Slender: The Arrival

Slender: The Arrival is a first-person survival horror video game developed by Blue Isle Studios among Parsec Productions as a fully realized, commercial version to Parsec Productions' Slender: The Eight Pages, with Chapter 9 being a remake of the aforementioned game. It is the fifth video game adaptation based on the Slender Man mythos. It was released on Microsoft Windows and OS X on March 26, 2013. Thereafter, the game was released on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in September 2014. It was released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in March 2015, before shipping onto Wii U in October. A Nintendo Switch port was released in June 2019. In October 2021, ports for Android and iOS were released. Slender Man’s creator, Eric Knudsen, served as a producer.

A 10th anniversary remaster and third game, S: The Lost Chapters, were announced on July 27, 2023, with the former releasing to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, and on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store on October 18, 2023.

Gameplay
The majority of the game takes place in abandoned areas (house, defunct mine, etc.), each with different objectives. Slender: The Arrival uses similar mechanics to its predecessor, The Eight Pages. The character is armed only with a flashlight. This limited defense forces a sense of helplessness, as the best way to survive in the game is to run whenever in danger. The Slender Man's behavior changes slightly between levels. In the first level, the Slender Man can be seen standing outside of the house through every window, once the player acquires the flashlight, and after going through the gate outside he can be seen on the top of hills well away from the player. In level two, he most often teleports off-screen or just out of the character's line of sight, but is capable of appearing directly in front of the player. It is observed that his motion centers around following the player, but consists largely of jumping from place to place, the inconvenience of which is increased as each of the eight pages are collected. His behavior is much the same as this in level four, except more active. In level three, he pursues much less aggressively, though is capable of teleporting directly in front of the player. In this level, the main antagonist is a girl who chases the player (most often following her path directly, but has been seen teleporting. It is unknown whether this is a glitch or an in-game mechanic). The only way of subduing her is by focusing the flashlight (on its second setting) on her. While looking at the Slender Man, the camera succumbs to electronic distortions such as static, blurring, color spots, audio distortion, etc., which obstructs the player's vision unless facing away, and far enough from it. The player cannot pause while this occurs, to prevent them taking a break due to being frightened. When caught, the game over screen is also different; while in Slender: The Eight Pages, the player saw a white static background with Slender Man's faceless head, the one for Slender: The Arrival is black, with an overhead-lit and color-distorted hue and less static. There are also new choices in difficulty (which must first be unlocked by completing the game once) being easy, normal, and hardcore. In hardcore, the flashlight can run out, enemies are more aggressive and the player's stamina runs out quickly. Easy has infinite flashlight, a great deal of stamina, and the enemies are not very aggressive.