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Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
Incorporating elements of various H. P. Lovecraft tales, especially The Shadow Over Innsmouth and The Shadow Out of Time, this game for Xbox and PC from Headfirst Productions focuses on a town in the thrall of perverse worship to an alien Elder God. While it bears the Call of Cthulhu moniker, the story focuses more on Dagon, the Deep Ones, and the humans who follow them. Numerous other creatures from the Cthulhu mythos also appear.
For those of you unaware, the Cthulhu mythos is a loosely formed mythos surrounding a pantheon of ancient slumbering gods created by author H. P. Lovecraft and linked together and expanded upon by such fans and later writers as August Derleth, Stephen King, and Neal Gaiman. Lovecraft lived and wrote through the 1920s and early 30s publishing short stories and novellas in such magazines as Weird Tales. His stories tended towards archaic language concerning man's place in the universe: the species is unimportant and survives only at the whim of the ancient and slumbering Elder Gods, who would devour the souls of humanity and enslave or unmake the universe if they ever awoke from their slumber. Bizarre and twisted creatures populate his stories, along with colorful descriptions of madness and horror. And Dark Corners of the Earth is no different
In DCotE, you play as Jack Walters, a private detective in the 1920s recently released from Arkham Asylum, where he'd been held for a case of amnesia, multiple personality disorder, and schizophrenia after a police raid he was a part of went haywire and he witnessed events and beings that shattered his mind. To top if all off its hinted that Walters is psychic and unknowingly uses that ability to solve cases. He takes a job searching for a missing grocery store clerk named Brian Burnham. Burnham ran the First National grocery store in Innsmouth, and so off Jack goes to find the lad. That's when everything goes out the window. Innsmouth is not a nice place: the locals are hideous and unfriendly, the innkeeper has a preference towards knives, and there's a weird temple in the center of town. It all goes downhill from there.
Soon after, Jack will find himself racing through the Innsmouth streets, battling his way out of dank sewers, sneaking through harrowing temples, and in a variety of other locations. Fans of the Cthulhu mythos will not be disappointed as bloody cult rituals, abberrant beasts, and twisted gods all find their way into the game. There are also numerous memorable scenes that will have horror fans shaking in their chairs, and the sequences where Jack is being chased are adrenaline-fueled and nothing short of exemplary.
The game is played in a first person perspective and features some gun combat, but it keeps a heavy focus on puzzles. And when there is something to shoot, the player is usually running the opposite direction anyway or trying to sneak past. Firearms aren't used at all throughout large portions of the game. The game also doesn't feature a HUD, instead relying on visual and auditory cues to tell the player how much damage they've taken. DCotE features a cumbersome health system in which specific items are needed to treat specific types of wounds, and wounds can appear on various parts of the body. Break a leg and you'll have to splint it, or else you'll only be able to walk at a crawl. Lacerations will have to be sutured, poison must be medicated, so on and so forth.
Then factor in a sanity system where Jack's vision blacks out and he begins hearing strange voices and other unusual sounds when he sees something that his mind can't handle, and you've got an interesting experience that can also end up a little frustrating. With madness comes changes in control sensitivity, visual distortions and fading colors. If it proves to be more than Jack can take, he goes mad and kills himself.
Gun combat is also more realistic in Dark Corners of the Earth than in most FPS. First, ammunition must be conserved because it's extremely limited as per the norm with survival horror, so even when the player does have a gun, it doesn't mean he can fight. Second, there is no targeting reticle, so players must use the iron sights to see what they're shooting. And no matter what, the gun fires bullets wherever it's pointing. Pull out a gun and fire in the middle of the motion, and the bullet will fly in whichever direction the barrel pointed, even straight up.
While the game was generally favorably received, it is known for being extremely buggy, and some bugs will break the game. My first time playing, I ended up stuck and reverting to a previous save because a switch refused to activate. Other players have reported similar problems at different times, and there are no official patches to fix them. Nor will there ever be an official patch, as Headfirst Productions went defunct less than a year after the title's release. However, unofficial mods have been released for the PC version that help stabilize the game.
Two sequels were planned, but both are now Vaporware.
For those of you interested, here's the intro video:
<![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/6FmJRmNQikE&rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/6FmJRmNQikE&rel=0</a>]]>
The Ring: Terror's Realm
Yeah, it's been a little while since I updated this. I apologize about that. So to herald my triumphant return to discussing the joys of horror gaming, I present you with a title so horrific and so foul that I must beseech you, nay, get down on my knees and beg you never, ever, ever to even consider playing it!
