Own Adventure book,' throughout the duration of the movie you'll be faced with a series of decisions that will effect the story's progress, and the fates of its stupid-as-dirt characters. Just activate the feature from the Blu-ray's start-up menu, and just like a 'Choose Your Though you can play the movie in its 81-minute linear form from the standard-def DVD release (yawn), the 'Play the Movie Your Way' mode is what this one's all about. Offeringĩ6(!) different permutations of the film's storyline on a single disc, you could spend hours watching and re-watching 'Return to House on Haunted Hill' and still not discover all of its secrets and subplots.įirst, a look at how it works. So, if we are to believe the breathless press materials sent out by Warner and Dark Castle, with 'Return to House on Haunted Hill' the world now stands on the brink of a new paradigm in how we can consume traditional entertainment. Both high-def formats support functionality that goes far beyond the clunky 'seamless branching' of standard-def DVD. Still, none of those past efforts really got it right, at least in terms of presenting a truly seamless user experience that wasn't clunky or disjointed (or the in case of 'Clue,' pretty damn expensive).īut now, thanks to the wonders of next-gen technology, we've progressed to a level where it is finally possible for viewers to command a navigational architecture that can facilitate true interactive storytelling. Whether it be 1985's big-screen 'Clue' (which had one of three different endings depending on which theater you saw it in), or New Line's recent DVD release of 'Final Destination 3,' which used that format's limited interactive capabilities to allow you to 'choose' the bloody fates of its characters. Sure, there have been attempts in the past to merge audience participation with narrative filmmaking, But for a generation of kids like me, the 'Choose Your Own Adventure' books were the closest we could come to living in our own little movies, and boy, were they a ton of fun.Īpparently, someone at Horror shingle Dark Castle Entertainment read a lot of Choose Your Own Adventure books as a kid, too, because now we have 'Return to House on Haunted Hill,' a direct-to-video sequel to the 1999 horror remake and the most truly 'interactive' movie ever produced. The other way? The choices were, of course, simplistic and the outcomes far-fetched. Should you open the green door, or the red one? Should you walk through the entrance to that scary old cave, or run

As you read your way through the story, every few pages or so you'd be asked to make a choice for the story's protagonist on how to proceed next. These 'interactive fiction' pocket novels, though typical of young adult fare of the time with their pulpy tall tales of sci-fi adventure and horror, added one very important and unique twist. As a child, I was absolutely hooked on the 'Choose Your Own Adventure' book series.

House on haunted hill blu ray