User reviews

This horror film's is a remarkable example of the old idiom: "A poor craftman blames his tools". This film was animated in a neglected animation software from 2012 and yet through sheer talent and community efforts, this film manages to prove that you truly can make cinema-quality films Source Filmmaker.

I'm not a horror or thriller fan, personally. At most I enjoy survival horror like PREY or Resident Evil, but the masterful cinematography and direction in this film has honestly given me an impeccable first impression to the horror film genre.

You don't have to be a Team Fortress 2 fan to enjoy it, but it does help.

Emesis Blue has one of the best concepts I have seen in a horror movie ever. Taking the most integral part of any multiplayer shooter, and turning it into the stuff of nightmares. This alone makes Emesis Blue a fantastically eerie time.

This movie definitely goes for a more eerie and strange approach, rather than a downright in your face scary way. Personally I really like this direction and really makes it stand out as a movie tonally. However I think the eerie feeling it was going for is a double edged sword, because at some points in the film it gets a little drawn out and boring while the mercs are walking around and exploring the building. For the most part however it worked wonderfully.

It does a very good job at giving this feeling of something isn't quite right with the lovable TF2 characters we all know and love. The animation itself is outstanding, and the visual shots in the movie are very impressive. Especially for Source Film Maker.

The story however, is extremely hard to follow. Emesis Blue really keeps its cards close, and doesn't tell you the story upfront. You kind of have to pay close attention to the film to get all the pieces to complete the puzzle, which can be seen as a negative or a positive.

What I'm saying is that I shouldn't have to watch a video to explain the story for me.

The voice acting reigns from decent to great, some of the actors do a great job of impersonating the TF2 mercs. While some do an alright, but serviceable job.

All in all, Emesis Blue is a great animated horror movie. Horror fans shouldn't sleep on this one just because it's animated or because it uses TF2 characters. Emesis Blue provides some of the greatest horror moments in a very long time.

Plenty of mystery and intriguing ideas. It's subtle horror with few jumpscares because the focus is on the story and being eerie instead of bombastic. There's plenty of influence from other movies like "The shining" "Interstellar" and even "Pulp Fiction" but the references never overtake the story. And what's really impressive is that the entire movie seems to be made in SFM, an old animation tool with a steep learning curve and this movie goes above and beyond the limitations of the tool. It's safe to say that it's one of the best horror movies I've seen in years which is crazy because it's not even an official movie, it's just something made by passionate people and posted onto YouTube.

Such an amazing atmosphere with beautiful and disturbing imagery. I can't get it out of my mind even though I saw it yesterday. I love the mystery, the ambiguity. The use of music and the sounds. It's honestly one of the creepiest things I've ever seen and it's a goddamn SFM movie about funny TF2 characters. Seriously, you do NOT need to be a TF2 fan to enjoy it. It's crazy that something like this could work, given how goofy and comedic TF2 is. It contains some very, very, VERY disturbing imagery. Everything about it is just perfect, and it's available for free on YouTube! Fortress Films are a blessing.

One of the best movies I've seen in the past months. This movie manages to build tension without jumpscares. The plot is interesting, building upon that of TF2 without fully sticking to it, allowing much creative freedom. The visuals are impressive for source filmmaker, with the sound design being immaculate as well. I can recommend this to anyone as it manages to scare without cheap jumpscares or loud sounds. It's not only scary but heartfelt too at moments, as well as being interesting outside of the horror. It's a classic, despite being based off a 15 year old game. Definitely watch this one.

Using Source Film Maker to make a feature length film is incredible enough on it's own. But due to the fantastic editing, acting, pacing, cinematography and sound design, it soars above any horror film released in recent years. It blew me away, and I can't believe it's even real. The premise on it's own is interesting enough, but you get elements from Fritz Lang's "M", and ideas similar to Interstellar, Resident Evil, Inception, and many more. The fact that when I watch it, looking at these TF2 characters, I'm not even thinking about the original game. I'm sucked into this world that is so intriguing that it hurts. I highly recommend checking it out if you love weird conceptual horror as much as I do.

