Nightmare Creatures

by Playstation

Product Features

• Select Your Merciless Alter Ego: Battle as the bloodthirsty mon, Ignatius, or Nadia, the lethal femm
• Confront 21 Hideous Creatures: Butcher brigades of beasts and zombies that continue their relentless
• Choose Your Mutilation Technique: Dismember legions of diabolical demons with over 28 mutilating mov
• Explore the Horrors of London: Solve puzzles and search for clues in the dark, dank streets, sewers

Product Details

• ASIN: B00002STJN
• Item Weight: 8 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #19,354 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

GameSpot Review

It's like David Bowie said, "Scary Monsters." Kalisto Entertainment's Nightmare Creatures sees 19th century London threatened by an onrush of gruesome beasts brought forth by the evil Adam Crowley (sort of a mix of the 1920's "wickedest man in the world" Aleister Crowley and The Muppet Show's Animal) and his sinister cult, the Brotherhood of Hecate. It's your job to wipe out these most unholiest of unholies and their master - either as the young American swordswoman Nadia or Ignatius, the staff-wielding monk.

While Nightmare Creatures has been likened to a hybrid of Eidos' Tomb Raider and Capcom's Resident Evil, that's not an entirely accurate analogy. The title takes place in a spooky 3D world that you view from a behind-the-back perspective; and that's where any comparison to either of the games pretty much stops. The game runs at a jaunty 30+ frames per second with up to four monsters simultaneously onscreen and with little or no slowdown, though admittedly, the environment is kept fairly dark and/or misty so that you can't watch the graveyards, alleys, sewers, and the like being built up around you. It's less a criticism than an observation, since the darkness can easily be attributed to "atmosphere."

But catacombs and cesspools aside, the real mood-setters are the monsters. You will encounter fifteen distinct types of creatures (ranging from zombies to giant spiders, dog-sized rats to werewolves, hellhounds to harpies, and three-headed ogres to flaming imps) and five different bosses, such as the Yeti, a four-headed fire-breathing serpent, and old Crowley himself. All have distinct powers and attack styles, making them quite a caliginous handful when an unpredictable, varied group pounces on your character all at once.

To combat these nasties, the characters are each equipped with a rudimentary sword or staff, which can eventually be upgraded to more lethal devices such as spiked clubs, double axes, and machetes. Beyond the basic wherewithal to attack these monsters in the first place, you also have a variety of fighting moves at your disposal. Additionally, there are quite a few power-ups to be found, such as single-shot and burst pistols, half and full healths, mines, fire bombs, and freeze, confusion, and berserker spells. And while the list may seem excessive, you will need all of this to stay alive. Besides the proficiency of the enemy creatures, there's an ever-dwindling adrenaline bar, which measures the amount of the natural stimulant in your system that must remain full to keep a Crowley-concocted poison from destroying your system. You can keep your adrenaline high only by continuously seeking out and winning battles.

And fighting the creatures can be a lot of fun, at least early on. They're very well designed, and their animations give them a sense of life. And power-ups such as the razor (which lets you slice them in half or quarters) are quite a kick. In fact, you can lop off the monsters' heads and their bodies will often still chase after you.

Altogether, it's a moderately interesting and original game package, though it definitely has its downside. For instance, after being made to execute about four full leaps, you must complete a number of difficult running jumps while avoiding/fighting several large, poly-tentacled monsters. Since falling into water kills the character off and the section is fairly far into the level, you don't get many chances to practice your technique before having to start over from scratch. If, hypothetically, the area had a series of connected catwalks to run through while battling the beasts or if the jumping function wasn't so entirely awkward to deal with, the level would've been much more enjoyable. While this is less of an issue later on in the game, the weakness of the fighting engine then becomes more readily apparent. Though there are reportedly 30 combos in all, you really will only end up using about six to eight. Since the more complex moves are significantly harder to pull off (especially with those attacking creatures interfering and all), you'll end up jamming on the kick or slash buttons with an occasional block or dodge. And while the thought of having to keep fighting throughout the entire game can seem pretty appealing, it loses its charm after you die several times trying to explore or find your way.

