slender: the arrival rambles (ITS LONG)

(yes there are spoilers)

so back in october i basically played this game religiously (and also just ate up any slenderman related content!) and since im sorta back to being like "i love collecting pages!!" i might as well write about the game specifically!

i played the revamped version and the original version, theres not exactly a big difference to them but the revamped version did include a new chapter and my experience with playing the revamp version was different than the original non revamped version BUT both were enjoyable and i love them both!

so my overall i think the game is pretty neat! i found it pretty nice for a slenderman game! i do like that theres a story to it, i also really enjoy like the setting i think the graphics are also pretty neat (despite me not experiencing the full graphics because of lag) and i think the soundtrack is also great, one specific soundtrack specifically makes me think of a TERRIBLE MEMORY and brings PAIN!!! cause of a specific level that i have very kind words to say about (i dont)! so i would for sure recommend the game if you have a spare $20 to spend! i thought that it was a very fun game and replaying it was still good!

now onto my personal thoughts about the chapters in the game because i do have things to say about them!

Part 1: Prologue

this is basically the beginning of the game, i enjoyed this section of the game mostly due to sightseeing LOL i enjoyed looking at the scenary the game had to offer but when i was done with that i continued on with the game! you head to a house, find your friend (kate) is missing along with notes that are telling somewhat of a story (lore! yay!) and head out into a forest at night! this level was for me was basically sightseeing, since theres technically no danger in this level i could pretty much take my time looking around and i did enjoy finding collectiable notes that relate to the story! but basically, a pretty good level that sets up the rest of the game!

Part 2: The Eight Pages

this level is the classic slenderman premise, collect his eight pages and dont die! theres exactly 9 monuments where the pages can spawn so one of the places you go to will not have a page! in easy mode, this level was probably the easiest since you can collect 5 or 6 pages and you'll be taken to the next level, in normal and hard mode though you do actually have to collect the 8 pages which is a bit of a challenge since i personally found myself missing some of the pages in the monuments and i had to keep going back to check for them and would usually end up getting caught by slenderman!! kinda annoying but eventually i did end up beating the level, i noticed that usually finding the pages that are located in the bigger monuments (theres 3 monuments that are randomized, a simple way to explain it is that in one round you can have the visitor center and the uncovered storage yard but if you die and have to do another round you may not get the visitor center and you might get the covered storage yard but in this round you'll also have the uncovered storage yard but no visitor center in this round at all, i hope that makes sense omg) so i usually locate the pages in those monuments first then find the pages in the other monuments and that eventually worked out for me! i pretty much managed to memorize the map and where the monuments are located (because just like the visitor center and the storage yard, the other monuments locations are randomized, so in one round you'll find the tent near a lake but then if you do another round it'll be in another location!) and i managed to win that level!! it might have taken a few tries but overall, it was kinda fun, i did have to circle back cause remember, slenderman is THERE!! but while it was annoying sometimes, i did it anyways! i just basically got the bigger monuments out of the way first since i didnt wanna get cornered by slenderman in a room or area, thats bad!!

Part 3: Into The Abyss

so this level seems pretty easy, once you've found the eight pages you wake up near an abandoned mine and to get out you have to activate six generators and get via the emergency lift! easy enough? NO!! because you have ANOTHER enemy to deal with! you have slenderman of course but he is not the major issue here because you have to deal with this weird person that chases you and once they run into you three times you have to start all over again!! this level was my personal hell oh my GOD

so of course, the location of the generators are randomized so they won't be in the same place which is unfortunate but it's understandable!! so the enemy becomes active when you generate your first generator, thankfully you can temporarily stun her by shining your flashlight on her but BOY is she persistent, its advised to turn as many corners as you can so you can lose her but if you dont have the mine map mostly memorized it might be a little difficult! theres two floors of course and yes you can find generators on the second floor too, this level is overall very annoying... having to deal with someone constantly on your back and slenderman can also pop in and block your way was very... annoying. ive played this level several times, no matter the difficulty of the game this level SUCKS!!! you can sometimes be lucky and have the generators all near each other and be out of there in a few minutes (like under 5 minutes, its an achievement that i managed to get!) but most of the time, that wont usually happen :( though thankfully, in easy and normal difficulty you can get the level done because you only have to activate the generators and honestly if you play the level enough you can memorize certain spots in the map and learn your way around for the most part! but then,,, hard mode is a different story.. in hard mode you still have to activate six generators but you need to find six gas can to activate them so now you have to find more things while dealing with slenderman and your other enemy, not to mention in hard mode you only get two shots before she takes you out,, you can thankfully find all the gas cans and then start finding the generators but (at least for me) i tend to miss the gas cans a LOT and i can't find the last can before the enemy starts becoming active and h. its just not that fun :') i still actually havent completed this level in hard mode because of this but ONE DAY I WILL!!! just not now i cant handle it omg

it is always satisfying whenever i beat this level because this level is like my least favorite overall because of like. everything BUT theres just always that super annoying level in games so its not all that bad! when you beat this specific level it does get easier (at least for me!)

also these two soundtracks evoke fear in me, i know these tracks all too well and they make me CRY

https://open.spotify.com/track/60lPbJo9U9sOOfQbspykFv?si=90280530eaae4846 & https://open.spotify.com/track/7M7kNRItTWEySnlAQu7DRb?si=d1e1fe54ca2d4f0d

Part 4: Flashback

flashback is a calm level, you walk down the mountain while nice music plays, once again find more notes that reveal more lore, sightsee a bit and find your way to an area that has a tv and also some tapes! unfortunately while these are tapes and while the playable character isnt the one in these tapes, you still will have to play the tapes and go through it yourself!

