Crow Country is an upcoming PS1-inspired Resident Evil-style horror game that’s just been announced, and I’ve tried the excellent free demo. While I love horror and RE with all my heart, it can often be difficult to find something that channels those early PlayStation Capcom games but still wants to modernize the formula while doing something truly unique. I’m glad to tell you that Crow Country fits that bill perfectly. To top it off, you can try the game for yourself right now.
With no release date set yet, Crow Country’s demo sends you to a rural Georgian state theme park of the same name. The year is 1990, and you’re searching for the park’s owner Edward Crow, but you very quickly discover that the titular park isn’t what it seems, as strange biohazard-looking creatures are everywhere, and Resident Evil’s classic survival horror game style comes into play.
While Crow Country’s visuals are certainly worth celebrating, I want to start by telling you how the game channels old-school Resident Evil while bringing it to some new places. While you’ll be conserving resources and solving puzzles during exploration, Crow Country gives you both full camera and weapon control, so you can change your perspective and aim your gun in any direction – think Resident Evil 4 if it was presented more like Resident Evil 1.
Couple this with the incredibly smooth controls, and you can see how Crow Country takes inspiration from RE, but uses that as a springboard to change how you see and explore the world as you engage with enemies with more precision. It’s a small difference, but it makes the game feel truly modern.
On top of that, Crow Country has some stellar aesthetic design; while all the characters and crow mascots look cute and cuddly, the CRT overlay, music, sounds, and oppressively dark visuals make it feel suitably spooky.
I also found the Exploration Mode, which lets you play Crow Country without being attacked, a nice touch. It’s a small change with a big impact and one that lets you sit in the atmosphere and solve the game’s puzzles without fear of the enemies.
You can learn more about Crow Country and download the free demo on Steam right now. Be sure to give the team at SFB Games some feedback after playing to help them make it the best they can before release, too.
If you want even more we’ve got the very best horror VR games you should be playing to scare yourself, alongside some excellent single-player games on PC you need to try.
