2014. Júl. 26.

American James McGee is an original game designer of our era. Doom and Quake fans can know his name for a time now, but I more like those projects of him which came from his own head. I loved Scrapland, I enjoyed the first part of the Alice series, and although Bad Day L.A. was failed, Grimm seems peculiar enough to worth a try. But here is the second part of the Alice game, and as the title says: Madness Returns. However, 11 years had passed after the release of the first part, and it shows on the game. While American McGee’s Alice mostly just turned Wonderland out and degraded it into an imagined world of a psychotic-schizophrenic little girl, the sequel hits much harder. In the first part Alice defeats her own out-of-control-evil-superego, the Queen of Hearts. After their house was burnt down, Alice literally went mad about loosing her family, and while she withers in an asylum, Wonderland drags her in more and more. But this world is the creation of her own mind, so loosing sanity leads to a horrific version of Wonderland. The sequel begins in the real world. A psychiatrist, Dr. Angus Bumby takes her under his wings and treatment. The girl is professedly blaming herself for the fire, so she cares nothing about the world around – principally because the good doctor tries to erase her memories by hypnosis. Attentive players can observe that too much crazy kids are living at the foundling hospital of Dr. Bumby, and the answer for ‘why is he so interested in the little folk?’ turns out during the game. I wouldn’t like to reveal the twists in the story but I can tell that in Wonderland Alice gradually finds her memories about the night of the fire, and with time she gets to the source of what endangers her personal world of imagination. During the journey she meets typical Wonderlandish characters who are, of course, just as twisted as everything around them. The girl herself is more like a warrior virgin with a gothic appetite than that little uncertain explorer, who walked in the worlds of imagination in the books of Lewis...

2014. Júl. 13.

Fear of darkness is one of man’s elemental instincts that is suppressed by the most. This is the cause why light and darkness were always the fundamental tools of the horror genre – the simple and ingenious idea is just that: forge weapons from light against opponents made from darkness. Alan Wake, the American bestselling author became famous around the world by his crime and thriller novels. He has a seemingly perfect life with an overzealous manager, a nice house, a beautiful wife, a career going up and lots of fans – but he is troubled by what can haunt any artist at least once in a lifetime. He has writer’s block, and as a result he didn’t write a line for two years. His wife, the charming Alice arranges a second honeymoon trip to the picturesque town of Bright Falls, where she hopes Alan can find not just romantic moments but some inspiration too. However, Alan finds nothing else but doubts, pain and terror. What’s more; these horrors come alive from the pages of his newest work in progress. Of course he – the player – doesn’t remember writing any new novel. There is no way to tell more about the story without spoilers, because surprises are coming continuously, starting from the first moment of the game. This is one of the main aspects that defines the atmosphere and gameplay of Alan Wake. The story is living and movie-like in almost every moment; it makes you forget that you are knocking around on the levels of a game. Luckily, there is not a hint of the well-known feeling of being a jumping-jack: “go here, go there, don’t be curious at all!” It is more like an interactive novel, or with a more thankful metaphor; like a high quality series in the psychological thriller genre. Deliberately; the developers emphasized this aspect of the atmosphere with main titles and “previously on…” parts between the episodes. (At the first time I almost fall off my chair in surprise when the rich voice of the narrator said: “Previously on Alan Wake…”) Hearing it the first time you could be averse from this episodic structure of the game,...