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ALONE IN THE DARK (1992): THE POLYGONS OF FEAR
When most people think of survival horror, they think of Capcom's Resident Evil series, which debuted in 1996 and sold nearly 35 million copies in just over 10 years.1 However, the conventions of Capcom's survival horror games, as well as others like Silent Hill (Konami, starting 1999), owe much of their success to Infogrames’ Alone in the Dark, a PC game released in 1992.
Part of the opening cut scene from Alone in the Dark, showing female protagonist Emily Hartwood approaching the mysterious Derceto mansion.
Alone in the Dark, designed principally by Frederick Raynal and Franck de Girolami, is an early blend of 2D and 3D technology; specifically, of software-based 3D polygons for characters and items, and prerendered 2D images for backgrounds. This hybrid engine allowed characters and items to be rendered (redrawn) on the fly and free to move to and from any position, whereas the environments or rooms could be shown only from a certain fixed camera angle that was dependent upon the player character's location. The technique allowed for dramatic, predetermined camera angles, but also meant that the player didn't always have a clear view of the action. Arguably, this feature made the engine work well for horror, as such camera angles are a quintessential aspect of most horror films—you know something is around the corner, but can't make it out until it is too late.
Although the 3D graphics of Alone in the Dark were crude and blocky by today's standards, with flat-shaded rather than textured polygons, they were remarkable for their time. Combined with superb atmospheric sound effects and a rich soundtrack, the overall presentation created a potent feeling sense of horror.
Because this was an early software-based 3D engine, it does not move as quickly as gamers might expect. However, the development team was able to turn this potential liability to their advantage—the slowness of some of the in-game actions heightens the sense of panic when the character is about to be attacked; direct or impending attack: it's like the nightmare in which you can't run fast enough to get away from the monster. In fact, the designers took this one step further by slowing down the player character even further when hurt, a realistic touch that few other games share.
Of course, Alone in the Dark was certainly not the first graphic action adventure or even the first horror-themed adventure. As far back as Atari's 1981 Haunted House for the Atari 2600 Video Computer System (VCS), action, adventure, and horror were logical combinations.
If Haunted House looks a lot like Atari's classic Adventure (1979), it's no coincidence—it's based on the same engine. Shown are the eyes that represent the protagonist and a bat.
In Haunted House, the player's avatar is a pair of eyes floating about a darkened mansion. The player's goal is to find the pieces of a magic urn and escape, all the while avoiding tarantulas, bats, and a ghost. Clever use of simple sound effects for actions like walking up and down stairs, wind blowing, and doors shutting help set the mood, and the visuals are blocky but still easy to identify. Although the programming effort that went into Haunted House was masterful, the VCS just wasn't powerful enough to set a truly horrific mood.
Other attempts at horror videogames on the VCS would follow, like Wizard Video's Halloween (1983), based on the popular 1978 slasher film. The player assumes the role of a babysitter in a two-story house, and scores points by escorting children to safe rooms or stabbing the killer with a kitchen knife. Michael Myers, the famous antagonist from the film, is also the killer in the game, and pursues the player in his iconically slow but relentless manner. Again, although the visuals and sound were pretty much what was expected on the platform at the time, the system's capabilities limited how terrifying the game could actually be. Other than the tension sparked by Michael Myers’ appearances, there was little to genuinely frighten the player.
Other platforms, like Mattel's Intellivision, also witnessed pioneering attempts at what would become the survival horror genre. Imagic's 1982 Dracula puts a slight twist on the standard formula by casting the player as the titular vampire. The vampire has the ability to transform into a bat and must stalk and bite a certain number of victims and return to his resting place before sunrise. Antagonists include wolves, vultures, and stake-throwing constables. Although the Intellivision had greater technical capabilities than the VCS and Dracula's presentation was fairly well done for the time, there was also nothing particularly scary about the game other than the system's controllers.
Even the arcade had its fair share of horror-themed games, like the gory and sadistic light gun shooter from Exidy, Chiller (1986), which tasked the player with shooting everything on screen, including humans chained and tortured in a dungeon. With more realistic graphics and sound, the game might have actually achieved more than mere revulsion.
