Alone in the Dark, the H.P. Lovecraft inspired PC adventure, was originally released in 1992 and was one of the first “survival horror” titles—coming out four years prior to Resident Evil. Its release defined the genre and was successful to the point of spawning three sequels. The fifth game in the series is coming out on June 24th, seven years since the last game, and based on what we saw at a recent press event, it clearly has the potential to rekindle the franchise. Taking on a new creative direction and bringing forward a slew of new gameplay mechanics the upcoming game already looks to be on track to redefine the genre as it stands today. High praise for a preview demo, we know, but it looked like a certifiable hit.
We at GameShark were invited to an event last week to get some hands-on time with the game as well as an interview with one of the producers. Series fans will be interested to know that the new game once again features series veteran Edward Carnby as the main character, who wakes up in modern day without having aged from his adventures in the late 1920’s. Suffering from amnesia, Edward has no idea why the men around him when he wakes up are intent on killing him and has even less of an idea of what is going on when hellish cracks begin to open up in the walls and forces unknown start turning those men and other people as well into bloody messes.
One of the many interesting facets of the game is the DVD-style interface, which is not only much like a movie in the sense of how it is laid out but also in that it can be used to skip both backward and forward into the game. Players who are having a particularly difficult time completing a certain section can simply skip past it, though to unlock the ending players must complete all parts of the game. To further drive the movie feel home when players return to the game they are treated quite literally to a “Previously on Alone in the Dark” cinematic that shows key parts of prior cutscenes and gameplay to bring the player back up to speed.
The inventory system is one of the key features that Alone in the Dark has showcased already, which is a real-time system in which the player looks down into their jacket to see what items they have strapped inside. The jacket has limited space but can hold many items of different shapes and sizes, all of which are everyday objects. Things like tape, lighter fluid, batteries, glow sticks, and other objects can be stored in the inventory, which can be combined for interesting effects.
Pouring lighter fluid onto bullets gives them added fire damage, while wrapping a bottle of lighter fluid in tape and throwing it makes an effective sticky bomb. Stuffing a cloth into that same bottle gives the player a Molotov cocktail, while they can also grab a standard aerosol can and use it in conjunction with a lighter to make a small flamethrower.
The player will spend much of their time battling enemies such as zombie-like humanoids and other creatures of the Mythos, but not always while using their pistol. Many of the enemies in the game are bullet resistant, and while they can still be taken down with key shots to the fissures in their flesh it can still take a clip to down them. To properly take these enemies down the player must utilize fire, which can either be created via creative use of inventory items or taken from the environment.
Melee combat is a decent course of action against the zombies and is performed by swinging the right stick around to mimic how you want Edward to swing. This lets the player choose to swing to the left, to the right, or in an overhead smash. In one area in our hands on presentation we got into an outright brawl with a zombie, and even though we repeatedly connected with a baseball bat it still ferociously kept coming. This of course changed when we held up on the right stick over an open flame to hold the bat out and light it on fire. From then on the zombie immediately tried its best to back away, until at one point it actually turned tail and ran prompting us to throw the flaming bat at it and igniting the fleeing enemy.
