We went into Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival thinking about the hours we’d spent with Clive Barker’s Undying all those years ago. Silly us. We expected another story-driven horror adventure with plenty of action and a few gruesome surprises. What we got was, well, considerably worse different. After completing Saber’s latest on PS5 Pro, we’re impressed by how faithfully it captures the Hellraiser universe, but we also wish to God we could forget some of what we’ve witnessed.
The Box Should Have Stayed Closed
We play as Aidan, whose girlfriend, Sunny, becomes trapped in the terrifying world of the Cenobites after the Genesis Configuration is opened. Yes, it’s that puzzle box with a particularly cruel purpose. Determined to save her, Aidan finds himself caught between the Scarlet Church, a cult devoted to the Cenobites, and the Labyrinth, the nightmarish realm ruled by Leviathan. Pinhead returns, too, once again voiced by Doug Bradley, and the game’s connection to the films goes far beyond familiar faces.
We certainly appreciate how seriously the devs have treated Clive Barker’s mythology. We do. The Cenobites aren’t ordinary monsters lurking around corners. Their understanding of pain, pleasure, and human desire is so twisted that reasoning with them feels impossible. There is a story worth following beneath all the suffering, and Aidan’s desperation to reach Sunny is the one human thing we could hold on to as the world around us grows increasingly insane.
Such Sights We Never Wanted to See
Those opening hours made us feel physically sick. We aren’t talking about the occasional unpleasant execution or a particularly bloody cutscene. Oh, Lord, no. There were moments when we struggled to continue. The violence is relentless, the torture horrifying, and the mutilated bodies so grotesque that we often had to put the controller down. In the face of such cruelty, we wouldn’t even call Hellraiser: Revival particularly scary. It is disgusting. Utterly, unashamedly disgusting. Every new room seems determined to throw something even more perverse at us than the last. It feels like the complete perversion of the human body and soul. For much of the opening, we have little choice but to sneak around, crawl through corridors filled with screaming, and witness cruelty on an unimaginable scale. We wanted—no, needed—to escape that place long before Aidan found a way out.
The presentation makes everything harder to endure. The visual design is remarkable, especially once we enter the Labyrinth, where architecture stops obeying comforting rules and flesh and machinery seem inseparable. The sound design is equally merciless. Screams, unsettling noises, and the sounds of suffering assault our ears without giving us a moment’s peace. At times, we felt that turning off the console did very little. Some of those sounds and images stayed with us. They still do.
We took breaks because we couldn’t bear another scene. As we’re writing this, certain images keep returning to us, and we sometimes regret having played the game. We can still hear some of those screams. That is a strange thing to admit in a review that’s ultimately positive, but Saber has recreated a world so convincingly repulsive that we felt trapped inside it alongside its protagonist. From an artistic standpoint, it’s an extraordinary achievement. From a personal one, we hated being there.
Fighting Our Way Out
Later, the campaign finally lets us fight back. Stealth and desperate escapes give way to more frequent encounters with cultists and other twisted creatures. We can use melee weapons and firearms, scavenge supplies, and try to survive long enough to get closer to Sunny. It becomes more action-focused, although the brutality never lets up. Perhaps we grew a little more numb to it by then. We certainly didn’t grow comfortable.
Swinging ordinary weapons and shooting enemies never felt as satisfying as we’d expect from a game that eventually asks us to fight so often. The encounters can feel cumbersome, and the basic weapons are considerably less interesting than the supernatural abilities at our disposal. We welcomed the change of pace after the oppressive opening, but the fighting itself could have been better.
With the Genesis Configuration, we can pull sharp objects from the environment and hurl them at enemies. We can also manipulate fire and, in time, unleash the Cenobites’ infamous chains. These abilities consume Suffering, a resource earned through violence and finishing off enemies. The box is a useful little thing outside combat, too, helping us manipulate the environment and solve puzzles. We’re sure fans will enjoy seeing an object so central to the films become a proper part of the gameplay.
What Is Seen Cannot Be Unseen
To say that our completed journey through Hellraiser: Revival left us with conflicting feelings would be an understatment of legendary proportions. We liked the story, warily admired the grotesque world Saber created, and enjoyed using the Genesis Configuration. Yet we can’t say we enjoyed being in that world. Not because the game is bad, but because it was too much for our fragile psyches. We’d recommend it to… well, someone. For the life of us, though, we’re not quite sure who. There’s so much undeniable value here, but entering this world means putting yourself at the mercy of whatever horrors the devs have waiting. And oh, they have such sights to show you. Those sights burn themselves into your memory. The game’s hooks sink in within the first fifteen minutes. They pull and twist, refusing to let go, like an unrelenting, sadistic lover. We may have stopped playing, but we never quite left its world. In a way, our minds became prisoners of Hellraiser: Revival. This game became our box.
We wanted to escape as desperately as Aidan did. Alas, we were the ones who couldn’t wait to open the box. The Labyrinth kept spreading, and there was no turning back. What is seen cannot be unseen.
Our Score: God Have Mercy on Our Souls / 10
- Title: Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival
- Developer: Saber Interactive
- Publisher: Saber Interactive
- Release Date: October 8, 2026
- Platforms: PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S
- Reviewed On: PS5 Pro
- Genre: First-person action / survival horror
- Game Modes: Single-player
- Playtime: 8–12 hours (completed)
- Content Warning: Extreme violence, torture, gore, nudity and sexual themes
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