The closest that the arcade came to something like survival horror was the visually rich Splatterhouse (1988), a side scrolling beat ‘em up from Namco. The game casts the player as Rick, who must rescue his girlfriend held captive in yet another apparently abandoned, creepy, demonic mansion. Luckily for the player, an evil hockey-like mask attaches itself to Rick's face and gives him super strength, with which he battles the ghouls and demons throughout the house. Despite having many home translations and sequels, including a 2009 home console remake from Namco Bandai Games for the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation 3, the Splatterhouse series remains firmly in the horror action category, with little apparent influence on or from other horror-themed games.
The only obvious way Splatterhouse relates to Alone in the Dark is that the in-game mansion is supposedly that of Dr. Herbert West, H. P. Lovecraft's “Reanimator.”
There is little to indicate that any of these earlier games or the myriad other titles that failed to deliver videogame scares for predominantly technical reasons, like Avalon Hill's Maxwell Manor (1984; Apple II, Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64) or LJN's Friday the 13th (1988, Nintendo Entertainment System), had any influence on Alone in the Dark’s design. Instead, American author and horror icon, Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890–1937), better known as H. P Lovecraft, with his famed Cthulhu Mythos, was the credited inspiration for the final product, right down to the tagline: “A Virtual Adventure Game Inspired by the Work of H. P. Lovecraft” on the front of the box. However, Raynal was also inspired by zombie movies. In an August 3, 2006, Adventure Europe interview, Raynal stated, “Romero's Zombie can be considered as my first inspiration. Since that movie, I [have] wanted to make a game where you need to fight against zombies, add to this the atmosphere from a lot of horror movies, which I found very entertaining, especially those where you are alone against the environment and your only goal is to survive. … So Cthulhu wasn't the main influence, but as I wanted the player to read texts to find clues, we used Cthulhu for its atmosphere and to add a few monsters.”2
The back of the box for Maxwell Manor. Creepy mansions and haunted houses have been videogame staples for the 35+-year history of mainstream videogames.
However, this does not mean that there were no games that influenced Alone in the Dark’s development. In fact, in that same Adventure Europe interview, Raynal states that it was his own work on porting Christophe de Dinechin's little-known but groundbreaking Alpha Waves (1990, Atari ST) to the PC that was one of the game's biggest influences.
Alpha Waves, one of the first 3D home videogames, was a surprisingly robust software-driven, polygon-based platform jumping and exploration title that featured simple shapes and multiobject interactions. A quick glance at the game in motion is enough to see how influential it was on the implementation and design of Alone in the Dark. As Raynal described:
When I was making the PC conversion of Alpha Waves, a very primitive 3D game, I had the feeling that it was time for 3D to offer something new to gameplay; I was convinced that it was possible to create a new animation system for human characters (angles interpolation in real time), then everything became obvious in less than three seconds, a man in a house, zombies, my old dream at least possible? But I knew that it was not possible at this time to have realistic 3D backgrounds needed to give the player the feeling that he is trapped in a real haunted manor. So I came out with the idea of 3D bitmapped backgrounds. In the beginning, I thought I could use digitalized photos of a real manor but hand drawn pictures came out to be better for characters’ integration and ambiance. Then I had to program all those 3D tools to make it happen as nothing existed for real time 3D at this time.
Screenshot from Alpha Waves, which was a major influence for Frederick Raynal in the implementation of Alone in the Dark. The triangular blue object casting a black shadow is the player, and the floating orange objects are the platforms. Similar jumping-centric 3D platforming elements would appear again in other 3D games like Jumping Flash! (SCE, 1995; Sony PlayStation) and Montezuma's Return (WizardWorks, 1998; PC).
Alone in the Dark is set in 1925. The action takes place in Derceto, a Louisiana mansion owned by the late Jeremy Hartwood, who apparently committed suicide after being haunted by a strange presence. Before passing, Hartwood translated many of the ancient manuscripts found within the house. The player must investigate the mansion, and has a choice of two avatars: a mustachioed private detective, Edward Carnby, who was sent to find a piano for an antique dealer, or Jeremy's niece, Emily Hartwood, who wants to find the piano for a possible hidden clue to her uncle's suicide. The choice makes little difference to the story, but does affect the look of the player's character.
