Crisol: Theater of Idols hands-on preview — A bloody good time

At Summer Game Fest, I was able to meet with the team at Vermila Studios about the newest Blumhouse title, Crisol: Theater of Idols. It was a bloody cool time checking out a level alongside all of the survival management system, multiple weapons, and scary enemies.

This game is fueled on your blood. Your health and ammo are both connected. As you reload your weapons, your health will decrease. The only ways I was able to get more health was through syringes and absorbing blood from corpses and animals you find along the way. Considering the enemy types you’ll encounter, you won’t be able to get blood from them, so it takes a keen eye to find health in this terrifying hellscape.

Your character, Gabriel, starts with a small gun that takes 3-6 shots to kill an enemy. As I progressed, I gained a shotgun that took them down in one. However, more blood is necessary for reloading weapons, so don’t get too loose with reloading. The gunplay was very reminiscent of Resident Evil 7 and 8, along with Bioshock, so players of that style of game will have no issues jumping into this thriller.

The early enemies are a lot of fun as they’re these mannequin-style horror show with their unblinking eyes and occasional quick movements. Coming around a corner to three or more spells trouble, especially early on. 

As we got to the middle and later stages of the demo, we ran into Dolores who called our character "soldadito", which means “little soldier” to taunt him. She was an extremely tall and lanky robotic woman who could throw you like you weigh nothing and treated you like her play-thing. She wasn’t able to be killed at any point in the demo, leading to some terrifying moments.

This game has a lot of promise, although there were some moments that a causal like me had trouble. That said, veterans of the genre should have no issue throwing their abilities at Crisol.

I was quite impressed with the visual fidelity in the demo. Vermila Studios has gone the extra mile, with extreme attention to detail on items like the weapons and the ivory, gold, and other embellishments. If you’re a fan of the Bioshock style survival horror, you’ll like Crisol: Theater of Idols.

Crisol: Theater of Idols arrives in 2025 on PC, Xbox Series X, and PlayStation 5!