Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent, scary adventure!, May 6, 2008
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
I can't believe there are no other reviews here for this game. I can't believe the price has fallen so low too. Penumbra Black Plague is an excellent experience. This Penumbra is sooo much better than the first Penumbra Overture. The story is intriguing. The atmosphere is incredibly spooky. The controls are good. Being able to move in a first person manner and being able to handle and pick any object up really adds to the realism.
It's hard to stop playing once you get started. I have enjoyed Black Plague much better than I did Penumbra Overture. Black Plague seems a lot more stable of a game than Overture too. This game has truly scared me many times where Overture never did at all. In fact, this game is just as scary to me as Darkness Within. At this price, Penumbra Black Plague is worth a try.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Penumbra: Black Plague- a gaming gem, October 2, 2008
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
You might have found this game after you played the original Penumbra game. Or maybe you saw the old engine tech demo Frictional released. I am here to tell you, this game is superb, and at the price it is, you have no excuse not to buy it, AND its predecessor.
The original Penumbra was similar in some ways- it was all physics based, which was still relatively new at the time. It had engaging, brain-bending puzzles, a compelling story line, and an atmosphere that was rich and encompassing. Still, there were some things, such as the combat system, which held it back a bit. Overture has stripped out all that was wrong with the original game, and the result is a masterpiece.
First and foremost, this is a horror game. And it is scary as hell. Aside from maybe Fatal Frame, this is the creepiest game I have played for a very long time. It achieves this in the way the best horror novels do, through intense psychological discord, and visuals which are quite nice, even now (2008). Light plays a huge part in the game, as the game is entirely lit per-pixel, and oftentimes you have to rely various tools to light your path (glowsticks, flashlight, flares, using lighter on gasoline, etc). It shares mechanics with light-based games such as Splinter cell, where you are concealed from enemies by darkness. MAKE NO MISTAKE, this is NOT Doom 3. Enemies will not be lunging out at you, and your flashlight is your friend, not your enemy.
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Because the combat has been entirely stripped from the game, you RARELY actually kill your enemies. In fact, aside from maybe one instance (where you use a physics trap to kill an enemy), you never engage them. This is part of what makes the game so frightening. Unlike Doom, where you run in with guns blazing, the protagonist here is just an ordinary guy, and he/you are afraid of ALL enemies.
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Another interesting aspect of this game, which to my knowledge is still pretty much unique, is the mechanism by which you interact with the environment. In games like Half Life 2, you have superficial contact with the environment- throwing enemies, rocks, etc. Here, the player is completely in the first person. You use a "hand" cursor to manipulate your surroundings in an extremely realistic way. To open drawers, you pull on them and look inside. Same with doors and nearly everything else. Heavy objects are harder to move, etc. Surprisingly, this almost never gets in the way, and adds to the game's amazing realism.
The way you can "observe" objects is reminiscent of old point-and-click adventure games, and is marvelously cerebral. The puzzles you encounter are all logic-based, and the solution is often something so mundane, like picking up a plank to lay across a chasm so you can cross it, that people who are used to fantastical magic-staff hunting may be stumped initially. There are NO pixel hunts in this game.
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The sound is superb and immersive, that's all that needs to be said.
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The game's story is quite good, at least compared to most games nowadays, with a chilling Lovecraftian denouement. You can probably piece together most of the story throughout the game though, from various notes and such you find.
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One gripe some people might have with the game is the length- this game took me ~7 hours to finish, which is a tad short compared to some other games. Others might finish it in 6, and others might finish in 10. Personally, when I finished the game, it felt like just the right length, especially after having played the first one.
For the bargain price you can buy this game, the length is a non-issue. You can buy the first and second acts for less than a new console game, and together they would be longer.
Friends, this game is so unique and interesting, you would be doing yourself a disservice by overlooking it. Penumbra: Overture is a worthy addition to any game library, and a must-buy for any horror/survival aficionado.
My Score: [88/100]
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4.0 out of 5 stars
The end made it worth it, November 11, 2008
Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars
I thought this game was better than the first game, Penumbra Overture. You still have timed puzzles, WASD interface instead of point-and-click, specific save points, and attacks by creatures that you can't kill. I liked the research facility environment. This game does finally fill in the story and has an ending that I found satisfying. You don't actually have to play the first game because this game fills you in on what happened before. I only paid $10 for this and it was definitely worth it.
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