Tape 1: Homestead

so in this tape you actually play as the person whos been writing the collectable letters and he is investigating a property to find out the mystery of this family, overall pretty good place to sightsee but there is an objective of course! you explore the property, find clues (lore) and continue investigating this giant property! the beginning of this game was pretty peaceful because you're under the impression that you're alone in this property- i mean due to what happened to the family no one should be here! but thats never really the case in this game! you think you're alone but you're really not!! you make your way down to an underground celler to find gas cans to turn on the power and when you turn some corners you find out you're not alone and you're with some... weird zombie thing that sounds like a child! you quickly get your ass out of there but when you make your way back to the giant wheat field which you had to cross to get to the celler and all the sudden the music is different, something is in that field with you but you dont really wanna find what in that wheat field so the best thing you could do is not stick around to find out (which i didnt do the first time i played, i got curious and saw the weird zombie thing but i did eventually get tf out of there!) you turn the power one, find a key to unlock a gate of a church they have on their property WHICH BTW the homestead map is lowkey one of my favorite maps, its big, its kinda pretty and ooough its just a cool map to me!! BUT to get to the church you have to cross the wheat field which HAS the weird zombie so... if you keep running and dont look back or pay attention to him getting closer and closer to you and open the gate you'll be okay! though anytime ive ran through that wheat field it always feels like this spongebob clip omg ( fun fact, the first time i played through this tape i was messaging my friends as i played and i was like 'im gonna go up to the zombie thing' and then i died immediately so thats how i found out that it can kill you!) so i went through the gate, read the tombstones they had which is also LORE!!! and made my way to the church, went through another chase scene (felt like that spongebob clip again), read up on some more lore through collectables, chased again and the camera was dropped but picked up by someone and the tape ends! that level was pretty long but i did like it, it was peaceful at first then it wasnt!

Tape 2: Escape

ill try to keep this short since its also a short tape! this tape is basically showing what happened to your friend kate before you arrived at her house, shes in her room scribbling weird stuff on paper before she feels that 'he' broke into her home, you play as kate and close all the windows and doors in your home but after you close a few slenderman breaks into your home and you go to hide in your room until you see, hes already in your room! unlucky!! but to avoid this, kate jumps out her room window and makes her way into the forest, very short, very spooky tape, nothing else to say about that!

Part 5: The Arrival

bear with me guys we're almost to the end!! JUST BEAR WITH ME!!! so this is the last chapter to the game, you leave the room with the tv and make your way up the mountain, collecting letters (more lore!) then making your way to a cave which has more lore and directions out of it, when you exit the cave you see a burning forest which you ofc have to run through, now in the original version of the game i didnt struggle with this level, i either managed to get really lucky and do it in two tries or it was a really easy level because in the revamped version this level is WAY more annoying! the trees kept falling down way more, slenderman was way more aggresive and blocking my path which kept making me go other ways and camp out until he leaves, not to mention my game for some reason just wouldnt load the ground and it made the round way more annoying and it took a LOT of tries to get through the burning forest :') BUT WHEN I DID you make your way to the radiotower room, your flashlight dies but you continue to find lore and then the dead body of someone, thankfully ignoring the corpse theres a camera right on it which is the person writing the letters (CR) and kate having a disagreement which ends up in CR dying, so he is the corpse in front of you. after the tape ends you're jumped by the zombie thing from homestead and you wake up in an abandoned house, its dark, your health is low, and the zombie thing is there with you, you find more notes and after you pick up a certain note, the zombie thing runs off and you start to hear your friend crying, you follow the sound and the closer you get to your friend crying in the corner, the more glitched and static-y your camera becomes, after you get closer to her, the enemy from into the abyss jumps out and attacks you, revealing that your buddy buddy kate was the chaser in the into the abyss level! she attacks you and then drags your body away and the game ENDS! and i personally thing that this was a good ending, sucked that i (the playable character) died but its still a good ending to me!

THIS BLOG IS LONG IM AWARE BUT i did say i have plenty of things to say on this game i would talk about the new chapter but theres not a lot to say about it other than it was creepy and made me shit ma pants a few times! it was long, it was scary and there was fire!

so yeah, i left out a lot of things such as lore because if i was disecting the lore of this game this blog would be even longer (maybe ill write my interpretation of the lore in another blog, MAYBE) but i think its kinda clear how much i loved this game and how invested i was! if you want, go play it, go listen to the soundtrack and just have fun with the game! :D

if you managed to read everything UHHH THNAK YOU i hope you found this somewhat interesting and i hope u have an awesome day!