Slender: The Arrival

About Slender: The Arrival

Slender: The Arrival is the official video game of Slender Man, the faceless figure in a suit that grew out of an internet creepypasta. Blue Isle Studios made it with Parsec Productions, the one-man studio behind Slender: The Eight Pages, the short free game from 2012 that made the idea famous. The creators of the Marble Hornets web series helped write the script. It came out on PC in March 2013 and reached Steam that October, with a full story, new characters and new places.

You play Lauren, who comes to Oakside Park to help her childhood friend Kate move out, and finds her gone and her bedroom covered in drawings of a tall, faceless man. The story comes in pieces: notes, drawings on the walls and found tapes. You walk through forests at night, an empty house, an abandoned coal mine and a mountainside, seen in first person and lit only by your flashlight.

The play is simple and tense. In the first chapter you gather eight pages in the woods, the way the free original worked, and each time you turn around Slender Man may be closer. Sprinting burns your stamina, which then takes time to come back, so running blind does not save you for long. A second threat, the Chaser, comes at you directly, and you hold it off by keeping your flashlight on its face. Later chapters give each place its own goal, such as powering a lift to get out of the mine. There are Easy and Normal difficulties, and a Hardcore mode unlocked once you finish, where the flashlight battery runs down and the enemies are more aggressive. Finishing also opens Genesis, a level that remakes The Eight Pages.

The main story is short, about two hours for most players, and critics named that as its weak point while praising its sound, atmosphere and jump scares.

In October 2023 the game got a 10th Anniversary Update on Unreal Engine 5: a full visual overhaul, a new chapter called Nightmare, in which Charlie Matheson's father wakes in a derelict hospital, plus subtitles and more languages. On Steam you can still switch to the original 2013 version through the game's branches. On Android the first chapter is free.

It suits players who want the classic Slender Man scare, a lone walk in the dark with something that keeps getting closer, in a longer and more story-led form than the free original.

How to play Slender: The Arrival

1. Pick Easy or Normal; Hardcore opens once you have finished the game.
2. Explore in first person with your flashlight and follow the clues about Kate.
3. In the woods, find the eight pages; Slender Man grows closer as you collect them.
4. In later chapters, follow each place's goal, such as powering the lift that gets you out of the mine.
5. Sprint to get away when he appears, but watch your stamina, which needs time to come back.
6. When the Chaser comes at you, hold your flashlight on its face to drive it off.

Tips

• Save your sprint for when you actually see him; an empty stamina bar leaves you crawling.
• Keep the flashlight pointed ahead and sweep it before you turn corners.
• Read the notes and watch the tapes you find; they are where the story is told.
• On Hardcore the flashlight battery drains, so do not leave it on when you do not need it.
• Finish the campaign to unlock Genesis, a remake of the original Eight Pages.

Questions