The Bridge Curse 2: The Extrication review

• Reviews by Pascal Tekaia
• Published:

Taiwanese horror sequel is an improvement on its predecessor, though still encumbered by some of the same issues

In 2022, Softstar Entertainment released The Bridge Curse: Road to Salvation, offering its take on the popular Taiwanese urban legend of a haunted bridge at Tunghai University, and the hapless group of students who decided to tempt fate by participating in a nighttime ritual that called the ghost’s wrath down upon them. While not often particularly scary, it offered a welcome glimpse into an Eastern culture’s horror sensibilities, which is something I always appreciate. Now the developer has completed the game’s follow-up with new folklore to explore. The Bridge Curse 2: The Extrication feels more refined in terms of storytelling, pacing, and atmosphere, though it also brings back some of the same underwhelming gameplay ideas its predecessor exhibited.

The Extrication is a fully standalone entry in the series, with no prior familiarity required. The story this time revolves around the haunted Da Ren building at Taiwan’s Wen Hua University, where, in 1960, several brutal murders gave rise to an urban legend about an elevator that takes its passengers to a dark plane of existence, never to be seen again. There may not be a bridge involved this time, but those who thoroughly explored the previous game may remember this narrative setup being briefly alluded to via an item description listing several of the country’s most famous campus ghost stories.

The new tale follows four main protagonists (a slightly slimmed-down cast of characters compared to the previous installment’s six), comprised mainly of the school’s film club who are prowling the campus grounds on a night shoot for their student film recreating the horrific events of that long-ago tragedy. Sue Lian, a local news reporter, also gets mixed up in the drama, summoned to interview the club members, arriving as night falls and unwilling (and later unable) to leave until she gets her scoop. Unfortunately for our protagonists, the rumored haunting proves to be anything but a myth, and it isn’t long before each of the four are crawling around spooky university locations and otherworldly planes, chased by various creatures and apparitions, like a possessed nightwatchman or a doll badly in need of an exorcism.

At its best, The Extrication involves roaming plenty of hallways, labs, and lecture spaces. Da Ren is completely deserted during the wee hours of the night but still fully lit and ready to resume hosting students for lectures in just a few hours’ time. It may be a mundane place during the day, but during the witching hour it makes for an amply atmospheric location. From the parking garage and cafeteria to the main lobby area and even the headmaster’s offices, the game frequently slows things down for some lighter-paced exploration as you gradually unearth the building’s sordid past via notes and ghostly messages scrawled on walls. There’s some brief yet enjoyable puzzle solving required here and there, like decoding the combination lock to a safe, as well as less standard fare like assembling a diorama of a key scene in the film club’s project, with items needed to proceed always found nearby. 

However, there is another side to the gameplay coin. A haunting isn’t much without the occasional spook to harangue you, and The Bridge Curse series presents many such moments as stealth gameplay sequences, typically seeing you stalked by one of a number of supernatural antagonists while an on-screen indicator lets you know whether you have been spotted or are safely hidden. While it is certainly unsettling to make your way through a poorly lit area (particularly when you’re sneaking away from the bogey and forced to turn your back on it, only to then hear it howl as it spots you and the indicator gets panicky), this system quickly loses its bite. Creatures can be easily outsmarted by simply hiding under a table, or else may randomly lose interest in you after you’ve run around a corner or two, even if you’re cowering in plain sight. At worst, being caught means resetting the chase sequence, but there’s nothing very difficult about these sections. 

Although overall still one of the sequel’s weaker elements, a handy new addition helps the creep-and-chase scenes here from devolving to the level of mild annoyance and frustration of its counterparts from the previous entry. Early on you find the Anima Lantern, an oil lamp that acts as a get-out-of-jail-free card if you’re caught during a stealth sequence. Once every few minutes, it charges up enough spiritual power to repel an attacking spirit, should you be unlucky or foolish enough to be cornered by one. Though it’s not a limitless safety net, I found it generally bought me enough time to get away and stay hidden until its juju had regenerated. The Anima Lantern is also used to reveal spectral messages – warnings, desperate pleas that will never go answered – otherwise invisible to the naked eye, adding a bit of interest to the game’s more straightforward exploration sections.

