ArkaEvren
Until Dawn

GAME · 2015 · UK

Until Dawn

Publisher
Sony Interactive Entertainment

47 archived facts 6 topics 2 sources Last reviewed Nov 2026

  • Until Dawn — production image

47 Interesting Facts About Until Dawn

Interesting Facts (17)

  1. #001

    SuperMassive Games have designed a mechanism in the game where you connect your PS4 camera and face it towards you when playing the game. When a jump scare occurs, the mechanism will make the camera take a picture of your reaction.

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  2. #002

    Larry Fessenden, who plays the Flamethrower Guy, has directed two movies about Wendigos: The Last Winter (2006) and Wendigo (2001). In Until Dawn his character hunts and contains Wendigos.

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  3. #003

    The posters that can be seen on the walls of the cabin's theatre are for real horror movies which were all produced by Larry Fessenden, who co-wrote and stars in the game.

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  4. #004

    The game is said to have over 1,000 different endings, even if an object is picked up, the story will alter.

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  5. #005

    Dr. Hill is the only named character who is guaranteed to survive the game regardless of player choice. However, he is only shown as one of Josh's hallucinations, but his existence can be proven as he is referred to by other characters (Sam can find Josh's phone with text messages from him).

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  6. #006

    The psycho was originally going to wear a scarecrow-like mask, but it was then changed to a clown mask as SuperMassive Games thought the clown mask would be scarier.

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  7. #007

    Brett Dalton as Michael and Noah Fleiss as Christopher were the only actors who didn't change from the PS3 unreleased build. The rest of the original cast included Tracy Weiler as Jessica, Megan Raye Manzi as Samantha, Rachel Oyama as Emily, Melissa Benoist as Ashley, Michael Charles Roman as Joshua, Gilbert Glenn Brown as Matthew and Megan Prescott as Hannah/Beth.

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  8. #008

    The character Flamethrower Guy, credited as such in the end credits, is not referred to by that name in the game. Instead he is called Mystery Man in the game's menu screens and Stranger in the game's subtitles. The developers also revealed that his real name is Jack.

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  9. #009

    In the office of Dr. Hill there is a painting of the Dutch painter Jheronimus "Jeroen" Bosch

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  10. #010

    Chris, Jessica and Sam share their birthdays with their respective actors Noah Fleiss (April 16), Meaghan Martin (February 17) and Hayden Panettiere (August 21).

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  11. #011

    Until Dawn has a lot of "false" scares throughout the game, Josh's plan is ultimately one big "false" scare.

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  12. #012

    A painting of the Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch appears in Hill's office. Hieronymus Bosch was a Dutch painter of the Renaissance. His unconventional oil paintings, often on oak wood, are known for their fantastical depictions of religious themes and narratives. They often focus on themes such as temptation, sin and judgment.

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  13. #013
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    You can save everyone, kill everyone or just save the characters you want to, if you know which choices (not) to make.

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  14. #014

    Mike is the only character who reacts to any of the Totem premonitions.

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  15. #015

    The Psychopath was initially going to wear a scarecrow-like mask, but it was later changed to a clown mask because SuperMassive Games thought the clown mask would be scarier.

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  16. #016

    Before the séance, Sam hints that Josh is the one behind the Psychopath killer incident: 'Watch out for Josh. He's a total prankster.'

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  17. #017

    While SuperMassive Games was rewriting the script and changing the cast, director Will Byles said, 'I want Hayden Panettiere to play Samantha.' They got a yes to the offer.

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Production Story (11)

  1. #018

    When Supermassive Games were rewriting and recasting, director Will Byles said: "I want Hayden Panettiere to play the role of Samantha". They approached her and she said "yes".

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  2. #019

    Peter Stormare wasn't revealed to be a cast member until a trailer for the launch date was released in May 2015. Will Byles revealed in an interview that the first choice for Dr. Hill was Jeff Goldblum.

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  3. #020

    Supermassive Games began developing Until Dawn from an idea for a PlayStation 3 game for the PlayStation Move accessory, with a stronger narrative focus than its earlier titles such as Start the Party!.

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  4. #021

    Supermassive Games hired American horror film writers Larry Fessenden and Graham Reznick to script Until Dawn, feeling that the studio's British writers wrote in a "parochial" way unsuited to horror.

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  5. #022

    Until Dawn was initially exclusive to PlayStation Move, requiring players to buy the Move controller to play it functionally. In that version, navigation and progression depended on moving the motion controller, which guided the characters' flashlight from a first-person perspective and could also be used to interact with objects and solve puzzles.

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  6. #023

    An early version of Until Dawn supported two-player cooperative multiplayer, with the studio targeting young couples in their twenties. A segment shown at Gamescom 2012 drew positive comments, but the most common complaint was the game's Move exclusivity, as most people did not want to purchase a controller for it.

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  7. #024

    According to Byles, every character in Until Dawn can live or die in any order and in many ways, and no two players will have the same experience because some scenes are locked away by different choices, encouraging replay.