As the game loads, a rendered Infogrames armadillo mascot spins, followed by the image of a book that is turned to reveal credits. After answering a copy protection question from the manual, the player is asked to choose either Emily on the left, or Edward on the right, where a picture of the chosen character alongside some introductory text is then displayed while ominous music plays. Once the introductory text is finished, the scene shifts via an in-engine cut scene to the player's character being driven in a jalopy, speeding up a dirt road leading to the mansion. This sequence gives an initial sense of the game's third-person perspective presentation, with a rendered car and passengers in richly prerendered environments that change perspective at key points. Once the character gets out at the front gate he or she starts to walk the rest of the way to the mansion, demonstrating the nice walking animation; movement point interpolation is a key feature of the game engine. The camera angle changes again, this time to the perspective of the eyes of a mysterious creature looking down at the character from a window, with only its hands showing, as the car drives off.
Once the character enters the mansion, the front doors quickly close, offering no escape for the startled character, who now has no choice but to continue on. The player takes control of the avatar's actions only after he or she reaches the attic, ratcheting up the tension and giving the player a small tour of the mansion on the way. The sequences also introduces the abrupt changes in camera angle as the character steps into certain predetermined points.
Although the animation is excellent (if somewhat deliberate) and the environments are well drawn, the characters are noticeably blocky (and in the case of Emily, “pointy”), consisting of a minimal number of flat-shaded polygons. Nevertheless, with clever use of color and clear distinctions between body parts and clothing, the characters are at least identifiable and work well within the game's carefully orchestrated art direction.
Once the character reaches the attic, players learn (often after a few restarts) that they must figure out how to block the trap door and the window so monsters can't make their way in, demonstrating the game's special mix of action and puzzle solving right away. By pushing a large chest over the trap door and an armoire in front of the window, the character is then free to explore the attic. Soon enough, the player finds items in the armoire (blanket), piano (letter), chest (shotgun), and bookshelf (book). As this exploration takes place, a monster breaks the window's glass, but can't get past the armoire, while another monster tries to push up the trap door in the floor, but can't move the chest. After finding and taking an oil lamp on the table, the character can safely direct the character to an exit out a side door and down the stairs. The goal is to search for further clues about the mansion's deadly occupants and ultimately find a way out.
In this screenshot, Emily successfully covered the trap door, but failed to block the window, allowing the toothy creature to burst through.
The atmosphere is retained throughout the rest of the game with creaky doors, weakened floors, and the sudden appearance of monsters who the character may not be equipped to fight and trying to stay one step ahead of the monsters—which the character isn't always equipped to fight. This is a mix that few games before or since, including the game's sequels, have been able to get quite right.
All player commands are executed from the keyboard, with the up and down arrow keys moving the avatar, and the left and right arrow keys changing direction. By tapping twice then holding the up arrow key, the player can make the avatar run (one of a handful of animation sequences in the game that doesn't look quite right). Running is a very imprecise affair and can heighten the sense of panic when trying to move the character away from danger.
Pressing the “I” or Enter/Return keys brings up the options screen, which lists inventory items, character portrait, and any active items, and possible actions. Fight, Open/Search, Shut, and Push are always available, and Jump (Hop, Jump, or Leap) is possible in certain situations. Further, certain items allow for additional commands, like Reload, Eat, Drop, and Throw. When one of the actions is selected, the player is returned to the game to carry them out. For combat, the player can engage in hand-to-hand fighting consisting of punches and kicks, or use cutting or thrusting weapons and firearms.
In this screenshot, Edward has successfully made it down from the attic and avoided falling through the rotten floor just outside this room. After finding nothing in the armoire, he is attacked by a shuffling zombie.