No, seriously, this game is terrible. Not only do I enjoy horror, I also can enjoy a horribly made game from time to time. I believe it's something to do with an almost kitsch value to it that makes it unique and allows me to laugh at it. The Ring: Terror's Realm did its best to go above and beyond anything I had ever experienced. I have beaten the title, and I can honestly claim that it is not only a bad game, it is the WORST game I have ever played. And I own Pit-Fighter for the Super Nintendo.
But I suppose an explanation is in order. The Ring: Terror's Realm is a Dreamcast game based upon the Ringu property, albeit an extremely loose take on it. The game follows Meg Rainman as she starts work at the Center for Disease Control following the death of her boyfriend Robert, who was also a CDC employee. Once at work, she begins exploring and investigating a strange computer program called RING, which apparently leads her into a strange and horrific virtual world where mankind battles it out in abandoned buildings against strange monsters.
I'm sorry, did I say monsters? I mean gorillas, cat things, and strange goblin-looking critters of various colors. And when I say abandoned buildings, I mean the CDC building. Yes, that is a bit of a spoiler, but you don't really want to play this game, so don't worry about it. The monsters don't really do much beyond running up and attacking you, which they have a nasty habit of doing at a rate that will prevent you from getting a round off if they get too close. They also randomly float in the air and drop down on top of you...I think that was more of a bug that never got resolved when the game was created. At least I hope it was.
To fight these critters, Meg has an arsenal of various weapons she will acquire, all fitted with laser sights, so you can aim at critters across the room, if you can see them with the fixed cameras and if they're standing upright. Perhaps the greatest point in the game's favor, at least in my opinion, is that Meg's also not a total pushover. She can fight while unarmed, knocking the monsters away or kicking them, which is especially useful on the cat creatures.
And then there's the graphics...
...but I won't be too critical of them. I feel its appearance is out of place for a Dreamcast title, but we are retro gamers. Games don't have to look spectacular for us to enjoy them. Just understand that people look blocky and move in unnatural means, and the textures are bland and repetitive. And creature movement isn't any better. There are some nifty mechanics with enemies having a difficult time detecting you in the dark, but it rarely comes into play.
As for the sound, there's only a handful of musical tracks, and these usually consist of five, maybe six notes in a sequence before repeating. It quickly becomes nauseatingly repetitive, and the creature sounds feel off. The voice acting is also some of the absolute worst, with the random friend who appears in the intro video earning my choice as the worst actor ever. The only saving grace is the sound at the starting menu of the game, where confirmations reward the player with the most satisfying squishing sounds I've ever heard. I broke into peals of laughter every time I heard them.
And finally there's the story exposition. Or the lack thereof.
You will need a guide for this game, or a lot of free time, because very rarely are you told what you are supposed to do next. Characters sometimes speak in broken English and conversation always comes off as stilted and disjointed. There's also little in the way of true character development, and most seems to be there solely to fill a stereotype or perform a nameless role. Characters will sometimes fly off the handle for no real reason in an unexpected emotional outburst. It makes for some tough going.
If you're really interested in seeing some gameplay, here's a video. You'll have to skip to about the 1:00 minute mark to get past their intro, but if you want a good laugh, check it out:
<![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Rphx550e52w&rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/Rphx550e52w&rel=0</a>]]>
Martian Gothic: Unification
Originally a PC title, this third person survival horror in the vein of Resident Evil would see a release on the PlayStation nearly a year after the PS2 was available in all markets. Because of this late launch, as well as graphics and a control scheme generally viewed as poor at the time of its release, it's been largely overlooked by the mainstream.
Here's a rough estimation of the plot:
"In Martian Gothic, the player is able to assume the roles of three characters sent from Earth to a Martian base to examine why it has been silent for 10 months, after a base member broadcasts a final message of "Stay alone, stay alive." Upon arrival the player finds that all the residents are apparently dead and that the base hides a horrible secret."
That's right, you play as three different characters with different abilities. While they all control the same and use the same weapons, each has skills required to pass the various puzzles or sections of the game. All three begin the game from different hatches on the base, and are not meant to come into contact with each other. If they do, that nasty unification bit occurs, and the characters are killed instantly. As for why that happens, don't worry, it will be explained in this bizarre Lovecraft-esque science fiction story.
Since the characters can never enter the same room together, items must be deposited in a series of vacuum tubes spread throughout the facility. Only four items can be put in the vacuum tubes at any time, and players can only hold limited items, so various item storage containers must be used. Unfortunately this means items can get lost and forgotten, though PC terminals will reveal what items are in certain containers around the base if necessary. You can still lose an item by putting it in the wrong location, so think before you stow something.
