Customer Reviews

Penumbra Collection

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Do you like puzzle adventure games? Get this game. Do you like horror and enjoy getting scared? Then get this game, it is awesome. The Penumbra Collection contains three games, though they were originally released as episodic content therefore making each one short. However, all three add up to about twelve to fifteen hours of gameplay, and that's not shabby.The three games are "Overture", "Black Plague", and the expansion, "Requiem". The Penumbra games are unique in a few ways. First off it's a first person adventure puzzle game, but instead of controlling like a point and click like Myst, it controls like a first person shooter. You move with the W,A,S,D keys, crouch,jump use the shift button to run, look around with the mouse, and even have lean keys. But do not think for a second this is an action game because it isn't, this is adventure puzzle solving at its finest, and scariest. The game also uses physics based gameplay. Remember the physics puzzles in Half-Life 2? Penumbra destroys those. In my opinion, Penumbra has the best use of physics I've seen in a game because their use contributes to the gameplay, and not just used to have things fall realistically.

Story: You are Philip Buchanon. Your mother has just passed away, and a few days later, you recieve a letter from your father. A man you haven't seen in thirty years, and thought dead. Following the instructions you take a boat to Greenland to find your father. After getting off the boat you're caught in a blizzard with no shelter or way to protect yourself. You come upon a hatch in the snow, nothing else around. Using a rock to break the ice, you open it up and go down. Thus begins the creepy mystery of what happened to your father and why he sent you the letter. The game's story is very interesting and well told mostly through journals, and notes, and a few characters you communicate with. The game is good at keeping the mystery going, but does explain everything the further you get into it. It does get weird in spots, but it's a horror game, it's supposed too.

Graphics and sound: The graphics in the game, while behind the times, are great and really add to the atmosphere.Also remember, the game was created by a four man team on a budget using their own game engine. I think thats impressive. Great lighting and shadows, pretty good animations on the monsters,as well as their designs, and a lot of detail in the environment make everything look grimey, gritty, dirty, and creepy. The lighting provided by your flashlight, glow stick, and flares are very well done. The sound is top notch with creaking doors, the banging sound a monster makes trying to break a door down to get to you, the actual explosion of the door when they do break it down, whispering voices, howls, snarls, growls, rumblings when the area around you shakes, and the voice acting all help to draw you into the world. The music changes depending on the situation. If you're walking around exploring, it's moody ambience music. If a creature is around, the musics changes to let you know to be careful. When the creature spots you and you have to make a run for it, it becomes intense adding to the fear you're feeling as you are trying to get away.

Controls: As I said, it controls like a FPS, so if you played those before, you won't have any problems. The controls are smooth and feel natural. You will use the mouse to look around, click the right button, and that will examine things in the environment, and the left button is used to pick up items to add to your inventory, and to malipulate the enviornment. Click and hold on a drawer, and pull the mouse towards you allows you to realistically open the drawer. Same with doors, with the exceptions of the ones that load into a another enviornment. To open a door, click and hold,than pull or push with the mouse. This level of interaction helps make the game more immersive. Running from a creature and having to actually open and close a door, then pick up and place a barricade against the door makes it all the more frightening then simply clicking on a door to open it.

Gameplay: The game has you wondering around the enviornments exploring rooms for clues, solving puzzles, and trying to stay alive. You have some inventory based puzzles like combining items together, as well as physic based enviornment puzzles. Unlike most adventure games, the puzzles make sense. There were quite a few times when I was stuck, and was thinking of all these different, complex ways to solve it, when the answer was right there in front of my face. For example, I had to get into a cabinet, but it was locked. Typical. Most adventure games would have you do a long drawn out process to create a key to open the cabinet. As I stood there looking at it thinking, I thought how great would it be if I could pick up this chair and throw it at it to break the glass. Because that is what I would do if I was actually there trying to get it open. So I tried it. I picked up the chair, and threw it at the cabinet. Smash. I broke the glass and was able to get the item I needed out. While the solution was simple, it was realistic. If you are stuck on a puzzled, just think about what you would actually do in that situation, and that may be the answer.

