MODERN GAMING
Alone In The Dark
Developer:  Eden Games
Publisher:  Atari
Year:  2008
Genre:  Horror
System:  PS3, Xbox 360 (played on 360), PC, Wii, PS2

You ever played a game that you WANT to like but there's so many irritating things about it that you just can't?  Well, maybe it won't hit you the same way, but the new Alone in the Dark game, which you can tell is trying to revive an old series by only giving the series title as its title, instead of being creative enough to make a new title, is one of those games I want to like but, well you get the picture.

Story - One of the game's stronger points is the plot of how Central Park, believed to be a place for relaxation and nature in the middle of the metropolis of New York, actually only exists to contain something evil.  And it's not the king of the homeless people.  Edward Carnby, main hero of the series, finds himself amnesiac and in a New York apartment building with a priest, an old guy and his sidekick.  Instead of walking to the bar, the old guy and sidekick try to kill the priest and Carnby, only for all hell to break loose because of some ritual that was unleashing some evil.  Traipsing through a slowly crumbling Manhattan with Sarah, an art dealer that got caught up with him, as well as the priest Theophile (who they REALLY could have picked a better name since he's a priest and I have bad hearing and this damn game has no subtitles).

Now we have your classic mystic cult that you've heard enough of in this century and probably sick to death of (seriously, let's get an original cult in like the ancient Babylonian cult of Tiamat), your evil baddie trying to end the world because he fucking well can, and the chick who's not there for any reason other than being dragged along and to become an emotional obstacle to the hero.  The only difference in terms of scope this game has from its predecessors, is that while the past games were more played like Resident Evil, this new game plays like F.E.A.R.  Take that as a good or bad thing.
Also in light of fairness to this game, I will review it in comparison to Uwe Boll's film "adaptation" of the last Alone in the Dark game before this one, titled The New Nightmare.
In terms of story, the game is a lot more coherent in its progression, with monsters having the constant weakness THROUGHOUT the game (in this case KILL IT WITH FIRE), unlike the movie, where light is the one weakness of the monsters and near the end of the film, the monsters fight for several minutes in full blinding stadium lights.  So, well done new game, you get points for remembering your blah story.


Gameplay - Here comes the weak point everyone, get your targets up.  Let's focus on the good points first.  Firstly the inventory system is pretty neat.  Instead of the game pausing to let you peruse through the items, you just open your coat in the middle of the place and have to select them yourself, all while shit goes rioting around you, like you would in real life if you had such a coat.  Not only that but there is a limit to what you can carry depending on what pockets are available to you.  There's your left and right pockets each of which hold different things, so there's a strategic imperative in knowing what to use and how much you need it.

Another thing is there's loads of things to do in the game.  Seriously, they tried to pack a lot of shit into this.  You can wield a range of melee weapons from bludgeoning pipes to fire extinguishers to burning chairs to broken keyboards.  You can shoot open doors at the lock, ram them down, hotwire cars as well as breaking the window if the door is locked, or even find the ignition keys somewhere as well as searching in the glovebox for any handy items.  You can combine a bewildering range of items together from spray cans and a lighter to make a flamethrower, to a handkerchief and a bottle of liquid for a molotov cocktail.  Hell you can even throw the liquid bottle and shoot it in the air, which you'll want to use a lot for being way more reliable.


Now to move onto the bad things.  The controls are rather crazy in the sense they're never entirely sure WHAT they need to do, same with you as in this game you can do a dozen different things ranging from making a flamethrower with a spray can and a lighter, to rappelling down an elevator shaft and having to press one of TWO jump buttons to reach that hole.  The problem is it tries to do TOO many things and as a result the controls become quite haphazard in so many situations.  It could well be worse, this is true, but that doesn't stop the game from becoming a mediocre mess.  There's also DRIVING SECTIONS!  And you know how fun those are in a game, when you're trying to blaze through the middle of a collapsing Manhattan in a Geo trying to leap over chasms (actually that part of the game was my favourite for being pretty epic but not everyone would enjoy doing that repeatedly).  Oh the fun you will have.

