"A new nightmare indeed"

The original Alone in the Dark has gained very little recognition for being a pioneer of the survival horror genre. Unfortunately for this franchise, this is probably the only achievement the series can claim.

STORY 6/10
Fairly original, but due to the graphics and gameplay it is executed poorly. The only good thing about the story is the main character, Edward Carnby, who is very slick. He's on a vengeance mission, which is usually enjoyable. His best friend died in mysterious circumstances while investigating a strange island. Carnby takes over the case, and is assisted by Aline Cedrac, a specialist in American Indian languages. During their flight to the island, bizarre circumstances force them to bail from the plane. Aline lands on the roof of the mansion, and Edward lands in a tree. Here is where you choose a character and take over.

GAMEPLAY 2/10
Its your basic walk-around-looking-for-clues-occasionally-getting-attacked-by-things kind of game. However it is deeply, deeply flawed. The environments are rendered with fixed cameras, but during the camera changes there is a very noticeable loading time which really destroys the flow of the game. Also, there appears to be an all-or-none thing happening with the enemies: either they are completely on the screen or not on the screen at all... you wont just see a zombie's arms sticking onto the camera. This is annoying, especially with the fast moving creatures who just seem to appear on the screen all of a sudden. Also, the lack of responsiveness on the controls completely ruins the game. There were some decent puzzles, but getting to them was a hellride.

SOUND 6/10
Not too shabby. The voice acting was reasonable. The general sound effects such as footsteps were fairly average, but some of the monsters made pretty disturbing noises. The music was average to poor but the song playing over the credits was gold! Its like 80s hair metal but worse (in the good way!).

GRAPHICS 4/10
Absolutely wonderful!... for A DREAMCAST GAME. And thats what it is - a Dreamcast game... but no excuses Inffogrames; Resident Evil Code: Veronica was a Dreamcast game, and the graphical enhancements were wonderful. I have to admit though, the lighting effects were very good, and I'm referring especially to the torch, which you control.

CONTROLS 2/10
Pretty standard except there's something seriously flawed somewhere. Controlling the characters in this game is like trying to control my girlfriend when she thinks she's seeing "the bats." Trust me, its very difficult. The only reason this section didn't get zero is because you can control the torch. That was pretty cool.

VALUE 1/10
The main value comes from not buying this game.

OVERALL I felt sorry for the developers of this game, because they had some awesome ideas but they all seemed to fail due to the terrible controls and graphics. It almost feels like it has enormous potential.

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 01/17/07