Wraith: The Oblivion - Afterlife

About Wraith: The Oblivion - Afterlife

Wraith: The Oblivion - Afterlife is made and published by Fast Travel Games, the Swedish studio behind Apex Construct and Vampire: The Masquerade - Justice. It came out on Oculus Quest and Rift in April 2021, on Steam VR in May 2021, on PlayStation VR in October 2021 and on PICO 4 in March 2023. It is the first video game based on Wraith: The Oblivion, White Wolf's 1994 tabletop game about ghosts in the World of Darkness, the shared setting of Vampire: The Masquerade.

You play Ed Miller, a photographer who died during a mysterious seance at the Barclay Mansion, home of an ageing Hollywood actor. You wake up as a Wraith, one of the restless dead, with no memory of how you died, and a sinister voice, your Shadow, guides you. The remnants of a premiere party are still scattered through the dark, wrecked house. Looking for the truth, you move through its rooms, find traces of the people who were there and watch past events play out as ghostly re-enactments.

You have a few Wraith powers. You can move objects at a distance, much like the gravity gloves of Half-Life: Alyx, sharpen your senses to hear whispers and track other spirits, and pass through some walls. Puzzles use keycodes and story items, and the path through the mansion is mostly linear with some backtracking. Lore you collect is kept in a memory palace you can visit at save points, and it holds clues about the Spectres.

You are not alone among the dead. Spectres, spirits of wrath and vengeance each with their own background, roam the mansion and want to send you to Oblivion, and you have no fighting chance against them. You hide in lockers and behind cover, slip through walls and use distractions, while an icon warns you when you are being spotted. If they catch you, you go back to the last save point. Reviewers called it a slow, atmospheric kind of horror that does not rely on cheap jumpscares, though the moments when a Spectre finds you are frightening in a headset.

It suits VR players who like stealth horror with a story to uncover, and fans of the World of Darkness. No knowledge of the setting is needed. Some reviewers found the controls and door and item handling fiddly and the dialogue cannot be skipped, and players on Steam were more mixed than those on Quest. Movement is rated intense for comfort, so it is better for players used to VR.

How to play Wraith: The Oblivion - Afterlife

1. Explore the Barclay Mansion in first person in VR, reaching out to open doors and drawers and pick up objects.
2. Use your Wraith powers: pull objects to you from a distance, sharpen your senses to hear whispers and track spirits, and pass through some walls.
3. Watch the past scenes that play out in the rooms to learn what happened at the seance.
4. When a Spectre is near, hide in a locker or behind cover, use a distraction or slip through a wall; an icon shows when you are being spotted.
5. Solve keycode and item puzzles to open new parts of the mansion, and visit the memory palace at save points to read the lore you have found.

Tips

• Move slowly and listen; the Spectres can be heard before they are seen.
• Learn where the hiding places are in each area before you need them.
• Take your time with doors and objects; the hand interactions can be fiddly.
• Read the lore in the memory palace; it gives clues for dealing with the Spectres.
• You have a hidden health meter, so pick up refills when you find them and back off if you are hurt.

Questions