Maneuvering between these spots might also be difficult for some folks, as Martian Gothic uses the same "tank" control scheme used in the original Resident Evil, lending credence to the claim that this is just another poor RE clone. The game also uses pre-set camera angles, so enemies can sometimes be difficult to see(and it doesn't help that your basic enemy is a zombie). But Martian Gothic also borrows an interesting element from the first Alone in the Dark: you can't kill your enemies. You can put them down for a little while, but they do get back up eventually. This makes avoiding fights absolutely key, which can be extremely difficult in the cramped tunnels of the Mars colony. And even if you could kill some of these things, it's probably better to run from some of the nastier ones anyway.
To progress in the game, you'll have to listen to computer recordings, solve puzzles, and search corpses while making your way through the Mars base and eventually into Olympus Mons and both over and under the Martian surface. It's interesting to note that the game actually started life as a point-and-click adventure title for Windows, but was drastically rewritten and changed when author Stephen Marley(known for his Chia Black Dragon series) joined the cast as a game designer. This means there are lots of puzzles. And they're not easy, either.
The game wasn't exactly well received, getting a Metacritic score of 64. In other words, it's considered average, not spectacular. That said, it also tends to go for dirt cheap. While the Windows version was only released in the United States, the PlayStation version was put out in both the US and Europe.
Here's the intro to the PlayStation version:
<![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/gByv5rcuCVc&rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/gByv5rcuCVc&rel=0</a>]]>
Echo Night: Beyond
Since last week I went with a very well known title in horror gaming, I figured I'd go for something a little bit more obscure, and a bit more mellow. In fact, this odd futuristic ghost story is more sorrowful than anything else. That doesn't mean it's without it's freakier moments, but the gameplay in this title doesn't have all the big action sequences of other titles. It's also the third in the Echo Night series, so if you're familiar with those, you should know what to expect.
In Echo Night: Beyond, you play Richard Osmond, a passenger on a space shuttle heading to a small lunar base. His fiance, Claudia, lives there, and it's their intention to marry once he arrives. But things don't go according to plan. His shuttle crash lands, colliding with the very place you're trying to get. Richard awakens to find himself alone in the wrecked shuttle. He decides to grab a spacesuit and enter the base to find Claudia.
Unfortunately for Richard, it appears everyone inside the base is dead, the power is out, and ghosts are wandering the halls. To progress in the story, you'll have to find various items and appease the wandering spirits so that their souls get released from this mortal coil. To do this, you'll have to talk to them, which is a bit unsettling as they tend to fade in and out depending on how close you are. There's also lots of backtracking in the game, which can become annoying, though much of the game takes place around a central junction, so nothing is ever terribly far away.
So, you're wandering in the dark, there are corpses everywhere, and their ghosts are wandering around. Could it get worse? Well yes, actually. You see, there's a bizarre mist that has spread throughout the base, making ghosts that inhabit it hostile, and if they get near you for long enough, your heart rate will spike and you'll go into cardiac arrest. This means two things: every encounter can be fatal fast, and your only options are to run away. There's no camera to fight with, no proton packs, no nothing. Instead, you have to sneak past them and pray one doesn't find you.
Also, the game's first person view really adds to the tension here, because these ghosts just have to be near you. You don't have to see them, and likely you won't: as your heart rates goes up, your vision blacks out. It can be a harrowing experience to enter a room with one and suddenly scramble for the door, only to realize you can hardly see where you're going. And if you do see it, well...some of these things get downright creepy.
Still, ghosts register on film, so you can use the vast network of security cameras to watch their patterns and discover their routes, since most of them follow set paths. Note I said most: there's one ghost in particular that will stalk you throughout the game, and he knows when you're using a security camera. Whenever you look at him he's got a nasty habit of looking back at you.
And then there's the atmosphere: you'll spend a good chunk of the game wandering around with just a flashlight, though it's not as bad as when you wander outside in my opinion. Once outside, there's little gravity so you jump really far, and the lighting gets a bit odd. The first time outside, I nearly threw myself off a cliff into a crater. To make matters worse, there are quite a few jumping puzzles while outside, and you do still have to look out for spirits.
The lack of action might bother some players, so this game definitely isn't meant for everyone. But if you're a fan of the old point-and-click adventure gameplay or enjoyed titles like Penumbra or other first person horror games, such as Juggernaut, D, or Hellnight, this may be right up your alley. And as an added bonus, it saw release in all three major regions, so getting it shouldn't be too difficult. Just be aware that in Japan it's known as Nebula: Echo Night.
Here's the intro for you:
<![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/jB9dLLGOp9A&rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/jB9dLLGOp9A&rel=0</a>]]>
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This is Ack's Blog.
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This blog is about horror games. The good ones, the bad ones, and the ugly ones. And the obscure ones. The point of this is to educate, both the reader and the writer. Because I love horror games, and I love learning about them. |
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