While it does have a lot of nice elements, Nightmare Creatures ultimately ends up as a fairly disappointing experience. That's really quite a shame because the potential and premise were clearly there for it to be an incredible game; it just feels like it came out of the development oven a few months too early. Perhaps the extra time and effort that seem to be missing from this title will appear in a sequel. We'll just have to wait and see. --Joe Fielder
--Copyright ©1999 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of GameSpot is prohibited. GameSpot and the GameSpot logo are trademarks of GameSpot Inc.

Product Description

Action Adventure

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Phantasmerrific!, June 9, 2005

By 

Draconis Blackthorne (The Haunted Noctuary) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Nightmare Creatures (Video Game)

Bathed in darkness, & with a decidedly eerie atmosphere permutating into many morbid manifestations, the player is brought into a horror world of gore & mysticism. The scenery is gloriously Gothic, covered in shadow... with many lurking abominations therein...

You have the choice of being one of two characters: "Father Ignacius Blackward, a man of God combatting Evil", or "Nadia F., a Microbiologist." The latter character, who's father was murdered mysteriously, probably as a plan of "The Brotherhood of Hecate", a mysterious Dark order dedicated to dominating the earth using these mutant monsters. They are led by "Adam Crowley", former "legitimate" scientist who now masterminds the secret Brotherhood of Hecate. Unfortunately, their bodies were immolated in the Fire of 1666. Crowley only desired to create a race of "Supermen" {...can you say Ubermenschten?}; but things didn't quite go as planned. Still, this was still a great opportunity to realize their plans anyway.

The plot is basically based around their Grimoire, which was written by "Pepys", a mystic / Black Magic Magician. The Legend is quite intriguing, & quite ingenious, actually.

Werewolves, fire-spewing Demons, Spider-like creatures, Zombies, & knife-wielding "faceless men" are only some of the inhabitants of this truly nightmarish dimension.

Nightmare Creatures presents a forboding challenge for all those who wish to enjoy a bit of Eustress, in this descent into a veritable Hell...

H V H J

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nightmare Creatures, January 5, 2005

By 

Chris Nielsen (FL) - See all my reviews

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Nightmare Creatures (Video Game)

An excpetionally well thought out game that is hindered by some slight problems which prevent this game from getting a 5 star rating in my book. The jumping certaintly is one of the worst parts of this game and certainly does help to make this game less enjoyable. However the atmosphere and the mood created are second to none as you roam the streets and Catacombs of England searching for the dark genius Alex Crowley. While most of the gameplay relies heavily upon hack and slash elements, and arcade style gameplay it is in the overall execution that this game succeeds. The creators have done a fine job of recreating the dark times which plaque the game world and have created some of the best monsters in a horror videogame, standing stride for stride with games like Resident Evil and Silent Hill, althogh Silent Hill does have this game topped in terms of sheer terror and horror that is created from the link between the player and the monsters, as truly Silent Hill's monsters are a perversion of reality, and some of the most intriquing monsters ever created. The sequel to this game does fall a little bit short of what I would have expected, although I do enjoy the finishing moves that you are able to execute in NC2. Definitely worth picking up, especially because of the cheap price that you can pick it up for, the game seems to be so inexpensive on this sight that you probably will be paying more for the shipping than for the game itself. By the way the best time to play this game is right before Halloween, as that was when it was originally released, and I'm sure the creators intended that the season be around you when playing this game, just an idea though. Thanks for ya time ya all. Yeah yeah.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The last word on "Nightmare Creatures", March 23, 2002

By 

Ben Rowland (Toronto, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Nightmare Creatures (Video Game)

Believe me, this is nowhere near the worst game of all time. It is strictly an average game. It breaks no new ground, offers very little in the way of new and fresh adventures, and it's explicit blood and guts get tiresome after a while. But where it excells is in the horror aspect, with well animated and truely frightning monsters lurking in the back alleys, there is much to fear.

Set in Victorian London (circa 1840), you assume the role of either a preist or a young student apprentice. The former excells with strength while the other excells at agility. Both offers skills essential to survival. Your task is to defeat all the monsters that an evil scientist has unleashed. Cliched as the story is, the action is fun for any fan of "Resident Evil" or "Tomb Raider", with the action in the third person similar to the other survival horror games.

The graphics are nice, but dark and moody. This makes the gaming experience unpleasant over the long run. The music is nicely done, and reminds me of the moods set in "Silent Hill". The action is nice, and will please gamers who crave action and painting walls with your enemies. But in the way of deep story or character development, you may want to look elsewhere.

Not very bad, but not very good either.