The remaster doesn’t have a release date yet, but it’s out sometime this year, potentially in December, for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC, PS4, PS5, and Nintendo Switch. Here are 15 things you should know about The Thing: Remastered, from what made the original so endearing to everything new being brought to the table.

“Faithful Restoration”

Nightdive has promised a “faithful restoration” of the 2002 survival horror, which offers third-person movement and a first-person mode, but what exactly is The Thing? Based on John Carpenter’s movie of the same name, it actually serves as a sequel with Captain J. F. Blake as the protagonist. Players are charged with investigating what happened at Outpost 31 in Antarctica. Unfortunately, they soon find themselves hunted by the same entity which wreaked havoc in the film.

Multiple Characters

While you’ll control Blake throughout the game, it’s also possible to give orders to other NPCs. Each has a unique role with Medics healing allies, Engineers opening locked doors, and Soldiers piling on the damage while being more skilled in combat than the other two roles. As a result, their cooperation is essential to survival.

The Thing(s)

The entity from the film is an alien, one that presents in all manner of grotesque ways. It consists of Scuttlers, smaller creatures that are easily dispatched; Walkers, which are larger and only defeated with the help of a flamethrower; and Bosses, who have their own mechanics but are also weak to fire. You’ll want to kill them for obvious reasons (read: living), but their grotesque structures aren’t the real danger. It’s the shape-shifting you need to worry about.

Impostors and Infection

And yes, that means killing any NPCs that you may come across and assuming their form. The challenge is that you won’t know who has been replaced, and thus, who to trust, which goes both ways, as they won’t know whether to trust Blake. Interestingly, if NPCs happen to be attacked by any of the Things, there’s a chance they could become infected and transform faster, which is far from ideal.

Trust

Further throwing a wrench into all of this is the Fear/Trust System. To gain the assistance of other NPCs, Blake must have their trust, which is challenging if they suspect him of being the Thing). Trust falls into red (complete distrust and attacking him on sight), amber (unsure), green (trusted), and 100 percent. While you can gain trust by protecting NPCs or giving them supplies, it can be depleted if you shoot them (accidentally or otherwise), among other things. If an ally is 100 percent on your side, they’ll continue following you regardless of how trigger-happy you get with friends.

Fear

Of course, you also have to account for fear, which occurs if you discover any gory sights or get attacked. If an NPC becomes too scared and enters Crack-up Mode, they can behave erratically, attacking you or even harming themselves. Certain decisions like giving them adrenaline, or killing Things will help alleviate the fear, but beware – once an NPC cracks up, you must find a way to help them before it’s too late.

Weapons and Tools

The Thing offers a decent selection of weaponry for Blake and the team to leverage. Aside from flamethrowers, you have assault rifles, submachine guns, grenade launchers, shotguns, and even heavy machine guns for fighting back against the Things. However, some of your most important tools will be adrenaline, ammo and health packs (since giving them to allies will gain their trust and help keep fear down), and the ever-essential blood test kits, which can prove that Blake isn’t infected. How you distribute these weapons and items is the real issue.

Total Levels and Playtime

A lot is going on in The Thing with its gameplay mechanics and potential outcomes, but it’s not as long as you’d think. There are 20 levels in total, but it’s set entirely in Outpost 31, the total playtime is around seven hours for the main story and about nine and a half hours on average for completionists. Nightdive hasn’t indicated whether it’s adding any extra content, but we’ll need to wait for more details.

Up to 4K and 144 FPS on Current-Gen Platforms

What you can look forward to in the remaster is 4K resolution support and up to 144 frames per second performance on PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5. Based on the gameplay thus far, The Thing: Remastered looks extremely crisp on higher resolutions and should perform even better, thanks to Nightdive’s KEX Engine.

Improved Lighting and Atmospheric Effects

On top of higher frame rates and resolutions, there are also improvements to the lighting and atmospheric effects, adding to the overall tension. Whether you’re wandering outside the outpost and taking in the frigid cold as snow rains down or appreciating the sweet fire and the shadows it casts, it’s a significant step up.

Improved Textures and Characters

Character models, textures and animations are also better, with the latter being hand-crafted by Nightdive and offering a more realistic feel. While that means the cast looks more endearing, it also means that all those Things running around (especially the Scuttlers) look even creepier and more disgusting.

Quality of Life Features

Nightdive is known for its quality of life features in its remasters, and you can expect as much from The Thing: Remastered. However, aside from Achievements on PlayStation, Xbox, and Steam, they’re yet to be fully detailed. Mark Atkinson, who directed the original, did promise some fixes for areas where players could find themselves without ammo, so there is that at least. Unfortunately, those hoping for different difficulty options are out of luck.

Scalable Difficulties

In Nightdive’s Deep Dive series, Atkinson confirmed that The Thing: Remastered won’t have a “Story Mode” difficulty. Instead, there will be scalable difficulties, which could mean the game becomes more challenging depending on how well you’re doing. Either way, don’t expect it to be a walk in the park.

Plays As Well or Better Than the Original

Atkinson also promised that the remaster would play as well or better than the original. Given that The Thing faced criticism for its control scheme, perhaps there will be alternate options available. On the other hand, maybe it feels more responsive for those who stick with the classic layout. As always, we’ll need to wait and see.

PC Requirements

The Thing: Remastered is thankfully very undemanding for PC players, requiring a whopping five GB of installation space. The minimum requirements include an Intel Core i5-3570 3.4GHz or AMD Ryzen 3 1300X 3.5GHz, 2 GB of RAM and either an Nvidia GeForce GTX 650 TI (2GB) or an AMD Radeon HD 7750 (1GB). Recommended requirements include a Core i5-6600k 3.5 GHz or an AMD Ryzen 5 1600 3.2 GHz, 4 GB RAM and either a GeForce GTX 1070 (8GB) or AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 (8GB). The requirements for 4K haven’t been explicitly detailed, but unless you’re stuck on the wrong side of 2016 in terms of hardware, they shouldn’t be particularly challenging to hit.

