The 7th Guest Remake just hit flat screens with a 2-for-1 VR deal

Vertigo Games and Exkee released The 7th Guest Remake today for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. This is a flat-screen adaptation of the VR title from 2023. It lets players explore Henry Stauf's haunted mansion with standard controllers and displays. The release opens up the puzzle-horror game to a much wider audience, specifically anyone who gets motion sickness from virtual reality headsets.

The publishers set up a generous cross-buy system for the launch. If you already own The 7th Guest VR on Steam or PlayStation VR2, the flat remake is automatically added to your library at no cost. The deal works in reverse as well. Buying the flat version today grants full access to the VR edition on those respective platforms. Xbox players only get the flat game, as Microsoft's console does not have a VR ecosystem.

Volumetric ghosts in a 3D mansion

The original 1993 game by Trilobyte helped popularize the CD-ROM format. It arrived at a time when optical drives cost as much as a budget computer. I miss the days when a game could sell two million copies just by putting "Interactive Multimedia" on a giant cardboard box. Back then, we begged our parents to buy expensive PC upgrades just so we could watch a ghostly toymaker taunt us in a tiny video window. Bill Gates even called the original release the new standard in interactive entertainment.

The 1993 version pasted flat, green-screened FMV actors over pre-rendered backgrounds. The remake replaces that trick with volumetric video capture. Actors were recorded in full 3D space with multiple cameras. They look like holographic projections that actually inhabit the real-time 3D environments. The cast includes returning characters like Martine Burden and Brian Dutton. They act out the same macabre camp that made the original so strange. The visual style blends these ghostly, live-action performances with highly detailed 3D rooms.

Puzzles built into the architecture

Exkee completely rebuilt the puzzle design. The developers integrated the puzzles directly into the architecture and lore of the mansion. They did not just port the isolated logic tests from the 90s. You will open intricate mechanical puzzle boxes and manipulate glowing supernatural symbols on a pool table. The haunted mansion shifts and transforms around you as you solve these environmental roadblocks.

Every shadow and distant creak builds tension as the house slowly reveals its secrets. The new environments are fully explorable. They replace the node-based movement of the CD-ROM era with standard first-person navigation.

More platforms on the way

The game costs $20 across all current storefronts. A 15 percent launch discount drops the price to about $17 on Steam and Xbox through June 18. Vertigo Games plans to release Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 versions later this year.

This dual-release strategy is a smart way to keep a piece of 90s weirdness alive. Giving players two entirely different ways to play the game for a single twenty-dollar purchase is the kind of pricing model we rarely see anymore. It is a massive upgrade over the 1993 original, and it proves there is still life in the 90s haunted house mystery.