Besides the puzzles, you will have to deal with the various creatures. In "Overture" you can get a couple weapons, like a pick axe, to fight the beasts with, but most of the time you will want to avoid them and this is where the stealth gameplay comes in. It's not complex like other stealth games, but you have to be careful. Crouching in the shadows and keeping still makes you harder to see. Also, if you keep still for a few seconds, you're eyes will become adjusted to the dark allowing you to see better, but only until you move. If a monster comes close to you and you look right at it, your character will start to breath hard from fear, and his vision will get blurry. You have to look away or your character will freak out and alert the beast.

I said you have weapons in "Overture", but you won't be able to use them effectively on more than one creature. You can easily kill a dog if you crouch down, hit it, knocking it down, then hitting it again as soon as it gets back up, but any more than that, you better run. You swing the weapons too slow to kill multiple enemies, but don't worry, you can run away or avoid the beasts in the game, so actually fighting them is a rare occurence, and I never had trouble with it. "Black Plague" eliminates the weapons completely, taking away any false comfort you had with them, and making the game even scarier because you cannot defend yourself. In "Black Plague" the best you can do is pick up something and throw it, stunning the creature long enough to run away. Thats pretty much the meat of the gameplay. Explore, read notes and journals, find clues, solve puzzles, avoid beasties, and figure out what the heck is going on. Oh yeah, "Overture", and "Black Plague" both have some intense sequences, like a fantastic chase section towards the end of "Overture", and the handful of "boss" fights in "Black Plague" where you have to use the enviornment to trap or kill the monster. These sequences are awesome and are among my favorite moments of the games.

Requiem: I've got a separate section for Requiem because it is different from the first two games. Some people don't like this one, but I loved it. Requiem eliminates the monsters, stealth, and exploration aspects of the first two games, and instead focuses on pure puzzle solving to get through the levels of the game. No inventory puzzles, just enviornment puzzles as well as some fun platforming areas. You go through a level, solving puzzles to get further into it, and finding special keys to activate the portal at the end of the level. There really isn't any story, and even though there aren't any monsters, you can still die, and the game still messes with you enough to creep you out.

Closing: Everything about these games, the puzzles, exploration, story, gameplay etc. blew me away. You ever seen those movies where a character is hiding in a room, maybe behind some furniture or boxes, and they peek out at the door and see movement from whatever it is they're hiding from in that small space between the bottom of a door, and the floor. That is this game. One part of "Black Plague" I was in a room and I heard a creature in the halls outside the room. I closed the door when I came in so I quickly crouched down, turned off my glow stick, and hid behind some crates. I peaked out from the crates, hearing the growls getting closer, then I saw it pass by the door, but it didn't come in. I sat there for five or more minutes waiting to see if it would come back. It didn't, but I could hear it walking around. I decided to make a run for it. I slowly opened the door, peaking out before fully opening it. I walked out, looked around to make sure it was safe and turned the corner. There it was, it saw me, I turned and ran, the music ramps up, I could hear it behind me, I heard it lunge but it missed. I eventually got away and safely made it to my destination. The games are filled with moments like this, both scripted sequences, and non-scripted. I have never played any horror games, or any other games for that matter, like these. If you love horror, puzzled solving, and adventure, do yourself a favore and pick this collection up. One of the best games I've ever played. Thanks for taking the time to read my long review, and I hope it helps in you decision to play these games.

A short while back, I bought a new computer and wanted to get a game that distanced itself from the concole games that I have played. The Penumbra Collection does that quite well. It is scary while requiring that you use your brain as you copmlete your objectives. Problems have more than one solution and ability to interact with the environment is amazing.
Overture is the frst episode. Its story is overly bizzare but it adds to the sureal nature of the rest of the game. I found it to be overly glitchy and at one point, the game just crashes. Needless to say, I finished this installment by watching it on youtube.
Black PLague is the second installment and is the masterpeice of the series. It's genuinely scary and the environments only add to the creepiness factor. The story is psycologically impacting as there is you are infected with a virus that is constantly talking to your character.
Requiem seems like a last minute add-on. Its entire focus is on puzzles.
If you're looking for a PC game that is scary, unique, and intelligent, look no further than the Penumbra Collection.

