I have never played any of the previous alone in the dark games but that does not matter, because this is an entirely new game. Despite this it does retain the same lead character, one Edward Carnby, but that is where the similarities end.
The main focus of this game is the story line, a kind of rehashed satanic apocalypse. It is exquisitely written but saying that the game suffers from a lot of pacing issues would be giant fucking understatement. I got the impression that the game was not deigned to be played for long periods of time but instead only for quick bursts. An idea that was further reinforced by the very cool recaps you get each time you load the game to show you what has happed previously. This feature is some thing that people who watch Lost will be very familiar with. In fact the whole game feels like a bad combination of Lost, 24 and a hammer horror film and that I think that this is what they were going for. The lost style catch up is not the only card that Alone In The Dark has up its sleeve, some of which work some of which don?t. It has an interesting inventory, intelligent fire based combat, a visual healing system and weird but useful DVD skip system which I will delve into further detail with later.
First the inventory system is a complete fucking disaster as it is accessed by simply opening up your coat upon, allowing you to see your whole inventory and you combine or select different items which sounds great in theory but as is often the case with good ideas, they often don?t translate well when you try to implement them, in this case the problem is that they get you to select items using the analogue stick which is very fiddly and makes it very difficult to select items and also to combine items. The inventory is small, plus there are a staggering amount of useless different combinations and the odds are most people will find a few they like and stick to them.
Second the fire which is fucking awesome and although it does not look particularly good, it makes up for it in spades by being very intelligent and this is more than just a cheap parlour trick as it actually forms the core of the combat mechanic, meaning all of the non-boss monsters can be killed very easily by fire. Also fire is used in several of the earlier puzzles utilising the fact that as in real life things burn at different rates and some things don?t burn at all and this not only works but works very well but it about the only thing that does.
Thirdly, the visual healing system now rather than just have you pick up healing items which take the form of first aid sprays and bandages and be miraculously healed, you have to spray the first-aid spray your self which is used to take care of smaller injuries whereas the bandages take care of any thing more than a flesh wound. Now, like the other features in the game, this is a gimmick and was pointed out that after awhile you would be entirely made up of scar tissue but at least they are trying to be different which counts for something.
Lastly the DVD style skip system. This is the first time to my knowledge that any one has tried to do any thing like this. The whole idea is to make sure that people don?t get stuck and fed up, so that every one can see the wonderful story line, and this system is actually quite useful as towards the end I got fed up with stupid puzzles so I just skipped them
So as you can probably guess from what I have just said this is not the perfect game and it has many more issues, such as how all the enemies can take a very random amount of damage which is fucking irritating after a while, plus this game is billed as survival horror, yet only the opening part of the game which takes place in an apartment building is actually remotely scary, then things take a very random turn for the worst as soon as you are forced to free roam and confronted with stupid puzzles. A
All the scariness disappears as wide open spaces are not scary what they should have done is kept it claustrophobic. I am not just going to write it off like every one else seems to have, and join the lets all ?fuck alone in the dark? band wagon as I actually happen to like this game. I honestly cant see why people hate it so much it is not as if it is the worst game ever made and at least it is trying to be different but maybe the problem because it is not trying to be Halo or rip any one else of but instead is trying to be different which is surely a good thing and as a whole it is a good game
So, Is it shit?
Yes, this game is supposedly a survival horror but as it is just not scary and for that reason it is shit.
The main focus of this game is the story line, a kind of rehashed satanic apocalypse. It is exquisitely written but saying that the game suffers from a lot of pacing issues would be giant fucking understatement. I got the impression that the game was not deigned to be played for long periods of time but instead only for quick bursts. An idea that was further reinforced by the very cool recaps you get each time you load the game to show you what has happed previously. This feature is some thing that people who watch Lost will be very familiar with. In fact the whole game feels like a bad combination of Lost, 24 and a hammer horror film and that I think that this is what they were going for. The lost style catch up is not the only card that Alone In The Dark has up its sleeve, some of which work some of which don?t. It has an interesting inventory, intelligent fire based combat, a visual healing system and weird but useful DVD skip system which I will delve into further detail with later.
First the inventory system is a complete fucking disaster as it is accessed by simply opening up your coat upon, allowing you to see your whole inventory and you combine or select different items which sounds great in theory but as is often the case with good ideas, they often don?t translate well when you try to implement them, in this case the problem is that they get you to select items using the analogue stick which is very fiddly and makes it very difficult to select items and also to combine items. The inventory is small, plus there are a staggering amount of useless different combinations and the odds are most people will find a few they like and stick to them.
Second the fire which is fucking awesome and although it does not look particularly good, it makes up for it in spades by being very intelligent and this is more than just a cheap parlour trick as it actually forms the core of the combat mechanic, meaning all of the non-boss monsters can be killed very easily by fire. Also fire is used in several of the earlier puzzles utilising the fact that as in real life things burn at different rates and some things don?t burn at all and this not only works but works very well but it about the only thing that does.
Thirdly, the visual healing system now rather than just have you pick up healing items which take the form of first aid sprays and bandages and be miraculously healed, you have to spray the first-aid spray your self which is used to take care of smaller injuries whereas the bandages take care of any thing more than a flesh wound. Now, like the other features in the game, this is a gimmick and was pointed out that after awhile you would be entirely made up of scar tissue but at least they are trying to be different which counts for something.
Lastly the DVD style skip system. This is the first time to my knowledge that any one has tried to do any thing like this. The whole idea is to make sure that people don?t get stuck and fed up, so that every one can see the wonderful story line, and this system is actually quite useful as towards the end I got fed up with stupid puzzles so I just skipped them
So as you can probably guess from what I have just said this is not the perfect game and it has many more issues, such as how all the enemies can take a very random amount of damage which is fucking irritating after a while, plus this game is billed as survival horror, yet only the opening part of the game which takes place in an apartment building is actually remotely scary, then things take a very random turn for the worst as soon as you are forced to free roam and confronted with stupid puzzles. A
All the scariness disappears as wide open spaces are not scary what they should have done is kept it claustrophobic. I am not just going to write it off like every one else seems to have, and join the lets all ?fuck alone in the dark? band wagon as I actually happen to like this game. I honestly cant see why people hate it so much it is not as if it is the worst game ever made and at least it is trying to be different but maybe the problem because it is not trying to be Halo or rip any one else of but instead is trying to be different which is surely a good thing and as a whole it is a good game
So, Is it shit?
Yes, this game is supposedly a survival horror but as it is just not scary and for that reason it is shit.