Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem
[Gamecube]

Long before humanity graced the universe, our planet belonged to another species - an ancient species bound by neither physics nor nature, purpose nor ethic. Through the passage of time, against the relentless advance of ice and the continental plates, and for other inscrutable reasons, these "Ancients" were driven deep into the recesses of our world. There, the lie imprisoned until the conditions are right for their return.

Hungry for dominance and the favor of the Ancients, secret organizations seek to restore the Ancients to their former station. For eons they have schemed and plotted in the darkness, attempting to bring these evil entities into our world through arcane magicks - blood rituals, worship, and sacrifice.Yet not all hope is lost.

The fate of Humanity depends upon the actions of a chosen few. They are average people, unprepared for heroic deeds, but the responsibility is theirs nonetheless. Even as their lives are torn apart by unseen evils, they most show courage in the face not only of the enemy, but also of their own fears. These poor soils teeter on the brink of insanity, tortured by the horrors of the Ancients.

A Secret war is being waged on the periphery of Humanity’s perceptions - a war wreathed in shadows and deception.

The Darkness Comes...You are Alexandria Roivas in the year 2000 A.D. Notice that I gave a year and include the A.D. label. There’s a reason for this. Eternal Darkness takes place over a period of years. Alexandria is called to her Grandfather’s house by the police only to find him brutally murdered. She is the last surviving relative in the Roivas family line so she feels it is her place to take some action and figure out how her Grandfather, Edward Roivas, was murdered. She comes across the Tome of Eternal Darkness, and this is where the other characters come in. Alexandria reads the first chapter in the book, which is about a warrior in Persia by the name of Pious Augustus during 26 B.C. After reading this story Alex seeks out 11 more pages to the tome which will have the gamer playing as a total of 12 characters all set in different times, with some recurring locations. Excellent story, very well told in a chapter fashion with breaks in between to uncover the secrets you read about in the very house that you are standing in. Eternal Darkness has everything it needs to become an excellent movie.

Graphically, Eternal Darkness is well rounded and spooky, but it isn’t anything impressive. The creatures are all very well crafted (with exception of the blob...I freakin’ hate blobs!) and each area in the game has a freaky atmosphere, just begging the gamer to explore every inch with sweaty palms. The spells are "spell bounding" to watch. I never ran in to any problems with glitching or anything remotely close to a pixilated wall. There were only two problems I had in this area. First off, the cut scenes completely milked my Gamecube, and at some points in the game I was actually worried about the system because it sounded like it was about to break under the stress of the spinning. My other complaint is that the switch from FMV to gameplay is very unclean. Some scenes end abruptly making me think that there was more but I accidentally hit a button or something.

The sounds couldn’t be better. Creatures yelp and scream in a horrifying manner, and so do their victims. Every gunshot fired, or blade swung sounds spot-on. When a zombies arm is sliced off with a short sword, it sounds disgusting. The soundtrack is brilliant as well. Sometimes I was actually afraid to enter a door because the tempo would pick up, and the moment a freaky score would come on when I entered a door, I would turn and exit. A game that can make you have sweaty palms with its soundtrack has truly accomplished something glorious. The voice acting is very professional and believable, and ranks up toward the top of the list as far as video games go.

The Control scheme is laid out perfectly. I’ll admit at first I was skeptical, but it grew on me within an hour. It’s not typical survival horror, but you’ll be fine as long as you don’t come in with the idea that you are playing Resident Evil or Onimusha.

The gameplay is the core aspect of every good title. Eternal Darkness comes in with a mind of its own (if you’re lucky you’ll still have yours when it’s over) and left me floored with how unique it was. There is no longer an excuse for cheesy, uninventive, recycled gameplay because this game shows that a genre can be reinvented. The action takes place in a 3rd person perspective, which is one thing I didn’t like. I can’t explain why, I just didn’t care for the way it looked. The camera does an excellent job of keeping pace with the intense moments so that you‘re never left in an awkward position. Intense moments are abundant, so don’t go thinking it’s just on occasion. When in possession of the Tome, it adds another element besides the basic hack and shoot methods; magick. With this great book of spells and stories, the character is allowed to learn spells by collecting rune stones and saying the magic combination of words. Spells allow you to get shields, reveal invisible doors, summon monsters, possess monsters and such. I thought this was a bad idea for survival horror but it’s actually very fresh and works well. As for guns and weapons, the character has a targeting system at the palm of their hands, allowing them to aim specifically for the head, arms, or torso. Various combinations can result in showing weak points. The insanity effect is the real meat of this one. That’s one thing everyone knows about ED. "Isn’t that the game where you can go insane!?" Yes it is, very much so. You have a green meter, a red meter, and a blue meter. Green = sanity. Red = health. Blue = magick. Every character has different size meters depending on what kind of person they are. Back to insanity, which is the green. When you are spotted by a monster or when something freaky happens, your sanity decreases. As it decreases more, stranger things happen. At first, you might just experience sounds such as a woman and baby crying in the distance or blood dripping from the walls. As it decreases more, things can actually happen to make you think something’s wrong with the game. I won’t go to deep in to this mechanic as it is really the most fun part to discover for yourself. Just know this, weird stuff happens frequently. Another thing you might want to know is that you can save any time during the game as long as you are in the heat of battle.

Despite being in the shadow of Resident Evil, Eternal Darkness actually shines just as bright in it’s own way. It’s a very different game and I truly believe that anyone who enjoys a thrilling game or a good story would enjoy this.

9/10

---Frayed