One would be bitterly disappointed.
The Legend of Coffin Rock takes the thrilling yet frustrating gameplay of
Blair Witch Volume 1, and turns it into a basic kill-fest with constant interruption by lengthy cut-scenes. While the story is somewhat intriguing, it won’t keep you hooked until the end unless you’ve got absolutely nothing else to do with your time.
You’re... someone, found in the middle of the woods with a massive head wound and nursed back to a semblance of life by a nearby farmwoman. The young girl who saved you turns out to be Robin Weaver, which actually ties into the whole Blair Witch mythos -- along with Coffin Rock itself, of course. Soon, Robin disappears and it’s up to you to find her. What could have been an intriguing game instead turns into rote torture. You have to get from point A to point B, so you kill everything in between. Then you get to hear sub-par voice acting for roughly ten minutes as the characters tell you what you need to do next. You’ll often flashback to your time as a Union soldier, defending the same small town of Burkitsville. These memory triggers often seem arbitrary -- a method of lengthening the time spent playing the game rather than any real continuation of the plot. Yes, it explains a few things, but it could be done without all the pointless fighting and whatnot.
And in the end, you’ll feel that all the fighting is pointless too. You can take out ghosts with bullets, for example. Read that last sentence again. Now tell me this game doesn’t have issues.
It also has serious suspension of disbelief issues. Why are you carrying Twana healing items when you first arrive? Why are there bullets lying on the ground in the middle of the yard, and why does your character trust that they’ll even fire? Why do I lose rounds when I reload my revolver before it’s completely empty? And why, oh why, do bullets harm ghosts? Things like this frustrate me more than control or graphics issues; they remind me that I’m playing a game, instead of enveloping me in the world that I’m experiencing through the actions of the character I control. It’s inelegant, could have been done much better, and hurts the feel immensely.
