Published 2009-05-19 6:00PM by Connor Beaton
Welcome to the twenty-fourth part of zConnection’s 100 Games To Play Before You Die, where we will be giving you a low-down of the 100 games (in no particular order) that any self-respecting gamer must play before their personal “Game Over”. From Asteroids to Half-Life, Bust-A-Move to The Longest Journey, expect to see a few familiar faces… and a few unfamiliar ones.
Penumbra: Overture is a truly unique horror game, which manages the impressive feat of creeping out even the most hardened of horror gamers without riddling the game with corpses or buckets of blood as some other games need. Putting players in control of Philip, a 30-year old physicist trapped in an abandoned mine in Greenland after trying to follow a clue left in a letter received from his dead father, the game combines fairly simple graphics and music with a gripping story and innovative gameplay.
One of the revolutionary things about Penumbra is the control scheme. Instead of hitting keys on your keyboard to open doors and move things around, players use the mouse to grab things and move them manually. Want to open a door? Click on the handle and move your mouse forward to gently push the door open. This innovative scheme greatly helps the immersion and creates an atmosphere rarely felt in computer games.
A game like Penumbra would ideally be played on the Wii, although Swedish developer Frictional Games have stated that a Wii port is unlikely. The game also spawned two sequels, Black Plague and Requiem. Some critics have actually suggested that Black Plague is even better than Overture, although fans tend to dispute this.
On that note, we conclude the twenty-fourth part of our article. Don't forget to check back tomorrow for the twenty-fifth part!
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