Spooked by Penumbra
Sunday, June 15th, 2008
Recently I went to look for a game that is different. A Game that isn’t backed by a massive company like EA or Activision, isn’t developed by a big number of developers and yet it is fun as a AAA game (Big games such as GTA4 or Crysis for example). So it happens that I first stumbled upon this gem which was first released as a free game with impressive engine. It was called just Penumbra. Later on, the developers went ahead to make the game commercial. Why not! Since the game has the spooks that are as good or even better than Doom 3, uses physics as good as Half-Life 2 and an impressive graphics engine that beats a lot of commercially released games!
Penumbra comes in two episodes. First was Penumbra Overture which is an updated version of the free released game. The story starts when the main character “Philip” receives a letter from his father which tells him not to follow him to a certain place. Of course the son decided otherwise. The game has some impressive use of physics and has a nice interaction system. For example, to open a drawer, you need to click on it then drag it same way you want to open it in reality. Same idea applies on weapons (which come in limited melee forms) in which you hold your mouse button, drag backwards or sides and then move the mouse the opposite direction to swing the weapon. The idea is nice but in reality gets frustrating. Other than that, the game is a nice fun of scares, puzzle solving and has some nice background music too to set the mood. Even better when played in the dark. The first episode has a cliffhanger ending which sets the stage for episode two: Penumbra Black Plague. The second episode concludes the story nicely and extends the logical and physical fun. It even scraps the frustrating melee combat system and reduces the number of patrolling enemies.
Overall, the experience was engaging for a budget game and easily beats a lot of AAA games out there in many areas. Just comes to show that you don’t need cutting edge technology, deep pockets or a huge number of developers to make a fun game. i clocked around 12 hours in total which isn’t bad if you consider both episodes as a single game.
So if you want a game that has nice spooks (nice isn’t the right word to use here, mind you), impressive use of logic and physics and wrapped in a story of mystery, then you want to give Penumbra a spin.