Launching in 2002 for PC, PS2 and Xbox as a follow-up to John Carpenter’s film, The Thing focused on a US Special Forces team fighting for their lives against the same alien. The twist is that the latter is a shape-shifter, making it difficult to trust your allies. Depending on an NPC’s trust and fear, they may “crack up”, suffering various consequences (including suicide).

Building trust is important, but your allies also have a chance to get infected by The Thing, transforming into one of its minions and attacking you. The Thing received praise for production values and action, though some felt it could have been mechanically better. If a remaster is on the cards, it should be interesting to see how Nightdive approaches it. Stay tuned for further updates in the meantime.

Who wants to guess the game we’ll be announcing this Friday at @IGN Live? 👀

Hint: pic.twitter.com/qmdtyJII2n

— Nightdive Studios (@NightdiveStudio) June 5, 2024

The game that I am talking about is The Thing, which was based upon the movie by the same name which itself was based on a short story by the name, Who Goes There? The story revolves around a group of soldiers investigating a strange alien force which has the ability to take on the form of anyone that it comes in contact with, which means that no one can be entirely trusted in these circumstances. The Thing was released on the big screen in 1982, and the John Carpenter-directed sci-fi horror was initially lambasted by critics as a run-of-the-mill horror movie with nothing interesting going for it. But when the movie was released on TV and VCR, it gained a brand new audience that absolutely lapped it up and as a result – became a cult classic.

Developer Computer Artworks sought to replicate the movie’s chilly atmosphere and unnerving survival horror gameplay in video game form, and The Thing was formally announced in 2000 with Konami backing the project as a publisher alongside Black Label Games. Of course, fans had their fair share of skepticism regarding the game – particularly due to the game being based on a movie. That said, The Thing was a great candidate for a video game adaptation since the story’s main hook of not knowing who the real alien is is too enchanting to pass out on. Additionally, the developers also reassured fans that the game would serve as a sort of a sequel to the events in the movie, which would allow for a more open approach to storytelling and morphing ideas for gameplay.

The Thing finally released for PC, PS2, and Xbox in 2000, and was subject to a somewhat of a mixed reception at the time. Some critics had a really fun time with the game, while others didn’t approve of the game’s mechanics and found them to be frustrating and highly scripted. But either way, most would definitely agree that the game wasn’t just another survival horror game but a game that had its fair share of original ideas that helped it stand out from the pack.

The Thing sees players taking the role of player character Blake who is a member of the U.S. Special Forces sent to the frigid conditions of Antarctica to investigate the strange disappearance of a research team. As the team lands, they slowly get acquainted with the hostile force that is The Thing as turned creatures and enemy soldiers pose an immediate threat to your existence. While the game is technically survival horror with a focus on resource management and the like, it also features action-packed third-person combat with weapons ranging from sniper rifles to flamethrowers to machine guns and many more.

Much like the movies, your player character will meet many comrades along the way who will join you for the ride. These companions can belong to one of many classes such as a medic, an engineer, or a soldier – each of which has some special utilities attached to them. You will have to recruit these NPCs since fixing broken circuits isn’t exactly one of Blake’s strongest suits. Since The Thing can take the form of anyone and everyone, it’s not easy to trust anyone wholeheartedly.

The game features an innovative trust-fear AI system for NPCs, which governs how promptly your companions will follow your orders. If a companion’s faith in Blake gets too low, they will suspect him of being The Thing and start shooting at him. On the flip side, if it’s adequately high – they will follow your orders in an instant. There’s also a fear gauge for companions, which is affected by entering rooms with corpses and having close encounters with turned creatures. If the fear level drops too low, you will need to inject your companions with a shot of adrenaline or an electric shock to make them rejoin your cause. In case the fear gets low beyond a certain point, NPCs may also commit suicide or die of a heart attack.

The trust-fear system works differently for different NPC classes and forms the basis of replicating the ominous vibe of the movie. In addition to this, there are sections where you are split up from your teammates which will then result in one of them turning into The Thing. Of course, having to gun down a virtual buddy that you spent hours with is a depressing prospect, but elements such as these help the game stand out amongst the crowd of generic survival horror shooters.

The Thing combined ideas from a multitude of sources and combined it into something that was truly special. Elements such as the trust-fear system can make for some frustrating moments, but looking at the complete picture – elements like these made for an engaging experience through and through. As such, it’s no surprise that The Thing stands at a rating of 77 on Metacritic, and sold over 1 million copies. While that’s not a lot, we have to consider that the game was a new IP and likely recouped development costs with these sales – so that means it was a commercial success.

An ambitious sequel was in the works at Computer Artworks following the first game’s release, and the team was working on elements like dynamic infections and burst-outs and a whole lot of jargon – but fate had other plans. You see, the developer hadn’t received payments from publishers for some of its other projects – which took a toll on the company’s finances. There were other undisclosed reasons of course, but in the face of these adverse circumstances – most of the staff left the company one by one, and Computer Artworks went into receivership.

Following this, all of the studio’s projects were promptly canceled – including The Thing’s sequel and the only semblance of the game that we got was a few concept arts showcasing the aforementioned description of ideas that the developer had for the game. The Thing’s downfall is an unfortunate one, because the game had already proven itself as a potent mix of survival horror and tactical shooter – but before the formula could be refined and expanded further, the franchise met a premature end due to the company’s circumstances. As it stands now, The Thing is a forgotten gem that could have been so much more – but ended up fizzling out despite all the right moves.

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