing, sense, stalk, shift, and rage. The abilities are gained throughout the match after every "ki ki ma ma" Jason chants. Morphing allows Jason to teleport to any part of the map. Sense allows him to detect the heat signature of a counselor nearby or far away based on his or her fear level. Shift allows him to travel at a tremendous speed in a short burst. Stalk mutes the chase theme music of that particular Jason and heightens his sense of hearing.

Rage allows Jason to go into beast mode where all his abilities are enhanced and he can go through closed doors and walls with ease. Rage is activated halfway through the match or when Jason has sustained enough damage.

Don't worry counselors there are cool down periods when Jason has to wait to reuse them after a set amount of time has passed. Each Jason has their own cooling down time period, some are faster or slower than others. As of now, there are currently 9 Jasons to choose from including the imposter Roy Burns from part 5. Each Jason also has their own set of special kills with either a weapon or barehanded. Up to 4 can be equipped at a time. Not to mention environmental kills where you can, for instance, burn somebody in a fireplace, campfire, burn their face off in a scalding pot, drown them in a toilet or lake, smash their head into the wall, hang them on a tree limb or a coat hook.

Jason also has traps that he can strategically place in different areas such as cars, his shack, the phone box, generators but just not inside.

• Part 2 Jason's strengths are fast morphing, 7 traps, and can run. His weaknesses are a slower shift, water speed, and weak defense. His main weapon is a pickaxe.
• Part 3 Jason's strengths are weapon and grip strength, plus he can run. His weaknesses are low stun resistance, stalk, and sense. His main weapon is an axe.
• Part 4 Jason's strengths are weapon strength, destruction, and can run. His weaknesses are low water speed, shift, and 3 traps. His main weapon is a meat cleaver a.k.a. the pig splitter.
• Part 5 Jason's strengths are throwing knives, high stalk time, and can run. His weaknesses are low defense, grip strength, and low stun resistance. His main weapon is the garden shears.
• Part 6 Jason (my personal favorite) strengths are throwing knives, high sense, and shift. His weaknesses are weak defense, slow morphing, and can't run. His main weapon is the fence spear.
• Part 7 Jason's strengths are high sense, water speed, and grip strength. His weaknesses are can't run. slow shift speed, and 3 traps. His main weapon is the machete.
• Part 8 Jason's strengths are high water speed, destruction, and stalk. His weaknesses are can't run, weak grip strength and weak sensing. His main weapon is the fire axe.
• Part 9 Jason's strengths are high shift with fast cool down, strong stun resistance, and long lasting stalk. His weaknesses are can't run, takes more damage faster called less hit points and three traps. His main weapon is the double-headed axe.
• Savini Jason is a special player backed Jason customized by Tom Savini, the famous makeup and special effects artist in the early "Friday the 13th" films. His strengths are fast shift, weapon strength, and destruction. His weaknesses are low water speed, can't run, and grip strength. His main weapon is the trident.

Bugs, glitches, and the new update in April

Unfortunately, the game isn't perfect and has a plethora of bugs and glitches which is the only downside of the game.

Some of them are connection issues where too many times the game will disconnect and end the game session. It seems to happen randomly. There are issues with items not being able to be picked up, rubber banding back to a car that you left, then Jason grabs you and gets an easy kill unless you have a pocket knife. Counselors that magically float in the air, Jason killing a counselor and the counselor still survives, Jason not being able to move and the list goes on.

The April update will include fixes for bugs and glitches, single player challenges, interchangeable weapons for Jason, legendary perks, Roy will have his true spruce green coveralls, Part 7 Jason will have his strengths changed to include normal shift speed and increased weapon strength.

Last but not least the developers will be adding a system where those that rage quit and leave early as a host, counselor, or Jason will be condemned to the salt mines will they will play with like-minded individuals. ("According to bloody-disgusting.com")

This game is a dream come true so please get this if you haven't already. Trust me, if you love survival horror or are just a fan of the movies, you'll fall in love with it! It's now in stores or online for the PC, Xbox, and PS4.