Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly Remake PS5 Review. Unlike a lot of remakes on this site, PSU.com does not have a review for the original Fatal Frame 2 game on PS2. As such, I’m taking the opportunity to deliver a comprehensive review of the entire game, including story and mechanics. With that said, this is a remake of a 23-year old game. Is there enough here to make this beloved classic relevant in 2026?
Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly Remake Review (PS5) – Beautifully Crafted Remake of A Beloved Horror Classic
The story begins out in the woods where twins Mio and Mayu return to a place where they used to play, the same spot where Mayu received a major leg injury that left her with a limp. While there, Mayu spots a glowing crimson butterfly and follows it into the forest. Mio chases after her but soon finds herself and Mayu lost in the woods. The only path they find leads them to a lost village. Here, they quickly discover that the village is completely vacated. Worse still, they see ghosts of people who died in the village.
The development team has done a great job of duplicating the layout of the original game in this remaster. All of the important details are there, where they need to be, to tell the same story that captivated fans so many years ago on the PlayStation 2. At the same time, the creative team behind this remaster has taken liberties to enhance the core experience for a modern audience. The first of these enhances that you will notice are the visuals. Not only does this team recreate the game, this team builds upon a solid foundation and renovates Crimson Butterfly into something both incredibly gorgeous and intensely ominous.
Even after the addition of extra details to every aspect of the game, the lighting then takes the entire experience to a whole new realm. This isn’t one of those games where they add a bunch of details and then make it hard to see the environment. Instead, you see practically everything, but the light is dim. Any light you find truly draws in your attention simply because of the looming darkness around you.
Full Immersion At Every Turn
After reading that last paragraph, I cannot help but feel the need to elaborate a little further simply because I don’t feel like I can put into words the impact that this game’s sophisticated lighting affects the game for the better. Instead of the darkness just being there and being inconvenient, it’s more like a transparent fog. You see everything you need to see, but you still aren’t seeing everything with full clarity. Everything just feels off and uneasy. It’s a glorious horror setting through and through and from beginning to end.
From the nearest I can tell, the frame rate in this remake is probably running at 30 frames per second. It makes character and camera movement feel weighted without actually holding you back. The refresh rate beautifully combines with the visuals of the game, and the resulting atmosphere feels so thick. In all likelihood, several people will not like hearing about the frame rate. Still, whether this was a design choice or not, it still adds to the ambience of the game.
The sound design also took me for a spin. Many games have done it where it creates a sound that mimics the thing you’re doing or sounds like the thing you’re walking on. Much like the greats in the horror genre, the sound design amplifies everything even more. Combining that with the fog-like nature of the darkness in this remake, the creaks and groans that you create while interacting with the world around you sound so much louder.
Picture This
Using the Camera Obscura, you take photos of ghosts in order to dispatch these lingering spirits. Much of the interactions in the game are the same as in the original: ghosts move around, you take pictures of them at opportune times, and you get points for dealing damage to the ghosts. However, the enemies in the remake have a few more tricks to offer. Sometimes, when they approach you, they flash you with an image of themselves that stuns you, which the game refers to as a Leer. It doesn’t debilitate you or anything like that, but it intentionally messes up your timing and stuns you for a bit. Then, the ghost moves to a different position to approach you while you’re distracted.
To make things worse, your foes can also knock you down. While on the ground, the ghost climbs on top of you to try and kill you. Here, you can use the Camera Obscura to fend off the ghost. The challenge in this is aiming at the ghost’s weak spot while it flops around in your face, trying to take you out. One frustrating aspect to this is when you are dealing with multiple ghosts at once. In the wrong scenario, you can basically get pinned on the ground several times over before you actually are able to stand up and move.
My first entanglement with a ghost was far more shocking than I care to admit. I have been playing the Fatal Frame games for years. So, going into this remake, I felt confident that I knew what to expect. That first fight startled me several time; a pleasant surprise, after years of playing these games. With that said, the fights early on are much more challenging than they are later in the game simply due to upgrading the Camera Obscura. Apply Prayer Beads to your camera, and you can increase how quickly it auto-zooms, damage output, and how quickly the film reloads.
However, some of the early mini-boss fights come around well before you get access to camera upgrades. These early fights just about took my motivation to play. In fact, if I hadn’t been reviewing this game, I might have stopped playing and moved on to something different. Knowing what I know now, I am so glad that I am reviewing this game and was forced to endure. Similar fights later on feel much more balanced. Still, I imagine that many people might hit those early fights and not want to keep playing.
Keeping You In Focus
What Crimson Butterfly does better than the other Fatal Frame games is that it manages its pace much better. Yes, the gameplay loop remains what it always has been: taking pictures and walking around; and yes, the initial mini-boss fights mess things up. Putting those points aside, the game presents itself thoughtfully. For the first few chapters, the game keeps you going in a relatively linear fashion, intentionally blocking off any side paths. It even utilizes specific enemies to keep you moving in the right direction. This aspect of the game is quite thoughtful.
When you hit the second half of the game, you find yourself back in a familiar location but via a different route. It’s at this point where the game stops directing you and asks you to figure it out for yourself. By this point, you have seen enough of the map to know exactly where you are and how to get to your objective.
Finally, it’s the little things that keep the pace of this game moving forward. When you encounter a puzzle where you need to take a picture from a specific angle, the reference picture automatically appears on-screen when you approach the prompt. Occasionally you find crimson butterflies that lead you to the next objective. Other times, the camera finds a focal point and colors that focal point to tell you which filter to use on that focal point.
The Remake That Dreams Are Made Of
The Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly Remake is a fantastic way to experience this beloved classic title on modern hardware. Narrative pacing is fantastic, and the way the game naturally directs you forward without outright holding your hand is absolutely stellar. Early mini-boss fights prove much harder than they ought to be simply due to a lack of early upgrades to your camera. Also, some people might not take kindly to the game’s lower frame rate. Nonetheless, this entire package lives and breathes something ominous and imposing. When people talk about wanting remakes, this is the quality of remake they have in mind.
Review code kindly provided by publisher.