Not only that but the combat system is HORRIBLE.  You use weapons with the right analog stick, going left then right to swing a weapon, or down then up to swing it down (trying to mimic pulling a weapon back for a blow rather than what I usually did in mimicking swinging the weapon DOWN like normal people do with these controls).  What you're essentially doing is flicking the right analog stick all over the place like an amateur heterosexual fiddling with his partner's clitoris, with less successful results.  For the simplest actions, this game becomes quite overcomplex in performing them, with a combat system surprisingly worse than Silent Hill's which you beared with because of the characters.


On another note, the checkpoints, while numerous are definitely annoying as hell for one major thing.  Unskippable cutscenes.  Here's an example.  In the sewers there is a cutscene where a guy under a light is under attack from a black oily floor, who do not like the light.  Soon as the light goes out, it swallows the guy whole.  Now, this black puddle is THE MOST EVIL THING EVER CREATED IN VIDEOGAMES.  Remember Luigi's Purple Coins in Super Mario Galaxy?  If that level had a baby, the evil oil floor is that.  You have to use your flashlight to get it out of the way.  Sometimes it goes quickly.....sometimes it doesn't, and all that slow while, the rest of it is sneaking behind you to swallow you.  And it will take sometime to get past this godawfully annoying part which is INSTANT DEATH, not sapping your health death, but INSTANT DEATH if you so much as touch the flashlight wrong.
And it's even more annoying for WATCHING THE FUCKING CUTSCENE OF THE STUPID CUNT WITH A FLASHLIGHT ON HIS HEAD OVER AND OVER AGAIN EVERY DAMN TIME YOU DIE.
On a side note this is better than the film for a film you have to WATCH and do nothing but drool at the even worse visual look of it all with a plot that unlike the game, has little sense or relevance to the series.  Speaking of visuals let's check up on that.

Graphics - Now we have reached the point where graphics can't get any better so we can just focus on how they're done.  The entire game feels like a big blockbuster movie.  No shit, there's explosions more times than you waggle your clit-flicking finger in this game, which is good because at least you wanna keep playing to know what else the game has up its sleeve.  Manhattan roads mashed up like broken asphalt teeth, crumbling stones when you're crossing ledges, doors smashed open and fires going crazy.  Either the makers wanted to overload us with what they thought as awesome gameplay well made and what we know as awesome graphics well done.


The blasts and constant risk of being crushed by masonry will definitely keep you tense as well as the freakish things that permeate the game.  The fire effects are stunning to behold too, feeling very alive and flickering with even the marvellous effects on how it burns items in slow spots of flames before consuming the item whole.
In comparison to Uwe Boll's cinematography, which not only confuses people with rip-off Matrix shots and gunfire battles badly illuminated, but also has Edward Carnby looking absolutely NOT like Edward Carnby from The New Nightmare (and in this game, he actually DOES look like Edward Carnby from The New Nightmare), this game is Oscar winning.

Music/Sound - The music is actually really good for this game.  With a Bulgarian female choir backing up an electronic orchestra, it's definitely unique in hearing a choir when you're racing insanely through the streets, and believe me, the atmosphere works.  You'll never really dislike the music unless you hate choir music or Bulgarians even.  On with sound, explosions and flames sound awesome, if this was a movie, it'd get nominated for Best Sound certainly.  Voice acting, while characters are a bit annoying with a teensy bit too much use of swearing (as in, feeling a bit forced to do such), is overall pretty good and detracts some irritation from the cutscenes, compared to Uwe Boll's film which is one long cutscene of irreparably bad emotionless acting and horrible soundtrack, half of which seems to be purposefully in bad taste.

So let us review.  Is this game better than Uwe Boll's film of the same name?  Absolutely.
Is this game better than Condemned which is in terms of gameplay the closest thing we can say it ripped off from?  Hell no.
It has some strong points of awesome music and wonderful action movie graphics and trying to actively break some gameplay cliches.  But it does everything too much and too complex in it, which instead of amazing us like it wants us to, only confuses and irritates us, like a bar crowd watching an octopus riding a unicycle while juggling and balancing plates.  It should be impressive but you're so confused by what's happening you only become frustrated.

Fun and Innovation - 3
Replayability - 2
Gameplay - 3
Presentation - 3

So is this supposed to be like FEAR in the sense that it's a horror combat game?

 

Maybe, but you have to remember which site we're talking about here.... A site full of fuckwads