In 1993, a CD-ROM version was released for the PC that included voiceovers for the in-game text and an enhanced soundtrack, as well as a small bonus game, Jack in the Dark, billed as an interactive Christmas adventure, but set during Halloween, somewhat like the animated Tim Burton film from the same year, The Nightmare Before Christmas. The player takes the role of a young child, Grace Saunders, who enters a toy store after dark and gets locked in. She finds that the toys are alive. Her ultimate goal is to save Santa Claus from an evil jack-in-the-box. With an emphasis on puzzle solving over combat, the game is a decidedly different experience from Alone in the Dark, though it obviously utilizes the same engine as that game and two of its sequels. Jack in the Dark was also made available by itself on a single 3.5″ disk and on the CD-ROM version of Alone in the Dark 2, where is served introduction to that game's main nemesis.
Alone in the Dark was ported to the 3DO and Apple Macintosh in 1994, with the former port making use of the standard game-pad instead of keyboard controls. Alone in the Dark 2 was released in 1994 for the PC, 1995 for the 3DO, and 1996 for the Apple Macintosh, Sega Saturn, and Sony PlayStation, with improved visuals for the latter two platforms. Unfortunately for fans of the previous games, Raynal was no longer involved with the series. As he described in the Adventure Europe interview:
I didn't decide to leave the license, but Infogrames itself, because of many disagreements with them. At this time, games were completely handled by the creator who usually was also the main programmer so I never wrote anything about game mechanics and ambiance secrets. I think they didn't understand what I did, the engine was brand new and helped the success of the game, but a game is not an engine or a movie, it's a whole system where situations and game-play are the first things to think about. There are complex links between technology, gameplay, and story, all of them always sending the ball back to each other, a game is good when the players feel this synergy.
Alone in the Dark 2 takes place at Christmas in the year 1924, where Edward Carnby (now known as the “Supernatural Private Eye”) and his partner Ted Stryker are investigating the kidnapping of Grace Saunders, leading them to another mansion, “Hell's Kitchen,” the home of infamous gangsters. Edward learns that Ted has disappeared in the mansion and investigates, but finds his partner murdered. Edward discovers that the mobsters are merely the corporeal forms of ghost pirates, and he must make his way through the house and eventually onto a hidden pirate ship to find a way to save Grace.
A sequence of four images from Alone in the Dark 2, showing from the top, left to right, an early unarmed encounter with a zombie gangster. To the chagrin of fans of the first game, the sequel was often more focused on combat than puzzle-solving exploration.
Beyond limiting the player to the initial choice of the one protagonist, the biggest differences between this sequel and the original is the downplaying of the horror theme and the emphasis on action. Interestingly, the player is occasionally asked to take the role of Grace, who—as in Jack in the Dark—is unable to fight, so she must sneak around and avoid direct confrontations with the gangsters, instead setting traps to defeat them. This feature brought a brief, but welcome change of pace for fans of the style of the original game.
Alone in the Dark 3 was released in 1995 for the PC, with a port to the Apple Macintosh following a year later. In the final game in the series that uses the original game engine, Edward Carnby is asked to investigate the disappearance of a film crew, one member of which is Emily Hartwood of the original game. Though the setting was different—this time a western ghost town called Slaughter Gulch, located in the Mojave Desert—the game's developers decided to go back to the original game's formula of more balanced action and puzzle elements.
Alone in the Dark 3 also makes a further concession to the sometimes overly challenging action sequences by allowing the player to adjust the difficulty of combat. Welcome changes from previous games are unlimited save game slots, which allow for more player experimentation, and an onscreen map that shows Edward's exact location. The map eliminates much of the frustration from the game's dramatic but sometimes disorienting camera angles, making it easier for the player to make progress in the large gameworld.
A collection of four scenes from Alone in the Dark 3, sequenced from the top, left to right. The third game was the last title in the series to use the by then creaky game engine, but it nevertheless delighted many fans of the original by placing less emphasis on combat.
Because the next entry in the series was not released until 2001, the time was ripe for many other games to take on the survival horror challenge. These included Acclaim's time-limited D (1995; 3DO, PC, Sega Saturn, Sony PlayStation); Capcom's B-movie homage, Resident Evil (known as Biohazard in Japan; 1996, Sony PlayStation), Konami's fog-laden and sound-centered Silent Hill (1999, Sony PlayStation), and Tecmo's Fatal Frame (known as Project Zero in Europe and Australia, and Zero in Japan; 2001, Microsoft Xbox, Sony PlayStation 2), which has the player battling ghosts by sealing their spirit in film. Of these, Resident Evil is the best known and has spanned the most sequels and series offshoots, though the others, with the exception of D and D2 (2000, Sega Dreamcast), have also been critical and commercial successes.