I wasn't sure what to expect going into Emesis Blue, but I have to say, it's beyond incredible. In the past, I've considered Spy's Disguise to be my favorite SFM movie and a standout in quality and production value, yet this blows it out of the water.

The animation is realistic, with characters having a real depth to them. Ludwig and Doe are excellent protagonists, with badass moments and moments of human vulnerability. Even the side characters have hints at their own stories, with their distinct models and personalities helping them stand out in their own right. While the movie clearly has its basis in canon Team Fortress 2 lore, it also has plenty of its own twists and additions, with cool and memorable characters that you won't forget.

As a surreal horror/mystery thriller, Emesis Blue performs extremely well. The imagery is haunting, in no small part thanks to the cinematic look and feel of the whole movie. Every frame's a poster (in fact, Fortress Films did actually release hundreds of 4K posters on their Patreon). The voice acting is superb, much better than you'd expect from a fan project like this (calling it that feels like a disservice at this point).

I'm able to follow the main gist of the story, yet there's still a great deal left to interpretation. Some people feel that the story is too confusing - I'd say that you're really not supposed to understand everything on your first watch. That would defeat the point of the mystery, no? What's important is that you understand the premise, and you can follow the basic plot as it progresses. You don't need a Ph. D. to tell that some messed up stuff is happening in the Slaughterhouse.

This movie is free to watch on YouTube, but if I had to buy an actual ticket to watch it at a theatre, I would've done it in a heartbeat.

Amazing cinematography, perfect sound design, good enough characters, obvious effort and love, but the story is a dumpsterfire, literally.

Actually, I know they put years into it which means it must have deep meaning, but it's the biggest drug trip bomb I have experienced. I fell in love with this film on my first watch and still do really like it, but after hearing one of my friend's opinion I decided to look at it from another perspective.

If you can make a 2-hour horror movie, go on. DON'T expect the people who will see it to spend hours or days or weeks studying every frame of it to understand what the hell happened. An amazing thing film directors do is not explaining too much, while also considering that given the right hints, the viewers can piece the story together because they are intelligent beings. Emesis Blue tries to do this, but fails.

The story is too complex to be told in 1 hour and 48 minutes, let alone having it be the first major film made in SFM, and even worse, your first-ever feature-length movie. Chad Payne made a remarkable achievement, but going for something this big as a debut film was unnecessary and risky, as it may have not play out as well as it is expected. If by the midpoint of the movie I can't say what the film is about in one or two sentences then there is a big problem. In other words, if by this mark the concept isn't crystal clear then your audience is hanging in mid-air.

Make a drug trip if you want, but don't expect everyone to like it because it's feature length and looks pretty. None of these qualities can save a movie plot in the slightest.

I must say that I am grateful this movie was made not only because it honours TF2 as a whole, but because it inspired me and gave me more motivation for the career path I want to pursue when I grow up, that being filmmaking. One thing this movie taught me is that with time and effort, you can put together that beautiful thing you want to share with the world and that most importantly, (Just don't mess it up with a psychological horror drug trip that no one can understand and you'll be fine).

Seriously, there are videos explaining the movie longer than the movie itself. It's tragic. If the story and lore were fleshed out better this movie would have been a 10/10 masterpiece for many more people, but this flaw is sadly hard to ignore.

I hope you're next project is better than this.

I'm a fan of obscure, unique, creative, and charming stuff, animations being one of them. The only team fortress 2 sfm animation that scratched that itch up to this point is the scratched universe tf2 sfm series. I'm hyper fixated on that. So when THIS dropped out of nowhere after its years of development. I was surprised, even more surprised, albeit, happy when I realised it has that unique storytelling and creative charm that you really struggle to find anywhere else!

Emesis blue overall is pretty amazing, you don't even have to understand what's going on half the time it's that good and entertaining. There's something so fun about a silent hill styled horror story set in the tf2 universe, it constantly makes you hope for the characters to get out of said scary/adrenaline filled situations. It's great!

