Amnesia, the Dark Descent

I’d like to start this off by introducing you to perhaps the most horrifying game I’ve ever had the odd pleasure of playing; Amnesia the Dark Descent. It’s a survival horror game that’s managed to have the biggest impact on me yet in terms of real fear. I’m not talking cat scares – shock horror – either. This is the sort of deep-set panic inducing fear that comes from a lovely combination of sound, level, and light design that creates an oppressing atmosphere. Lots of people are spooked by loud noises and something springing out at you; it’s just natural. But that sort of fear alone is easily over come; it doesn’t stick with us. We can feel apprehension if we’re expecting it to happen but if that’s all they put into their horror it’s going to start feeling repetitive and cheap quite shortly.

The game runs in what I’ll simplify massively by calling a haunted house. There’s a lot of back story and Lovecraftian themes I could get into that they used, but all you really need to know for the context is that you’re in a big spooky mansion you can’t leave for plot reasons and there’s a variety of horrible monsters in here. And boy does Amnesia use those monsters to good effect. It’s not that’s there’s tons of them with particularly terrifying design or anything (not to say any of them are pretty to look at, least of all sprinting at you down a shadowy corridor), but rather in when and how they put them in the game. They’re rare, but not so much that you really ever end up feeling safe. It’s a ratio of actual-terrible-monster to merely terrible background noises that keeps players on their toes.

The noises of the monsters (or things that sound like new monsters you’ve not seen yet) are omnipresent and probably the best part of their sound design. A notable recent example I saw in their new downloadable expansion pack was a scene where you as the protagonist had to crawl through stone air ducts. Shortly after you enter them you begin to hear sounds coming from behind you which quickly elevate into distant but ever nearing roars. Roars that actually make the character whimper and screen shake as they shudder. This combined with the previous room being another one of their oppressively dark gloomy chambers and the knowledge that there was a monster looking for them earlier quite literally led to a near panic of the player at the keyboard. The obviously intentional claustrophobic design of the air-ducts in question was a marvelous piece of game design, and certainly a more terrifying experience than you’re liable to get from any recent movie I could name.

I think the best part about that scene was the fact that on a later play through we actually checked out the tunnels. Nothing is attacking you. It’s one hundred percent atmosphere and it does its job wonderful. Even equipped with the knowledge nothing was about to murder me I felt tense in the segment, always wondering if we might have made a poor call and that the monster might just be slow to get going. This is only exasperated when you realize there’s yet another chase scene later in the expansion (and several in the initial release) where a horrible murderous monster is pursuing you, and it’s only your frantic slamming of doors behind you and full out sprinting that keeps you alive. It’s one thing to watch an actor scramble through a scary house in a movie; it’s something else entirely when you’re put in their shoes.

Another facet of the design was that the expansion, meant to be a short half an hour run through game, only lets you have one life. If you die at any point in the game the whole thing shuts down. There’s absolutely no saving and if you want to try again you begin at the very start. It’s basically just upping what’s at stake; not only will you be terrified when you die, you’ll also lose all your progress. Honestly I don’t think it’d work in any longer of a game, but given the relative shortness of the expansion giving the player a sense of real loss when they die works nicely.

Really, the best way I can sum it up is that if you like your horror and you haven’t bought amnesia yet; go do it, it’s only $10. It’s great, it’s terrifying and when you finish it you’ll love it just as soon as you change your pants.