The Bridge Curse 2: The Extrication

Genre:	Horror
Presentation:	Realtime 3D
Theme:	Paranormal
Perspective:	First-Person
Graphic Style:	Photorealism
Gameplay:	Survival
Control:	Direct Control
Game Length:	Short (1-5 hours)
Action:	Stealth, Chase
Difficulty:	Low

Another big part of the Bridge Curse franchise is the fact that you’ll control each main character in turn, with the game transferring control at predetermined points. It doesn’t take long for the core group of protagonists in The Extrication to become splintered apart, at which point you’ll bounce between each particular narrative, always jumping directly into a different character’s shoes via first-person 3D navigation. While they routinely cross over into each other’s story paths, there are times when you’ll swap to a new point of view to experience the same stretch of time from a new perspective, filling in the gaps of what was happening elsewhere while you were busy looking into something else. 

Keeping the storyline straight is a lot easier with only four characters, helping the game flow along far more smoothly. Richie Chen is the club’s president and de facto leader of the crew. He’s also the one responsible for planning out the shoot. Yu Hai-le, nicknamed A-Hai, is his girlfriend and the club’s scriptwriter. Finally, there’s Doc (real name Wu Zi-nan) who is the group’s comedic relief, from his over-the-top, down-on-the-ranch handlebar mustache prop that he even wears off-camera to the fist-pumping and silly poses he strikes to punctuate his dialogue. Doc is the one who first got in touch with Sue Lian and invited the reporter to the campus for a late-night interview.

The trimmed-down cast is varied enough that each character feels far more individualistic than in the previous installment, making it easier to remember who’s who and allowing you to just focus on experiencing the story playing out. Whereas many of the characters in the first game were constantly meeting up, assembling in various combinations before ultimately splitting back up again, things are far easier to track here. It’s not just fewer people to stay on top of, but there’s less switching back and forth – though there is still some of that – with the game sticking with the same protagonists for longer stretches of time. It’s still not a long adventure, though, only lasting a reasonable four to five hours in total.

On the visual front, things are also improved this time around. While not breaking through any new frontiers in graphical fidelity, environments are sharp and detailed, and generally well done. We don’t spend time wandering around any outdoor areas in this installment, but there are plenty of times when artificial light gives way to darkness to amp up the creepy vibes (though even characters without an Anima Lantern have a flashlight to illuminate their path). One particular enemy, the Mad Ballerina, is so beautifully animated and true to life in her graceful and artistic movements that she easily becomes a standout in a game filled with otherwise grotesque enemies, like the broken-necked woman whose head hangs upside down behind her back, forcing her to move backwards as her lolling head incessantly searches for you.

The game’s voice acting inadvertently lends it a certain B-movie charm, particularly with its nearly omnipresent lack of lip sync between dialogue animations and recorded voice lines in the English dub. Still, the actors do a passable job, despite the occasional cast member who is perhaps a bit too inexperienced, with some odd line deliveries that interrupt others or performances that lack finesse. But it all rather fits The Extrication’s intentionally campy vibe, and I appreciated that the actors appeared familiar with the faithful pronunciation of names and places. Those who’d rather experience the original voice-over also have that option. To help sell the ghostly atmosphere, the developers have opted to shy away from traditional musical accompaniment almost entirely, instead relying on a backdrop of eerie sound effects that amp up to outright panicky cacophonies during the more intense sequences.

The story being told here is more engaging than its predecessor’s, as we actually learn a bit about the school’s history and the tragic fate of some of those involved in the 1960 murder spree. The urban legend surrounding the building’s curse is far more than a simple throwaway line of text, and those involved in it aren’t just faceless names in a script, adding a welcome layer of depth to the unfolding mystery. 

Final Verdict

With The Extrication, I think the Bridge Curse series may have found its niche in horror gaming, if not yet its ideal execution. The game’s four central characters are injected with a bit more personality than the last time around, making them more relatable to the player. And even without its unintentional B-movie lip sync issues, the localization is, on the whole, well done without taking itself too seriously, bolstering the already improved pacing and storytelling. However, it’s not all roses yet, as forced stealth gameplay segments remain and aren’t much fun, and outside of a number of jump scares, the horror elements still feel somewhat restrained, even if the overall atmosphere is heading in the right direction. It’s not bad by any means, particularly if the prospect of rarely explored cultural urban legends sounds appealing, but even with the improvements shown here, it has a way to go if it ever wants a chance at being top of the class.

Pascal played The Bridge Curse 2: The Extrication on PlayStation 5 using a review code provided by the game's publisher.