Slender: The Eight Pages Editor's Review

Slender: The Eight Pages is a short horror game in which you're alone in a dark wood, searching for messages scattered around the trackless forest.

And that's exactly what it is, sadly. 

After ten minutes of trudging around the forest, the screen fizzled and a rather portly, monochrome figure appeared for a moment. Game Over.

OK, that can't be it, can it? Unfortunately, yes it can. On the second try I was slightly more successful; I found two of the eight pages before the overweight Slender Man had his supernatural way. Not wishing to spoil the game for fans of the genre I'll say that there is a way to prolong your survival, but I'll leave you to work out what it is.

The Slender Man meme has proliferated virally, and the concept of this impossibly tall, thin and faceless figure, glimpsed as a black shadow in the corner of the eye has undeniable horror potential. There's a strong hint of Blair Witch in the videos to be found on YouTube, and the number of followers suggests that this is a cult that provides a rich vein for developers of horror games.

The game has reasonable atmosphere, but Hadley should review the chills created by the deserted orphanage in Thief II. Nothing happened for ten minutes in that game too, but I was riveted for every second. Much of Thief's neck-prickling fear came from a brilliant sound track of half-heard whispers and moans. In The Eight Pages we get nothing more than our own footsteps. It's a reasonable start, but it needs much, much more.

Pros: It's free. Slender Man fans might love it though.

Cons: No real gameplay. Unimaginative graphics. Rapid onset of boredom. And the Slender Man probably shouldn't be overweight.

Conclusion: Overall this feels like an exercise by someone trying out their new 3D game development software. As a free download it's a way to kill a few minutes, but if you're already that bored, this is probably not the answer.