i usually don't write long reviews, but i thought this game probably deserved one.
as many of you know, bendy and the ink machine (BATIM) has been a pretty popular horror game for a long time. ever since 2018, it's been one of those staple games from the big horror-game era, and i remember watching my older brother play it way back when and thinking it was the COOLEST thing ever. he was super into the game and lore. his room was bendy-decorated, he dressed up as the characters for halloween, and he talked about the game constantly. he and his friends would draw bendy, talk about the game, and reference it in their conversations, while i listened and watched. i guess i'd always been interested in it, but i was pretty young at the time, so even though our pc had the game on it, i never actually opened it up and played it myself. about 4 years ago, that computer finally crapped out and we had to get a new one. at that point, all of our family's games were on one joint account, so we decided it would be easier for everyone to make their own accounts. as we all got older, my brother and i slowly grew apart. i never ended up getting the chance to play it, and i didn't want to ask him to use his account just for that, so eventually i just gave up on it.
fast forward to july 18th, 2026- 8 years later- when i saw that the game was on a dirt-cheap clearance sale. obviously, i thought it was worth buying. at the time, i figured it would just be one of those "staple" horror games from 2018, a fun little throwback that would just rot away in my library forever. after dragging my feet and complaining about "having nothing to play" for a while, i remembered i'd bought it recently and finally booted it up on august 21st, 2026.
when i first started playing, i didn't think much of it. i figured it was just a crappy, short, boring 2018 "horror" game with outdated graphics and scattered plot holes. but, i was wrong.
the more i played and started figuring things out, the more shockingly familiar everything felt. walking through the off-white and black environment, getting spooked every now and then, i'd come across things that meant much more to me than i expected. it felt like i was re-living my brother's life from 2018- like i was playing bendy for the first time with him, experiencing something that used to be such a big part of his life. maybe i'd see a poster he had hung on his painted bedroom wall, or something that looked like one of the things he had modeled out of cardboard and proudly displayed on a shelf. i'd hear voice lines that he used to quote all the time. i'd come across references to the lore that i hadn't heard in years, yet somehow still recognized immediately, because i never really forgot any of it. i never forgot those moments with my brother back in 2018, when we were both still young and still close, when he wasn't embarrassed to show off the things he was interested in, when we talked every day, when we hung out with his friends on the sidewalk outside our house, and he'd tell them that "his little sister wanted to come hang out with us, too," and i'd sit there and listen to him and his friends talk about whatever video game or tv show they were interested in, catching little pieces of his life that he was kind enough to share with me.
now, we've grown so far apart that we barely know what's going on in each other's lives anymore. and i guess that playing this game gave me something like a wake-up call. it reminded me that while things will never be exactly the way they were- never the same house, never the same sidewalk with his friends, never the same hot summer afternoons or chilly fall evenings, never sitting on that loud green electrical box (which i only recently found out was incredibly dangerous, lol) listening to them talk about their interests- it doesn't necessarily have to stay the way it is now, either. we're more similar than i realized. right now, he might just be the older brother nuisance living in the room next to mine, eating from the same fridge and making the same ruckus with his friends on call at 3 in the morning, but he was also once the older brother i looked up to. the person i listened to whenever he talked about his teenage interests, bendy, or whatever else he was excited about. the person i thought was the coolest person in my life.
when i finally finished the game, i cried so much. i thought about all the voice lines i remembered, all the posters and objects, the shortcuts and tips, the characters, the boss fights, all of it. somehow, every little piece of the game was tied back to my brother. everything reminded me of those days, 8 years ago. i had remembered so much of our old life all at once, and the nostalgia completely overwhelmed me. i cried for hours just thinking about it.
things have been easier since then. my brother and i talk to each other more often now. the sight of him doesn't make me feel as angry or irritated as it used to. the distance between us won’t just disappear, and i don't think we'll ever be able to perfectly recreate what we had as kids. but i think it'll get better- slowly, until, maybe, we're close brothers again.
so, steam, thank you for putting this game in my recommendations and convincing me to take a little step back into my childhood. sorry for the long and corny rant!
now, as an actual game review:
for an older game, i think it’s actually pretty good. i wasn't much of a gamer back in 2018, so i can't really speak to what the standard was at the time, but i think the graphics work well with the game's (nearly) monochrome art style. the atmosphere is amazing, and the story is much more elaborate than what i initially expected. i also really like how the game handles the characters and lore. every character gets enough time to be introduced and established, while players can choose how deeply they want to dig into their stories or whether they'd rather just continue through the main game. my playthrough took around 5 hours, although it'll probably be shorter for most people. i'm personally not great at figuring out puzzles or tasks in games, and i'm also not the best with horror or suspense, so i expected this game to be pretty difficult for me, but it surprisingly wasn't. i thought the objectives were explained clearly enough that i didn't spend an hour overthinking every little detail and sending myself into a spiral trying to figure out what the game wanted me to do. the horror was also pretty much perfect for me. it's not constantly terrifying, but there are enough creepy moments and jumpscares to keep you on your toes without making me want to immediately close the game. overall, i really enjoyed it. if you're even slightly interested in horror games, i'd definitely recommend giving it a try. it mixes horror, exploration, puzzles, storytelling, and a pretty unique art style in a way that i think gives it a lot of appeal. and, who knows- maybe another 2018 teen will unexpectedly cry about their childhood 8 years later.
thank you for reading!