Though said to be thematically inspired by Capcom's Japan-only Nintendo Famicom role-playing game, Sweet Home (1989, itself based on a movie), including the mansion setting, puzzles, and loading screen when opening doors, Resident Evil is in many ways a reimagining of the original Alone in the Dark. For instance, the player has a choice between two characters—one male, one female, each with a different backstory, the backgrounds are prerendered and the camera angles fixed, and character and creature movements are deliberate, with somewhat sluggish control. Further, many of the same surprises take place, such as monsters bursting through windows and startling the player. Naturally, in the span of four years, the visuals are significantly better and there are now numerous cheesy cut scenes to advance the story, with awkwardly translated and badly voiced dialog, including the infamous line, “Jill, here's a lockpick. It might be handy if you, the master of unlocking, take it with you.”
In an attempt to cash in on the success of the Resident Evil series, Infogrames released the fourth game in the Alone in the Dark series in 2001 for the Nintendo Game Boy Color, PC, Sega Dreamcast, and Sony PlayStation. In Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare, Edward Carnby is reimagined in a different timeline (the year is 2001), and as a darker and more sarcastic character exploring Shadow Island. The player can also choose to play as anthropologist Aline Cedrac. Though borrowing liberally from the control scheme and settings of the early Resident Evil games, The New Nightmare introduces more dynamic lighting effects that are worked into the game's mechanics (the creatures in the game are sensitive to light) and features two different styles of gameplay, much like playing as either Edward or Grace offered in Alone in the Dark 2. This time, playing as Edward presents a more action-oriented game, and playing as Aline offers a more puzzled-oriented experience. Despite some promising features, reviews were mixed and sales relatively tepid in a genre dominated and likely biased by higher-profile series.
Like the other genre staples, Resident Evil and Silent Hill, Alone in the Dark received a movie adaptation in 2005, very loosely based on The New Nightmare. Unfortunately, as bad as movies based on videogames can be, the Alone in the Dark movie was even worse than most of these, directed incompetently by the infamous Uwe Boll, who seemingly found most of the survival horror aspects of the game unimportant for inclusion in the film. As film critic Mark Ramsey quipped, “Alone in the Dark is certainly what you'll be if you're in the theater for this movie.”3
Despite being saddled with the legacy of what is considered one of the worst movies of all time, Atari, which holding company Infogrames had a majority stake in before assuming the name, still released a new entry in the series. Under the now-overused title of Alone in the Dark, the game was released in 2008 for the Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 2, and Sony PlayStation 3. Completing Edward Carnby's transformation from an unusual 1920s private detective to a rather generic leather-coat-wearing, five-o'clock-shadow-having Keanu Reeves lookalike, the game tasks the player with investigating rumors, allegations, and suspicions of clandestine activity in the tunnels below Central Park in New York City.
The 2008 version of Alone in the Dark adds a few intriguing elements to the classic formula, including driving cars, an option for first-person perspective (something present in light-gun-based Resident Evil games), and a highly publicized fire modeling element. The fire simulation boldly attempts to mimic the real thing, and can be used for taking out enemies and burning or melting objects in the environment. Unfortunately, some of the other newer elements—like fetch quests and extensive backtracking—don't work quite as well and drag down what could have been a tighter and more impactful gaming experience. Critical reception was mixed at best, with major criticisms being its glitchy game-play and confusing controls. However, with sufficient sales, unlike The New Nightmare, the game should provide a strong foundation for additional sequels that might address some of the game's failings and help to deservedly restore the Alone in the Dark name to something more than a Resident Evil pretender in the eyes of many modern gamers.
1March 4, 2008, Capcom Co. Ltd., press release.
2http://www.adventure-eu.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=207&Itemid=29.