Even if you know nothing about team fortress 2 its worth a watch.

The premise of the movie is downright comical - a serious horror film about team fortress 2 characters, the same ones who use literal rockets for jumping around and say quirky one liners after manslaughter. Not only is it extremely true to the original canon, it incorporates it perfectly into the psychological horror narrative and is terrifying. The graphics, despite mainly using models from 2007, look good and have spectacular animation and lightning. The voice acting and sound design is on point and sounds professional. The story, while intentionally confusing and fractured, is extremely engaging and will leave you thinking about it even after the movie ends.

Though I expected that this would be a joke or seem like a 3am YouTube video, this was actually one of the better horror/thrillers movies I watched. I am impressed that they had made an entire movie through animating tf2 characters.

Though you might get annoyed or confused from people looking the same that more helps the mood of it in my opinion. I might have to rewatch it again to find all of the small details though. The amount of dedication it must have required to create this must be incredible. For being a YouTube video Emesis blue is undoubtedly one of the best horror movies I have ever watched and I recommend it to other people.

I've been a huge tf2 fan since 2014 and I never would've excepted that someone or some people would make such a thing for this game, which struggles nowadays with bots and valve itself on not caring about it. This movie tells people and everyone how a true horror is formed and made. Also this movie is free to watch on youtube, which is amazing considering the fact that its made with a Source Filmmaker, The oldest software of Valve, which is not even being updated at all. Fortress Films reached above and beyond on this film and I think that it deserves a Saxxy Awards of 2023.

Well done Lads :)

I've been a fan of TF2 for a long time now, with many hours spent in the game, but even more spent in the community watching SFM films. And as much as I love the classic takes on the TF2 world, any serious take on it especially grabs my attention, with Emesis Blue being the finest example of this. The plot is intriguing, the writing is sophisticated, and the animations and cinematography are subtle and striking. TF2 is a game that (even in the lore) fixates on the concept of cheating death, with the Mann brothers' Australium fueled life extension, the Respawn system, and even the Medic making a deal with the devil to prolong his death. But Emesis Blue is a serious examination of the mortality of the character's and how their moral actions bring about consequences. Will they persevere or will their minds fracture? Lastly, the film brilliantly understands how to use psychological horror, with its most chilling scenes not relying on music, or jumpscares, but merely on the silent facial expressions of the characters. We experience the scene as they do. It's a remarkably sophisticated film that pays homage to classic horror films, and keeps me thinking about it due to how rich the plot is. It's a masterpiece, and you should watch it.

People rank Emesis Blue highly because it's the first full-length Source Filmmaker movie with striking visuals and a gritty, dark atmosphere, which is a welcome breath of fresh air from the comedy-oriented, short-form animations usually produced by the Team Fortress 2 community.

That said, I'm not here to review it as a TF2 SFM movie, I'm here to review it as a movie. And as a movie, it feels incredibly confused, meandering and incoherent.

The plot is very hard to follow, constantly introducing new concepts and characters with no time to flesh anything out. Between hallucinations, people being resurrected and hints at time-travel, you'll have absolutely no idea what's going on by the end of it. Tons of key details are deliberately cryptic, vague and "open to interpretation" - at times, making it feel less like a story and more like an alternate reality game (ARG), with its layers upon layers of obtuseness. This is a red flag for me, as making your narrative unnecessarily convoluted is one of the best ways to mask its lack of merit.

That said, what frustrates me even more is how the film sidelines its own, original ideas just to cram itself full of references. Hans Becker's 1931 film "M" is a running theme and presumably plot-significant. There are constant, blatant allusions to Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining", with some scenes being shot-for-shot recreations, and one of the monsters is basically Tyrant from the "Resident Evil 2" remake. At this point, I can't be sure if any of this movie's cool moments are original, or just pinched from some other game or film I haven't seen yet.

