Alone in the Dark

The Good
First off I bought this game when it first came out. I was amazed by the fluid 3d graphics, haunting camera angles and tricky puzzles. I was an instant fan. The story is basically a haunted house plot but has a suprising depth to it thanks largely to the fantastically written books that are found around the mansion. The puzzles, unlike the simplistic fodder that's featured in more recent games of the genre such as the famous Resident Evil, are challenging and thought provoking but are never without clues, however hidden. The music on the cd version is great and if you can get hold of it in this form, it's well worth getting. (you also get an exclusive mini adventure called Jack in the Dark that is all but forgotten now.)

The Bad
The puzzles, while good, also have a hidden evil in that it's possible to stuff something up leaving you unable to finish the game without restoring. Also some sudden death is featured so save often and use multiple saves. The game is fairly short. On the first time through you will likely not take more than a few days and subsequent plays are completed in under an hour. Lastly, the battle system is a little confusing at times because of the camera angles.

The Bottom Line
Alone in the Dark is a fantastic survival horror game which started the entire genre. It suffers slightly from some unwinnable situations but if you're a fan of the genre then you really should check it out if only just to see where it all began.

The Good
The Alone in the Dark games are some of my favourite games from the early to mid-nineties. Carnby was sort of a hero for me, and I've spent hours and hours playing the games...more than once. The first game was, as I recall, one of the first (if not the first) Infogrames games to take advantage of the Cthulhu license. Yes, the game is in fact set in the universe of H.P. Lovecraft, where ancient horrors once ruled the world and man lives in blissful ignorance of the truth. The game doesn't reveal much about the Cthulhu mythos though, choosing instead to be more of a haunted house story. The interface is similar to that of the more recent Resident Evil games, as are the graphics. The camera angles are what you can expect from a horror game - creepy and suggestive. If you play this at night with headphones and all the lights turned out, don't be surprised if you feel more than a little edgy. Another high point of the game is the sound (not to mention the music). I'm not sure if there's a disk version of the game, but if there is, it must be vastly inferior to the CD version, which has CD audio not only for music, but also for the incredible speech in the game (which you only hear when reading books/letters).

The Bad
The game may be a bit too hard for some. I don't believe there are any difficulty settings, so if you're looking for a straight adventure game, Alone in the Dark is not for you.

It's also not as good as the second game :).

The Bottom Line
An excellent survival-horror game with excellent production values. Although one would expect so, it still holds up to the expectations of the modern games player ;).

The Good

Alone in the Dark gave birth to survival horror, and while Resident Evil made this very genre a household name for gamers, Alone in the Dark was the founding father of the category.

As either Edward Carnby or Emily Hartwood, you explore the large mansion Derceto. Unlike Resident Evil, there aren't multiple endings or character specific privileges, so you need not worry about which character you decide to control....

Many puzzles are straight-forward, but not always. The enemies are mainly zombies, but they are infrequent, and some of the other ghouls are just there to make you solve a puzzle quicker and then exit the area before the monster/ghost gets close to you. In one memorable scene, you have to pick up something left in a ballroom, but without alerting the dancing ghosts to your position. This can be tricky, so I advise you to save first.

Some copies of the game came packaged with Jack in the Dark, a mini game starring Grace Saunders from Alone in the Dark 2. It is a very simplistic adventure in which you have to rescue Santa Claus from a gang of toys that have mysteriously come to life.

The Bad
The game(s) have blocky graphics, and using a keyboard to control your character(s) gets incredibly boring after a while.

The Bottom Line
Alone in the Dark is a splendid mixture of puzzles and monster fun, with a strong emphasis on the work of H.P. Lovecraft.