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Any horror fan should be familiar with the name Clive Barker, the creator of Hellraiser and Candyman, who has also worked on (or adapted) several video games.
One of Barker’s most famous forays into the gaming industry, Clive Barker’s Jericho was released for seventh generation consoles and PC on October 23, 2007. It was developed by MercurySteam, which had less experience at the time. MercurySteam is currently best known as the developer of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow for Konami and the terrifying Metroid Dread for Nintendo, MercurySteam was a very different studio at the time, but it’s worth noting that it first honed its horror skills on Clive Barker’s game Jericho , an underrated creepy shooter that was forced into a crowded October release schedule, probably too soon.
In Jericho, the eponymous team of supernatural special forces, something like “Ghostbusters” with big guns, fought against a variety of monsters to stop the ancient evil in the world. The ambitious gameplay was complemented by Barker’s narrative quasi-religious flair, who worked closely with MercurySteam to shape the final product. For example, the squad leader dies early in the game’s storyline, but survives as a ghostly presence that can possess other squad members, giving rise to Jericho’s ambitious squad-changing mechanic. Each character has a unique ability, from blood magic to resupplying the squad through time travel. Jericho is one of the most interesting, if not classic, FPS horror games that the concept still exists today, but MercurySteam’s lack of experience resulted in a lack of gameplay and polish, and not every narrative element survived the page transfer in the most convincing way, which was demonstrated at the very beginning of the game by a vulgar summary of the setting with dubious voice acting.
The game fell into obscurity fairly quickly, and Barker hasn’t worked on another game since, which is a shame, as despite Jericho’s significant shortcomings, it can still surprise at some points.