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  8. #025

    Some of Until Dawn's plot points were designed to be indirect and vague so that the narrative would gradually unfold. Byles acknowledged this design choice as "risky" and said it might disappoint mainstream players, though he felt it enhanced the game's "horror" elements.

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  9. #026

    Fessenden and Reznick wrote a script for Until Dawn that ran to nearly 10,000 pages.

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  10. #027

    The Until Dawn development team aimed to instill fear in players and sought a balance of terror, horror and disgust. Supermassive leaned most heavily on terror, which Byles defined as the dread of an unseen threat.

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  11. #028

    Jason Graves composed Until Dawn's main theme first, believing it captured the team's goals, and submitted it to Supermassive Games as the demo pitch.

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Behind the Scenes (9)

  1. #029

    Despite its third-person perspective, Until Dawn adopted a static camera angle similar to early Resident Evil games. The development team initially resisted this approach because the designers considered the camera "archaic".

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  2. #030

    Byles and production designer Lee Robinson drew storyboards for Until Dawn to ensure each camera angle had narrative motivations and to prove their placements were not random.

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  3. #031

    Until Dawn's strict auto-save system was designed to be "imperative" rather than "punitive". According to Byles, a character's death would not end the story before it reached the ending, and some characters may not have died despite their deaths being hinted at.

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  4. #032

    Until Dawn's story was written in a non-linear fashion, with chapter 8 completed first, which led to some inconsistencies in the story. The dialogue was cut back significantly once the team adopted motion capture technology, which the team said facilitates storytelling through acting.

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  5. #033

    To gauge whether Until Dawn was frightening enough, the team measured playtesters' fear levels using a galvanic skin response test.

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  6. #034

    For Until Dawn, Jason Graves blended melodic and atonal sounds, drew on Krzysztof Penderecki and Jerry Goldsmith, and wrote tonally vague themes to match the game's mysterious storyline; the music grew louder as the player character neared a threat.

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  7. #035

    Until Dawn's mountainous setting led Graves to use a "goat-hoof shaker" for the mountain theme and many key tracks, and he also leaned heavily on synthesizers as a homage to John Carpenter's work.

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  8. #036

    Only 30 minutes of Until Dawn themes with melody and chord progression were recorded across three orchestral sessions, because most recording time went to 8–10 hours of atmospheric music and sounds that Graves later combined to evoke different emotions in different scenes.

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  9. #037

    Until Dawn's Decima game engine was programmed to determine how the music was layered based on players' choices, and the game's soundtracks ran nearly 15 hours, with "O Death" performed by Amy Van Roekel as the theme song.

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Characters & Cast (5)

  1. #038

    Mike is the only character to react to any of the Totem prophecies.

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  2. #039

    The only main characters to not have a Don't Move sequence are Ashley and Josh. If you choose to lock the door when finding the Wendigos in the basement in the final confrontation, the first Don't Move sequence will be longer than if you chose to follow Mike. Sam has the first few and the last few Don't Move sequences.

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  3. #040
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    All of Mike's actions, lines and choices at the beginning of the game will determine how many clothes Jessica will take off before she is abducted.

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  4. #041
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    The twins, Hannah and Beth, and the Flamethrower Guy are the only characters that can't be saved from death. Also, Josh is the only character that can be saved but cannot be rescued off the mountain.

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  5. #042

    Until Dawn's playable characters were built as typical horror movie archetypes, but the writers had them reveal more nuanced qualities as the narrative progressed. The writers believed games, unlike films, could use quieter moments for characters to express inner feelings.

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Easter Eggs & References (3)

  1. #043

    The setting of the game, Blackwood Pines, foreshadows the events in its name. The name Blackwood is a reference to Algernon Blackwood who wrote a story called "The Wendigo". Coincidentally, the Wendigos are the game's primary antagonists in the final chapters of the game.

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  2. #044
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    Sam foreshadows Josh being the mastermind of the psycho killer arc before they use the ouija board: "Watch out for that Josh. He's a schemer."

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  3. #045
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    The setting of the game, Blackwood Pines, foreshadows the events in its name. The name Blackwood is a reference to Algernon Blackwood, who wrote a story called "The Wendigo". Coincidentally, the Wendigos are the game's primary antagonists in the final chapters.

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Deeper Meaning (2)

  1. #046

    Chris foreshadows that wendigos will be the main antagonist of the game when he jokingly says to Jess that he was about to eat his own leg. As the way to become a wendigo is to eat human flesh.

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  2. #047
    Contains a major spoiler — show

    Until Dawn has a lot of "false" scares throughout the game, and Josh's plan is ultimately one big "false" scare.

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Related pages

  • Mr. Robot — Until Dawn comes up in the facts on that page

Sources & editorial notes

Sources for the entries on this page

  1. Wikipedia Until Dawn — WikipediaEncyclopedia · accessed 18 Sep 2026

Information from external sources is independently selected, consolidated and edited by Arka Evren. Sources are listed for verification and further reading. Encyclopedia text is used under its licence (CC BY-SA). How we work