‘Saw II: Flesh and Blood’: The ‘Saw’ Game You Probably Forgot About

There is a new Saw game, Saw: Genesis, coming out soon. Developed by Bloober Team, which developed the Silent Hill 2 remake (check out our review of that here), the Blair Witch game (our review of that one here), and plenty of other solid horror offerings. And you know what that means? Time for another retrospective on a previous Saw title. This time, I’m taking a look at Saw II: Flesh and Blood.

This game, released for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in 2010, was developed by Zombie Team. It directly follows the events of the first Saw game, Saw: The Video Game, and takes place between the first and the second films. It follows Michael Tapp, the son of Saw protagonist David Tapp (Danny Glover), as he tries to figure out why his father died. This, of course, leads to a confrontation with Jigsaw and his cohorts.

The game takes place in a few different settings, such as a hotel, abandoned factories, sewers, and more. In these locations, Michael has to work through a variety of traps, deciding whether to save people from their own traps or let them die. It gives off big Saw VI energy, which we all agree is the best sequel, right?

The gameplay is third-person survival horror, with a few action-game elements mixed in. You solve puzzles, endure quick-time events, and engage in QTE-based combat, which is actually kind of interesting. It reminds me a bit of the duels in Dark Cloud. (Which, while not horror-related, you should absolutely play if you haven’t. It’s an all-timer).

There is, however, one very neat twist. Spoilers ahead.

The first section of the game is not actually Michael. You play as a drug addict named Campbell, who has to make a pretty significant decision. You can either save yourself or sacrifice yourself to save a stranger. At the very end of Michael’s campaign, you discover that the person Campbell had to choose to save or not was Michael himself.