Penumbra - Unique, Immersive, Pretty, And ...

[ascottk]

I'm downloading penumbra now

 

 

As for D3, there was only a few moments when I was taken by surprise (I think it was one of the spiders). But overall I found d3 to be too predictable: "Okay, there'll be a demon around the corner . . . just like the last four hundred corners I passed . . . " and sure enough, there was a demon or two waiting or spawning into the area.

[SneaksieDave]

With trepidation, I made my way towards the door...

ROFL! Yeah I remember that one too.

 

Damn, it's like, they had decent ideas about 20% of the way through, and then they lost their interest or something (except for the bosses - those were neat, and hell was "okay"). Another I remember is very early on, the hanging guy who says "help me" or "kill me" or something, and the walls are bleeding as the room is bathed in red...

 

BAH, they chickened out and went too toned down for this game. They should've gone full-on horrible satan death gore possessed like they did with D1 and D2.

[woah]

I suppose one of the reasons I found Penumbra really scary is as a result of playing Call of Cthulhu (sp). It taught me to expect the unexpected and--on top of that--expect nearly insurmountable odds. Before COC, I would have always assumed that having no weapons to defend myself with ment the game would be purposely designed to protect you (as is true with most games in their introductory sequences). I never thought I would ever have to flee and dodge within feet of heavily armed enemies down several foot wide corridors, or venture into dangerous, monster-infested areas without even a crowbar to defend myself in a game. And in between all of this, you would be tortured in that there would be long, drawn-out periods in which you were tricked into believing the next confrontation was imminent (for instance, you were often had visions of some creature that was watching and stalking you from hidden places. You were always asking yourself if this would be the time it might try to get you). It was a harsh awakening, but--in the end--it made my gaming experiences in horror games, overall, much better.

 

Now, when I play something like Penumbra, where you are not equipped with any weapons (which definitely brought me back to the vulnerable mindset of Call Of Cthulhu (sp)) I fully expect the possibly of something to come lurking around a corner or out of the shadows at any time, and involve you in a merciless gameplay conflict. I'm always glancing behind myself, and stopping when curious sounds arise. It's much more intense.

 

Though, after playing Penumbra, I realize it really didn't nearly stress you to the extent COC did, but--at the time--being weaponless had no bearing on my expectations of what challenges I might face.

[Gildoran]

Wow... I ought ot play Call of Cthulu if it had that kind of an effect on you!

[Arumakani]

The game got a lot of good reviews, especially from gamers. You can't go far wrong buddy.

[woah]

I'm not necessarily saying Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth was one of the best games ever made (Although it was quite awesome, and I would recommend it, but don't get your expectations too high as that never helps. The game was not perfect). Rather, I'm simply saying it altered what assumptions and expectations I normally made in a PC game. In other words, they involved you in terribly hard, stressful, and frightening circumstances, even when you were left entirely weaponless. You can't really effectively play it from the mindset of other games, and you'll be in for a surprise if you do.

 

 

The areas in which Call of Cthulhu fails is in its introductory sequence, AI, and graphics (I would be fine with this, but horrible lip-syncing does not lend itself well to immersion. Everything else with the graphics acceptable). In addition, some challenges are just too hard, depending on pure luck, and thus become tedious or angering (and I have a lot of patience) after replaying them 15 times.

[sparhawk]

I wonder why you don't like the introduction. It was strange, but it was quite good IMO. It has some problems yes, but immersionwise it is pretty good.

[woah]

I must correct myself. The FMV introduction I found very good, as I did with the playable sequence in which you infiltrate the house of a cult. It was the "start" of the game where you first arrive on the bus. I'm not sure why, but I felt it was a bit too slow and uninteresting.

[Mr Mike]

Not sure if any of you guys have seen this but Penumbra is now being developed into a fully fledged title.

 

And here's a nice video showing progress.

 

Is looking very interesting imho.

[Unstoppable]

Not sure if any of you guys have seen this but Penumbra is now being developed into a fully fledged title.

 

And here's a nice video showing progress.

 

Is looking very interesting imho.

 

Aye I heard about it the other day it's the commercial sequel to that game .

[Domarius]

Good news! Thanks for the heads up!

[oDDity]

If the implication is that Dark Mod might do the same eventually, I don't think so. It treads the line of plagiarism a little too precariously to go commercial without changing quite a lot. As a mod, you can definitely get away with a lot more.

[Crispy]

I agree that mods can often get away with more than commercial releases; I also think that the Dark Mod would be fine anyway. It might look like plagiarism, but is it infringement? I don't think so. The team have been explicitly careful to avoid infringing on any IP.

