Layers of Fears studio decides the extra 's' is too scary, so now it's called Layers of Fear again

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Bloober Team's next game has a new (old) name, and a June release window.

Layers of Fears was announced in 2022 as "a psychological horror chronicle built upon the foundations of the original Layers of Fear." The title was kind of a play on words: The 'new' game is actually an updated and expanded compilation of Layers of Fear, the Inheritance DLC, Layers of Fear 2, and a new Final Note DLC—four Layers of Fear, thus Layers of Fears. 

That was my assumption, anyway, but it doesn't matter now because Bloober Team announced over the weekend that it has changed the name back to Layers of Fear, and that it will be out in June.

Why the name change? We described the Layers of Fears title not long after it was revealed as "ridiculous and good but not very search friendly," and it seems that we were onto something—it was maybe just a bit too clever for its own good.

"By adding the 's' we wanted to emphasize that this game is based on the original games but also contains new storylines that bonds every thread from the series," Bloober Team said on the official Layers of Fear Twitter feed. "However, we received feedback from our fans who loved the original name. And we've decided to get back to the roots."

That's a reasonable explanation, although it leaves the studio in the slightly awkward position of being stuck with a Layers_Of_Fears Twitter feed. (Layers_of_fear appears to be a fan account that was abandoned in 2016, and given the current chaos on Twitter the odds of having it released or transferred into Bloober's control probably aren't great.)

Along with the new(ish) title, Bloober Team also dropped a spooky new trailer for all to enjoy, and set a release window of June 2023, just a few months from now. The updated Layers of Fear is being redone in Unreal Engine 5 and will support 4K resolution, ray tracing, and HDR, "brand-new core mechanics," and a blending of all the Layers of Fear chapters and DLC into a single "seamless" game. It's available for wishlisting now on Steam and the Epic Games Store, which has not yet updated to the new title.

Andy Chalk
Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

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