Alone in the dark part 5 (PC version)

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Sathannas

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Jan 5, 2008
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Alone in the dark (5)pc version.
Before we start off this review I have not completed the entire game, so my insights will only be on the things I have tried, as well game play mechanics.

In 1992 the videogame developer infogrames released Alone in the dark, a survival horror game that set the standard for the rest of the survival horror franchise. The game took place in 1925 where an artist committed suicide in his mansion, you assumed the role of Edward Carnby a private investigator who was hired to find a piano on the attic of the house: Derceto soon Edward realized that matters were not so simple, and had to fight through the mansion against all sorts of hideous monsters and puzzles?

It has been almost 16 years after the release of the first Alone in the dark, and not a lot has changed?
You play as Edward Carnby, but the year is now 2008 and he is suffering from amnesia? Edward awakens in a building in New York City, where he is being held captive by a mysterious group of men threatening to kill him; soon he realizes that they are the least of his worries...

Game play:
Alone in the dark, has an emphasis on rational thinking, and that?s a praise that has to come first, because it is a thing that many games tend to forget. Most of the puzzles in the game, can be solved quite logically, like how to open a locked door? You simply take the fire extinguisher from the wall and smash it open.
The game has a variety of options that you can follow, and it gives a nice change of pace from an else very linear progressive pace.

One of the key ?attractions? of the game is fire, yes you can create fire to any wooden or flammable surface and it will burn in a semi-naturalbutseeminglyacceleratedway. It?s a nice feature, but it feels more like a gimmick than an actual ?revolution? that the hype made it up to be, and for me I never get the feeling of the fire as this all powerful ally/foe because even though most things can burn, the fire is still restricted by scripting and many of the scenes where the fire seems to be random, it?s scripted.

Alone in the dark uses an odd mix of First person shooting mechanics and third person over the shoulder to classic survival horror fixed camera positioning, it?s a really weird mix up, especially the first person aspect. Whenever you want to fire your gun, you have to switch to first person view, and although it does give a better accuracy, it feels out of place. With these three different forms of camera angling, the controls feel odd to say the least, but also slightly archaic, especially the classic survival horror 2-d walking around, it?s like playing the Old Alone in the dark all over again, just with a nice graphical touch as well as new game play gimmicks.

Another, gimmick feature is the ?realtime? inventory screen, which basically means that you cannot switch items in combat, which is very annoying because you will realize pretty soon that each enemy is going to need a different strategy, you get a gun fairly early in the game, but since most enemies die by fire, it?s far easier to stock up on spray cans which can be used as a makeshift flamethrower. The inventory is very limited, since it?s the inner pockets of Carnby?s jacket, this gives the game a nice added difficulty since it makes you think twice before stocking up on ammo and health.

As mentioned before the game is staggeringly high on combat approaches and this is also very apparent when using items, there are tons of different ways that you can use items, like putting a handkerchief into a bottle of alcohol will result in a Molotov cocktail or wrapping a bottle of oil up in duct tape and thus creating a bomb that will stick to any surface it touches. Most of the games weapons are actually normal house items like water bottles and duct tape. The melee combat is very original, in order to swing a melee weapon, you have to move the mouse in a direction which will result in Carnby holding the weapon either up, right or left, and depending on where the object he is holding is, his blows will come in different directions, this system is wickedly effective, and adds another layer to what could have been a very boring aspect of the game, unfortunately it?s all ruined by god awful mouse controls.

This is what ruined most of the experience for me, the controls will start to annoy after dealing with them for an hour or so. What annoys me most is that the game can never really focus on one method of game play style instead it tries to bounce around with too many and end up falling down and failing miserably on all three aspects. Another big annoyance is the game?s irritating chechpoint system, there is a save function, but since it only saves the start if each checkpoint, and since the game has an auto save feature, the save feature is quite redundant. What is more annoying is the placement of the checkpoint, which is usually sometime before really hard ?point fights? which I like to call them, which are basically mini boss fights.

Story:
The story revolves around Edward Carnby and his struggle/quest to find out what is going on in Central park as well as learning about his own past. During the story he meets a woman named Sarah, who also turns out to be a later love interest, the story feels so uninteresting that it hurts, since it?s made up by disconnected conversations and none important phone calls and messages, it really feels like a messy story. Sarah?s character feels very forced, and it doesn?t help that she has no real reason for being there. She just tags along because she apparently has to. The game is further disjointed by being split up into episodes, which take around 40-60 minutes each to complete, there 8-10 episodes in all and there is a nice little recap each time you reload a game so you won?t be totally lost when you go into the game again, but to be completely honest the story is big letdown, even though it does seem very intriguing, and have the potential to suck the player in, it never seems to kick into gear or captivate the player.

Graphics/Sound:
There is not much to say about the graphics in Alone in the dark, they look good as with most games this generation, what really sets this game apart though, is its use of fire and smoke, those are really beautifully rendered.
In terms of level design the game is superb, from seeing New York city being ripped apart by an apocalyptic force while speeding through the streets in a Cab, or climbing around the ledges off a crumbling skyscraper, to the haunting silence of Central park, after being turned into a living nightmare. The game suffers from the occasional graphic glitch, as well as severe framrate drops, although that could just be my computer.
The sound department works well, it?s nothing spectacular, it helps bringing out the spooky tension that a survival horror game is supposed to incite, aside from the soundtrack, which is surprisingly well done.

Overall verdict:
From what I played, which is about ¾ the game has a lot of neat ideas, but sadly for each good thing that the game offers, three problems show up. I really want to like the game, but I can?t help but feel that this game came out in the wrong generation, with many of the game play mechanics feeling a bit old and dated. It?s a great Survival Horror game but since this genre has been slowly dying ever since Resident evil 4, and most attempts at reviving it have been badly received, sadly this is the case with Alone in the dark. As much as I admire Eden games attempt at reviving this old classic franchise, I can?t help but feel that they should just let it rest.

Rent it.