By
Eli Green
July 13, 2006 - 10:58
Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem is the first release on
the Nintendo Gamecube by Canadian developer, Silicon Knights. The story follows
the lead character, Alexandra Roivas, as she tries to uncover the mystery
behind her grandfather's death. She soon discovers that her grandfather had
been leading a secret life, involved in the study of the dark arts. Finding a
strange book in a concealed room in her grandfather's mansion, Alexandra comes
to discover
the focus of her
grandfather's research, a plot by ancient powers to destroy the world and the
stories of the people who have tried to stop it.
That's when things get scary. As the gameplay follows each
character's personal chapter within the storyline the player is faced with
monsters, magic, deathtraps and the slow deterioration of their characters'
sanity, resulting in enough hallucinations to drive even the most well balanced
gamer off their rocker.
Gameplay
The control system is very simple and easy to use, including
customisable buttons for quick
spell
use. Aiming and attacking is the same for each weapon, long or short range.
Simply use the A button to attack freely, or use the R button to aim at
specific limb on your target before pressing A to attack.
Magic, or Magick as they spell it in the game, can be
executed either by assigning quick spells to the buttons of your choice or by
going into the menu and selecting and casting spells by their category.
One of my favourite parts of this game is the Sanity Meter.
The more afraid your character is, or the more monsters you encounter, your
sanity level drops, causing your character to hallucinate. Silicon Knights was
extremely creative with this feature using sanity effects like the random head
explosion, bleeding walls, upside down rooms and much more. This feature,
alongside the rest of the frightening gameplay will be sure to freak anybody
out.
Environment and Graphics
The locations in Eternal Darkness are quite lush and well
detailed. Even though the game only uses indoor locations, there is still a
sense of architectural design in place, not just a linear level system. Many of
the locations in the game also have a dark feel to them. Decaying ruins and old
church halls have a
frightening look.
The ability to have the characters interact with objects, whether they simply
give information on something or have accompanying actions, is a nice touch and
adds to the feeling of the environment itself. The fact that characters also
react to certain things in the game, such as crackling fires is also a really
nice addition.
The character design is very nicely done and each character
is well detailed. The characters' bodies move with fluidity and appear very
close to real human movement. Admittedly, there are some things with the
characters which could have looked better. On some of the characters the
texturing on some areas, such as skin or parts of clothing, is quite
noticeable. As graphic technology advances it's highly probably that that kind
of problem will be seen much less.
The use of FMV for the cutscenes is understandable. While
seeing them in real time video would have been very cool, there are just some
things that wouldn't have looked quite as nice, or might not have been possible
at all. Things like the ancients wouldn't have had quite the same effect if
they were shown in real time. And frankly, the FMV just looks beautiful.
Sound
One word can be used to describe the sound for Eternal
Darkness. Creepy. The sound on this game is just plain creepy. Keep you up in
bed at night, huddled in a little ball with a flashlight creepy. I give it two
thumbs way up. As such an integral part of the scare factor, it was necessary
to make the sound as good as possible, and Silicon Knights did not slouch on
that. Echoed voices in the background, blood curdling screams, a good mystery
soundtrack including great voice work for each character push the level of fear
to higher heights.
As an added bonus, if you have a surround sound system or,
better yet, one with Dolby Pro Logic II, you can get the full surround
experience. Every single bone chilling voice will haunt you from all around
you. If you somehow weren't scared before, you will be now. Just don't turn off
the lights.
Conclusion
It's nice to see that some developers actually have the guts
these days to step up and make something original. Silicon Knights put a lot of
work into this game, and it shows. I'm making sure to play this game again.
Gameplay: 9.9
Environment and Graphics: 9
Sound: 10
Story: 10
Fun: 9.5
Overall: 9.8
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