Amnesia: The Dark Descent - Review

Hey all, so this is my first post on my first blog. I figured I'd kick things off by posting my opinions on Amnesia: The Dark Descent up here, enjoy.

I know this is hardly a new game anymore and we all probably know what it is and what it’s mechanics are but I wanted to briefly review it and give it a bit of a plug. This game is truly excellent, I’ve tried my hand at the first Penumbra game and while that was good it was far less scary as you could kill the enemies. What Amnesia did that I really loved and feared was put me in a position of complete powerlessness by not allowing you to even hurt the enemies. From about 20 minutes in I was terrified for the rest of the game and whenever I got that vibe that an enemy was about to ruin my day I became practically catatonic. Though I was pretty amused that the instant I closed the game I felt immediately safe.

                              

The story itself didn’t really exist, it was just a survival game with snippets of Daniel’s back story being revealed. I guess that was the story. I know the whole waking up with amnesia thing has been done to death and that story telling technique is pretty stale, but the back story of Daniel and his relationship with Alexander really interested me. Who was Alexander and why has he ruined my day so badly? I came to feel a little bit guilty for playing Daniel after a while, you know once you visit those chambers near the end and do the flashback to the farmhouse.

At any rate I thoroughly enjoyed Amnesia and for $20 would say it was well worth the price. Support Frictional Games people IIRC this was their first solo funded project and it has done incredibly well for itself, hopefully this injection of funds will help them bring out another, more terrifying survival horror because they just seem to get better with every release. And on that topic the Penumbra series is also really good and probably available on steam at a decent price.