Smile and say AIEEEEE, horror fans! Tecmo and Team Ninja are bringing a “remake” of PS2 survival horror Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly to PC via Steam in early 2026. Why am I brandishing a glyph-covered Canon EOS 90D at you, while singing the Ghostbusters theme? Allow me to explain: Fatal Frame’s signature touch is that you defeat spooks using a magic camera. Naturally, this also means that you have to look steadily and calmly at said spooks while they shimmer and sway towards you. Catch some of that nonsense in the remake’s announcement trailer.
I’ve only ever played one Fatal Frame game, 2005’s Fatal Frame III: The Tormented, in which you alternate between a relatively safe daytime apartment and a dream manor where the monsters are. I’m told that Crimson Butterfly is the best of the lot. It’s the story of twin sisters Mio and Mayu Amakura, who visit a stream one day to reminisce about their childhoods before the area is submerged by the construction of a dam.
Alas and alack, Mayu spots a nice red butterfly that lures her away to a “village of never-ending night”, home to a “forbidden ritual”. I had a similar thing happen to me while hiking along the Dales Way, once. The butterfly was a deceptively cheap Airbnb listing, the village was Kendal, and the forbidden ritual was all-night karaoke at the Olde Fleece Inn.
According to the Steam page, the Crimson Butterfly remake will be a “complete overhaul”, with “richer and more engaging gameplay in both exploration and combat”. In particular, you can expect a “Holding Hands with Mayu” mechanic that, presumably, lets you hold hands with Mayu. I really hope there’s more to this so-called remake’s “richer and more engaging gameplay” than simply letting major characters hold hands, Tecmo.
I enjoy the nerdiness of Fatal Frame’s photography mechanics. The camera can be upgraded with different lenses and types of film, and it’s not impossible that you might learn something about shot composition while you’re flashbulbing poltergeists. Given nerves of steel, you might find yourself demanding that the ghost go out and come in again, because dang it, this one could be worthy of the New Yorker. The ghost will not listen to you, of course, but don’t let that stop you yelling at your TV screen.
Two previous Fatal Frame games have made the leap to PC – Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse and Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water. Our Mask of the Lunar Eclipse reviewer Kim Armstrong was not keen, commenting of the PC port, “while this unique combat may have carried the game’s lifeless story back in 2008, this rerelease is nothing more than an expensive reskin of a relic.”
We didn’t review Maiden of Black Water, possibly because it was so terrifying that Graham (RPS in peace) refused to assign it and instead threw it into a lake one dark and stormy evening. Or possibly because it was so boring that Graham (RPS in peace) refused to assign it and instead threw it into a lake one dark and stormy evening. He’s gone now, so it’s impossible to say for sure.