The 3 game set was a pleasant surprise for me as I had expected something less
due to the price.
A horror adventure game with a first person perspective and play action more like a
first person shooter than the typical pixel fest of most adventure games.
Since enemies are able to dispatch you with ease you will usually rely on stealth rather
than confrontation. The atmosphere is very creepy and you may find yourself on occasion,
unable to move. Along with the fear factor, are a couple of emotionaly disturbing events as well.
Graphics are ok and I would encourage one to play it as the games designers recommend.
Voice acting is very good. Puzzles are interesting and fairly straightforward. The first two games
are the best but Requiem is still fun. Kind of a light dessert after two heavy courses.
I srongly recommend the 3 game set of Penumbra.

I've never played any other commercially sold games that screamed "indie" quite as hard as this trilogy. Uncategorizable gameplay style? Check. Plot based on a myth you've probably never heard of? Check. Music better than the graphics? Check. Lame-o physics engine? . . . Well, actually not check, to the developers' credit, but otherwise you see the point. That said, the puzzles and stealth are challenging without being unfair, the atmosphere is creepy as hell, and you'll cheer in victory the first time you manage to kill a seemingly-invulnerable monster. My main complaint is that the controls are clunky, but you'll probably get used to them after a while. If you meet the (somewhat specific) system requirements, find a cheap used copy and have yourself a blast.

As if the quality of the games wasn't enough, they are all in one box! For ten dollars!

A problem I've had with many of the horror/adventure games I've played (Indigo Prophecy being the worst offender) is that the secret behind all the goings-on turns out to be pretty lame. Indigo Prophecy, for example, started AWESOMELY, but then came apart by the time it revealed what was happening. A time-traveling Mayan hit man? Really? But the Penumbra games do not have this problem, how you come to be in Greenland investigating the mine is scary, the action, clue-finding, and puzzles are scary, and the resolution is scary. It kept me on edge the whole time, courtesy of the top-notch sound effects and the atmosphere of the environments.

Black Plague (the second chapter) is definitely the high point, but the other two are also very good.

The only main negative is that combat is utterly useless. In its defense though, avoidance of your enemy is much scarier and adds to the feeling of helpless desperation and isolation. It makes you rely more on your wits than your weapons, which is something that Black Plague did really well. (Come to think of it, you never even pick up a weapon in Black Plague.) Plus, the things hunting you in the dark are scarier when you're running away instead of up-close and personal anyway!

Overall high quality! It makes me look forward to playing Cryostasis in the future.

This game was absolutely amazing. I would recommend this to anyone who is interested in a strong story and innovative and interesting gameplay.

If your looking for a classic scary game, you have found the right one. My company will be making a video review later on. :)

"Survival horror" games are more frequently "Action games with horror elements", rather than "horror games with action elements. Fortunately, the Penumbra deviates from the typical Doom 3 and FEAR horror model. Instead, you play as Phillip: a totally ordinary person with no superpowers and a lot of weaknesses. If you like challenge, chilling atmospheres, stealth, tension, and genuine terror, then this game is for you.

I've played a lot of games, and Penumbra is the scariest yet one of the scariest yet.

And if you liked Penumbra, Frictional Games has also developed Amnesia: Dark Descent, also one of the scariest games I have played.

I rather liked this game. It is not a first person shooter, although it is played in the first person. The whole collection is the same way. Its more of a dodge the enemy, figure out the puzzle, type of game. It was a nice change from the action packed games that I'm used to playing.

Amazing story, best story out of anything ive seen, great series. the last expansion is basically an eerie version of portal with a companion sphere, which is just awesome. took a few months, but this was some of the best 50 hours ive ever spent on anything. its less than 10 bucks and your computer doesnt need a crapload of upgrades, get it.

In black plague and requiem there's artefacts that you can find and if u find them all you're given a code. Instead of looking for them, beat black plague and look up the code and where you're supposed to type it in online. This is much easier and isn't a burden and is overall more fun because it doesn't give you the feeing that you HAVE to find all of the artefacts. This feeling, in my opinion, would ruin the game a bit for me.

Very enjoyable game, one of my favorites, very scary, there's nothing to hate about it.