Necronomicon

by Dreamcatcher

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00005B4B5
• Item Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: May 8, 2001
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #17,611 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Inspired by the writings of H.P. Lovecraft, Necronomicon plunges you right into the heart of the mystery. The prerendered, exceptionally detailed 3-D environments and realistic graphics in Necronomicon re-create the Lovecraft universe. You'll encounter old, dilapidated houses, dark, dingy passages covered by moss hundreds of years old, an alchemist's laboratory packed with magic spells, and evil-looking machines. These, combined with the rich, evolving story line, will captivate you as you make your way through the many locations, each stranger than the last, all the while being drawn in by the game's immersive atmosphere.

Product Description

Inspired by the writings of H. P.LovecraftProduct InformationThe year is 1927. William H. Stanton's life suddenly takes a terrifying turn forthe worse. What strange secret is his childhood friend hiding from him? Whatlurks in the alchemist's mysterious cursed underground laboratory? What is themeaning of the Necronomicon esoteric formulae? Is this collection of occultsecrets the key to the world of the dead? Dare you use these secrets and facethe terror which may lie beyond?Join William Stanton on a mysterious journey in a desperate quest to save thelife of his friend. Travel beyond the realms of science and discover themysterious apparatus which holds the secrets to the afterlife. Explore eerieenvironments and discover clues as you decipher ancient symbols that reveal thelocation of a portal leading to other worlds. It is believed that here youwill uncover the timless secret of life itself.  Challenge your everyrational thought and face your every fear as you learn the secrets of theNecronomicon and enter the realm of life death and beyond.What worlds exist beyond the gateways of time... What secrets lie beneath thedilapidated farmhouse...Product Features A gripping graphical mystery adventure that captures the imagination. Superbly detailed 3D graphics and a rich storyline combine to bring the fascinating and mysterious world of H.P. Lovecraft to life. 30+ hours of gameplay. More than 15 characters modeled in realistic 3D. More than 40 locations. Captivating original musical score.System Requirements Windows 95 98 or Me Pentium 200MHz 32MB of RAM Video card capable of thousands of colors 8X CD-ROM Drive 16-bit Sound Card

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Delightfully Creepy, July 16, 2001

By 

Colin Paterson "b-lever" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Necronomicon (CD-ROM)

If you're a big fan of H. P. Lovecraft, you may feel with good reason that this game uses his writing as little more than a context for standard role-playing conventions. But, it does manage to give a few chills as you wander deeper and deeper into the action. And, bring to mind some of the shiver-producing moments experienced while reading Lovecraft.

I nearly jumped out of my chair at one point when my phone rang. The game had brought me so deep into the action and the sudden unexpected noise caught me while I was expecting something to suddenly appear in the shadowy view on my computer screen.

This game has good atmospheric components. Ambient sounds fit the environments well. And the background music is very good -- never overwhelming but never boring either.

As for danger, there are very few risks involved. However, when you do encounter a tricky situation, you'd better be prepared. And, as the game progresses, the chances for a bad end due to a poor decision are greater.

That's to be expected. Playing with dark magic and reviving the dead -- I call that serious business! You'd better be certain about what you're doing.

A couple of drawbacks as far as I'm concerned -- there seems to be a little too much "wander and find" activity at some stages of the game; and, secondly, the in-game animated videos are not always the best quality...but they do what is needed to advance the story.

This game has some of that old New England creepiness which we saw in "The Blair Witch Project". So, if you liked that, you should give this game a try.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, unique, but misunderstood, game, December 28, 2004

By 

Ixx (Area 51's ruins 40 years from now) - See all my reviews

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Necronomicon (CD-ROM)

Although this game does indeed have it's flaws, what game doesn't? Every game has problems. The reason this game had so many problems is because Dreamcatcher misjudged its audience. The target was, H.P. Lovecraft buffs like me, people that are interested in the occult, also like myself, and finally, those who like these types of games.

Here's where the first problem starts. People who play these kinds of games, although they are all great thinkers (they have to be), that range is in fact so broad and vague, that too many people won't get it.

There are several big, recurring complaints about this game. One, it's too hard. Okay, a fair argument, this game is very hard, yes. But, if you are a bit educated in the occult, it will not be nearly as difficult. One thing many people fail to realize about this game is that some of the secrets and puzzles in it are based on real occult information! Much of it is rather simple, like astrological signs, signs of the days, and the lik e (as a hint for people playing this game: look for a book called Heptameron - you can probably locate an online version more than easily - or look on a website called www.hermetic.com. It has lots of occult books and authors ranging from simple to complex, and they're all FREE to read right off the site) However, when you have to perform the spirit summoning spell of Eliphas Levi, there is a complicated ritual that you have to go through, and lots of items to collect for it.

