The Dark Pictures series is getting a new feature called “Turning Points.” In Directive 8020, you can rewind time for the first time. Here’s how it works and when it comes in handy.
With Directive 8020, The Dark Pictures series finally gets a feature many fans have wanted since Man of Medan. The so-called Turning Points directly affect your decisions. Instead of having to live with every mistake, you can replay key moments later and try different paths. That makes Directive 8020 feel noticeably different from earlier entries in the series, especially when a major character suddenly dies because of a quick-time event.
- Find more on the game in our Directive 8020 topic hub
What Turning Points in Directive 8020 actually are
Turning Points work like fixed story nodes. The game tracks important decisions, QTE results, and key scenes, then lays them out in a clear timeline. There, you can see the different branches of the story. Each node represents a specific story moment, while the lines show how your choices affect later events.
The big difference from regular checkpoints: You’re not simply jumping back a few minutes. In Directive 8020, you return to the exact point where your story changed. From there, you can choose different responses, save characters, or experience certain scenes in a completely different way. That can increase the playtime of Directive 8020, but you decide by how much.
Why this makes Directive 8020 play differently
In older The Dark Pictures games like The Devil in Me, mistakes were often final. If someone died because of a QTE, you either had to live with it or restart the entire playthrough.
Directive 8020 removes exactly that hurdle. If you lose a character in an important scene, you can jump straight back to that moment and try again. In longer chapters especially, that saves you a lot of repeated playtime.
At the same time, some of the pressure disappears. If you know you can rewind at any point, certain decisions automatically feel less risky. Whether that’s a good thing depends heavily on how you prefer to play horror games like this.
When Turning Points are really worth using
Randomly jumping back again and again won’t help much in the long run. The feature becomes most interesting at the moments where the story clearly changes.
That can happen, for example, when:
- a character dies during a QTE
- you completely destroy an important relationship
- you miss clues or optional scenes
- you want to see alternate story paths
The quick-time events in particular quickly show how tight some situations can be. A single mistake is often enough for an entire scene to play out differently. I noticed that right away in Episode 1, when I suddenly had to save Simms.
Secrets and collectibles
Many collectibles in Directive 8020 are directly tied to specific decisions or to which characters are still alive. A good example is the “Good Old Death” secrets. There are five in total, but they first appear in Episode 8 and are then unlocked retroactively. For the remaining ones, you’ll need to jump back through Turning Points and try different story paths. Without this feature, you’d need several full playthroughs. For completionists, Turning Points are almost essential.
I was skeptical, but now I’m convinced
I think Turning Points in Directive 8020 are really well executed. Mostly because the game lets you decide right at the start whether you want to enable the feature at all. That means you can choose for yourself how punishing or relaxed your playthrough should be.
Normally, I’m more of a fan of having to live with my decisions in games like this. Especially in horror games, part of the appeal for me is that mistakes have consequences and characters can die.
Still, I caught myself rewinding several times. Not because I had to, but because I wanted to see how certain scenes could play out differently or which story paths I might have missed. That’s exactly why the feature works so well, in my opinion. You can stick to your choices, or you can give in to curiosity and try a different path after all.