 

It's possible that it might attract a court case if it became commercial; on the other hand, given the apparent low commercial valuation of the Thief property in Eidos' eyes, they might not care. On the other other hand, they're a trigger-happy bunch.

 

As always, IANAL.

 

In any case this discussion is largely academic; the point of the Dark Mod is not to make money.

 

 

 

I haven't checked out Penumbra yet but I definitely want to. Might get to it eventually...

[Mr Mike]

If the implication is that Dark Mod might do the same eventually, I don't think so. It treads the line of plagiarism a little too precariously to go commercial without changing quite a lot. As a mod, you can definitely get away with a lot more.

 

I don't know if that was aimed at me Odd, but it's certainly not what I was getting at.

 

Crispy, do yourself a favour and check it out. I personaly felt there was so much potential in their engine... a fully fledged survival/horror would be awesome.

[New Horizon]

I don't know if that was aimed at me Odd, but it's certainly not what I was getting at.

 

Crispy, do yourself a favour and check it out. I personaly felt there was so much potential in their engine... a fully fledged survival/horror would be awesome.

 

Yes, I just tested it out a few days ago...and I was impressed. Movement feels tight...and it has a perfect Thief lean.

[sparhawk]

If the implication is that Dark Mod might do the same eventually, I don't think so. It treads the line of plagiarism a little too precariously to go commercial without changing quite a lot. As a mod, you can definitely get away with a lot more.

 

Either it is infringement, then we can get sued, or it is not, then we still can get sued, but we can win. Either way, it doesn't matter wether it is a mod or commercial. Companies havn't been shy to shut down mods, even for old long abandonded titles.

[Mr Mike]

The commercial off shoot developed from Penumbra now has a demo available - http://www.penumbra-overture.com/demo.htm - I haven't tried it yet, downloading now.

[Ishtvan]

Thanks! I'm downloading now too. From the website, it looks like going commercial yielded better writing/better english translation now, too.

[Ishtvan]

That demo was interesting, but really short. They added gesture-based melee combat of sorts, which is interesting, but kind've awkward because you have to hold an extra button down to prevent your view getting locked in place while you are holding a weapon in the backswing position waiting to strike. Also looks like there are some extra features like holding an object closer or farther away, which was not documented in the keybindings but I happened to find because they used the same default keybinding for it as we're using in TDM.

 

GameSpot reviewed an earlier demo that sounded much longer (unless they were talking about the original tech demo, but I don't think they were because they mentioned AI that were not in the tech demo). Maybe they cut down the length in the new version?

 

Yes, I just tested it out a few days ago...and I was impressed. Movement feels tight...and it has a perfect Thief lean.

Except when you lean and then yaw your view so that it hits something... BAM! instant un-lean. Sound familiar?

[Crispy]

Except when you lean and then yaw your view so that it hits something... BAM! instant un-lean. Sound familiar?

(For those playing at home, that used to be an issue with TDM's leaning before Ishtvan fixed it. TDM leaning > Penumbra leaning, baby! )

[Unstoppable]

I think the Dark Mod could potentially be retail. Oblivion ripped pages from Thief and Eidos didn't sue. They even got a Basso mission in that game. I was stunned. How could Eidos not sue. They got water arrows, noise maker arrows, etc I was like wtf. Anyway Eidos needs to crank out Theif 4 and hire you guys to do it hah! Thief 4 if it ever comes out will be futuristic.

[Domarius]

They had a dude from the Thief team working on it to make it like Thief...

[demagogue]

Speaking of Call of Cthulhu (well, months ago now, but anyway...), I have a darkmod related story to go with it.

 

One of the first ideas I had for an FM in DarkMod was to convert an excellent interactive fiction called Anchorhead (link, which very often gets ranked best IFA ever in those kinds of lists, e.g., here). For all practical purposes it copies Lovecraft's book Call of Cthulhu, changing details here and there. I thought the atmosphere was so great.

 

So when the game CoC came out, I was so deflated. Nobody is going to believe me that I had the idea earlier to make this conversion; they'll all think I copied CoC! But I still wish the conversion would be made because the IF version is more story/puzzle oriented. I just have less motivation to do all that work now because of CoC.

 

(by the way, you can play Anchorhead online if anyone is interested in seeing it: http://www.ifiction.org/games/play.phpz?ca...&mode=html)

Edited March 20, 2007 by demagogue

[Nyarlathotep]

(by the way, you can play Anchorhead online if anyone is interested in seeing it: http://www.ifiction.org/games/play.phpz?ca...&mode=html)

Damn you! I can feel the time slipping away through my fingers already!

[sparhawk]

Do I see this right, that Penumbra is not a "real" game but just a tech demo? Usually I hate to download such stuff, so is it worth it?