However, I will vouch for the difficulty complaint be saying that there not enough hints to nudge you in the right direction. Like the salts room, for example. There are about 8 long aisles lined to the brim with shelves jugs and pots full of ashes of all different kinds. You're looking for one particular jar - there are no tips as to its location anywhere in the game - the only way to know is to already have enough knowledge of who Eliphas Levi is. And that, again, is based on real occult information, littered throughout the game in very cryptic forms that the average shmuck won't understand. Better yet, there's one point in the game where you have to mix a special brain fluid. Once again, the chemical shelf is lined with all kinds of chemicals, with no clues to the mixture. The only way i solved this puzzle was through trial and error - long trial and error (i'm too stubborn to use a walkthru).

All that aside though, this game is VERY good. And keep in mind, Lovecraft fans, it ISN'T directly based off any of his stories! Instead, it takes certain elements from various stories and meshes them together (very well, i might add). Stories such as Charles Dexter Ward, Nameless City, Dunwich Horror, etc. are used. Even one of the houses is designed directly after Strange High House in the Mist. So Lovecraft fans fear not - you'll get your fill! Just not in the way you might imagine.

I highly recommend this game to anyone that doesn't mind having to do a bit of research into the occult world to fully understand what's going on. Either that or look at a walkthrough. The developers definitely had their hearts in the right place with this interesting game, but their minds seemed to have gone off on a bit of a tengent with the puzzles.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Average, July 15, 2002

By 

wysewomon "wysewomon" (Paonia, CO United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Necronomicon (CD-ROM)

_Necronomicon_ is a stunningly average game. Like most games, it has its good points and its bad points. Unlike many, however, it has nothing that really sets it apart in either direction. The good parts are simply pretty good, not thrilling. The bad parts aren't unforgiveably bad; they're merely annoying. As it is based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft and I feel the same way about those, in this respect it turned out about as I expected.

You play William Stanton, a scholarly fellow who lives in the Rhode Island town of Providence. The time is the late 1920s (although the character costumes make it look more like the late 1800s). As the game opens, you answer the door to your old school friend, Edgar. He tells you he's in danger and entrusts you with a mysterious artifact. Soon after, a man appears who introduces himself as Edgar's doctor. Edgar, he informs you, is suffering paranoid delusions. His family is worried about him. Can you find Edgar and figure out what's going on? Trying to accomplish this superficially simple task leads you into an unexpected realm of necromancy and black magic.

The graphics are great, as is the voice acting. I felt that in both look and character _Necronomicon_ really taped into the New England feel, where things are both endearingly quirky and a little eerie, especially to outsiders. The game relies heavily on the sense that there's something mysterious going on here that everyone knows about but no one is talking about. Every non-player character is at least mildly eccentric and some are downright creepy. This gives you a sense that you don't know whom to trust. Unfortunately this doesn't really go anywhere, aside from creating atmosphere. I kept expecting to find hidden agendae, or to uncover things that weren't as they seemed on the surface, but this was not the case. As a result, the whole game lacked depth that could have made it more interesting.

The puzzles are mainly inventory-based mechanical. They are neither particularly challenging nor particularly easy. Any challenge comes from some external situation rather than the puzzle itself. For example, a room might be so dark that it's hard to see what's going on, or a solution might depend on combining one or two of a large number of items, where no indication is given which are correct or even what the result should be. This gives the game an annoying degree of randomness and makes it seem that every solution is a matter of chance, rather than brainpower. You're just a likely to stumble on the answer by chance or luck as you are to "figure it out." Often failure to get it right means death, so there were long periods of dying over and over again while trying different things out. I found this trying.

_Neconomicon_ suffers from extraneous detail: things you can look at that have no purpose or things you can interact with that don't really have a function. I constantly found myself wondering, "Is this a puzzle or isn't it?" A lot of this stuff seemed to have been put in there just to extend gameplay, but it left me feeling gypped. In general, it seemed that there was too high a proportion of irrelavant material and the material that was relevant just didn't thrill enough or make up for the make-work. There was too little of the satisfaction that comes from solving a really complex, logical puzzle from carefully collected clues.

_Necronomicon_ is also one of the most linear games I have ever played. There's almost no sense of interacting with the game or doing things in an order that makes personal sense. Once you start, you're locked into a pre-determined path. It may be a fairly interesting path, but it just doesn't involve the player like a more non-linear game.

There are two different endings to the game -- a "Successful" ending and a "failure" ending. Which you get is contingent upon your success in figuring out the last puzzle. Unfortunately, once you start the last puzzle you can no longer escape and start over even if you figure out you're on the wrong track. This resulted in having to view the "bad" ending sequence about 20 times, and you can't escape from that either. That was the singularly most annoying thing about the game, in my opinion. By the time I had seen the "bad" ending 5 times I was ready to give up and go look for the answer just so I didn't have to see it again. After all that, the "good" ending was distinctly anti-climactic.

On the whole, I neither liked this game nor hated it. It was just something to do on several summer afternoons when it was too hot to do anything else. In that respect, it was worth it. If you decide to play _Necronomicon_, don't expect too much and you should get along fine.