As Dusk Falls review – superior storytelling elevates this interactive thriller

PC, Xbox; Interior Night/Microsoft
A branching interactive thriller played out from different perspectives, including characters' histories, is clever though at times repetitive

A family is on a tense road trip from Sacramento, California to St Louis, Missouri. The kid is tired; the dad seems conflicted; there's clearly some unspoken tension between the mother and the grandfather. You get the impression that not everybody is keen on this cross-country move, but you don't yet know why. I was just getting interested in this small-scale domestic drama when things kicked off properly: stopping at a roadside motel for the night, the little family gets caught up in an escalating stand-off when they are taken hostage by three brothers who have just robbed a sheriff.

As Dusk Falls is a branching thriller that you play out from both perspectives: the antagonists, and the victims. Your choices - what you say, what you do, how long you take to press a button to open a window or make a grab for someone's gun - affect what happens to everyone, both immediately and hours later, at the end of the story. This develops empathy for every character, particularly when you start delving backwards and forwards through their lives after the tense set-piece of the motel stand-off. It also puts you in some horrible situations, because the interests of the people you're playing are often at odds with each other.

As Dusk Falls is released on 19 July; 24.99.