Alone in the Dark 2

The Good
The MIDI music is truly exceptional; some of it borders on "composition". The voice acting, while cheesy at times, was overall extremely good, and definitely added to the game. Sound effects were phenomenal and very effectively utilized.

Camera action was novel for the time; kudos to the people who wrote the engine.

The puzzles were appropriate. Some were a bit outlandish (every adventure has a FEW...), but overall, this would be a good game for beginner-intermediate adventure lovers.

The Bad
The fighting was awful. The AI is simply too good and controls are too bad. Ammo is too scarce. The enemies are too lethal. The fighting aspect of the game is completely out of balance, and ruined what would otherwise be a top-notch adventure.

The graphics were weak for the time, considering that this game is a contemporary of Doom and System Shock. Even moreso when you consider it came out one year before Quake. Although the graphics weren't really up to snuff for its day, I don't think that's what the game designers really had in mind for this game anyway.

Movement could be wonky. The engine didn't always "register" the edge of a wall or corner correctly. This made moving around a little frustrating.

The Bottom Line
One thing this game got right all the way is mood. The whole game is about mood, and it was brilliantly done. The whole game is creepy. The people who wrote this game did so masterfully. The plot and scripting were brilliant. The music may be something you'd listen to on your CD player.

Unfortunately, the game is unplayable for two reasons.

First, as mentioned before, the fighting aspect is just ridiculous. Had they left out the fighting, this game might have been a classic.

Second, being a DOS game, you'll have trouble with it:

There are actions which cannot be performed unless you play this game under a DOS emulator like dosbox or dosemu under Linux, or use an application to slow down your CPU like "turbo". If you can't make Carnby run, you need to slow down your processor (or install Linux, which is always a good idea).

But even worse, the game will crash at various points if you try to play it under Windows. Various calls to routines to open certain files will fail with a "file not found" error. The "fix" is to either play the game under real DOS or a DOS emulator like dosemu.

Lastly, sound most likely won't work unless you're in real DOS or a DOS emulator or with an application like VDMS.

What the game has right, it has very right. And what the game has wrong, it has very wrong.

The Good
Nothing. I thought it was going to be like the first. Suspenseful, a little spooky, etc. Far from it. VERY far from it.

The Bad
The game was OK as I started playing, but about an hour and a half into it, PIRATE and MOBSTER references started getting involved. This was not the same type of suspenseful / scary / puzzle game like the first Alone In the Dark.

The Bottom Line
Words cannot describe how I feel about this game. I personally feel like I wasted about 4 hours of my life and I RARELY would say that with ANY game. It surprises me as the first one was great. This game was atrocious. Even the camera angles are worse than the first game and the first game wasn't that bad as far as camera angles were concerned.

The Good
A common complaint of the first game was its shortness and this one delivers a longer, harder game that is still quite immersing. While the story was not quite as interesting or mysterious as the original game, it was still a good mystery to solve. The puzzles are also well done. Only a few did I think were a bit too obtuse.

The Bad
For some reason the designers of this game thought that the reason why people loved the original was for the combat. This game has a huge increase in fighting over the first which really tested my patience for the game. The weak point of the first Alone in the Dark game was the awkward combat. It is barely functional and only worked because it was not used very often. Its sparse use meant you never really had to dwell on its limitations. Unfortunately since this game is more about fighting bad guys than ever before I soon started to lose interest in the game. This problem is especially apparent in the opening to the game which is mainly combat oriented. I'm sure this game turned off a lot of new players as they were constantly cut to pieces in the opening moments of what is supposed to be an adventure game.

The Bottom Line
The higher emphasis on fighting in this game spoils what would have been a pretty solid adventure game. Still there is enough in the game for me to marginally recommend it to fans of the first one. But for newcomers it might be best to stay away and play the original.