When these references are not important to the plot or themes, they feel like pointless, shallow pandering - almost as if the author is desperately trying to prove they're a "true horror fan" by pointing to all the horror games and films they know. When the references ARE important, it feels frustrating that we're expected to do homework before we can get a basic idea of what's happening (no, I'm not watching "M" just to decrypt Dr. Ludwig's character). A good story should stand on its own legs and convey its own meaning without the need to constantly invoke ideas from other authors. It's fine to be inspired by things you like, but intertextuality does not replace substance.

And ultimately, I don't see the substance. I look back and don't remember feeling particularly invested in the characters, themes or plot. The biggest takeaway I had was "it was a very pretty, full-length horror film made in SFM with the TF2 characters", and it seems that everyone else is way too impressed with that to question the rest of its creative decisions.

I mean, just contrast this with other surreal horror films like "Skinamarink" or "Funny Games", and the difference is night and day. "Skinamarink" is very sensory, focusing on a simple core idea (2 kids trapped in a house being tortured by an omnipotent demon) and trying to make it as tense and unsettling as possible by slowly escalating the weirdness and brutality. "Funny Games", on the other hand, uses its surrealism to explore horror tropes and question why audiences are invested in the struggle between victim and killer, breaking the 4th wall to point out how arbitrarily filmmakers set the rules of such conflicts.

With that frame of reference, Emesis Blue is just a mess in comparison. Its imagery doesn't feel deliberate or poignant, and more like it's trying to overwhelm the audience with as many shocking twists and turns as possible in an attempt to confuse them, making them THINK there's some larger picture they're missing.

So yeah, I'm sorry. As a technical achievement for SFM, it's amazing, but as a horror story, it's just bad.

I loved this film so much. This is a feature length animated film made with passion and love for animation and cinema. To think that this was made with SFM (probably with some nuke magic) was just amazing. There were some super subtle stuff in the beginning like shots breaking camera direction to create a sense of unease, while we watch the events go down from Medic's perspective we get chaotic direction on his shots, which was later echoed by the time loops and hallucinations, and some fantastic match cuts, etc, visually this film was absolutely stunning. On top of that, so many references for cinephiles to enjoy (M, the shining, dr.strangelove, the house that jack built, to name a few) and classic horror visual ques, German expressionism, all the visual elements were so well excecated its honestly shocking. This is a masterpiece built with so much love for cinema I was 100% invested through out the entire film. I work with Maya and making this type of thing in SFM? Insane. This is better than half of the stuff in cinema right now, and Valve should revive the Saxxy award for this. It's well written, well animated, well paced, well shot and well acted, if this doesn't win some kind of award I'm gonna RIOT.

This movie is honestly outstanding, its incredible and can build suspense so easily it just shocks me. It even proves that SFM movies can be really good and jesus this was frightening to the point I had to pause at some point and take a break which is especially hard with how bad movies are nowadays because they dont take risks and stick to common unoriginal concepts so investors can get their money but here they spent so much time and effort with a huge risk of a concept that could've been good or bad, or executed good or bad and man did it come out as a full fledged full on masterpiece. Would recommend.

I've watched many horror movies, from the greats (Scream, The Shining, SAW) to the solid ones (Leprechaun, Unfriended) to the worst ones. This one is among the greats, and it fits among them perfectly.

From the writing to the scenography it was a stellar watch, and worth the five years of wait. I attempted to rate it accordingly from a scale of 1 (Watched family guy while watching the film) to a 10 (Used duct tape to shut everyone up while watching the film). I rated it an 8 (No blinking while watching) It's got a few jokes which were genuinely funny, it fits among the Team Fortress 2 lore and best of all it uses some good horror movie tropes, and if I'm not mistaken takes a few tropes from the greatest ones. I highly recommend you watch it.

I love the way this looks, the models used in this film some of them are pretty old but the lighting in this is wonderful. I am also a huge simp for the what appears to be a Nagant 1895 used by the spy.

The voice acting can be kinda off for some of the characters but for some like the scout and the soldier it is spot on. I like the use of that old German film and the camera angles. Everything just fit together really well and looks great. The lighting in this film really helps hide the age of the assets from TF2. All of the effects compliment the background. This is the best I have ever seen of a SFM animation.