Penumbra - Final Thoughts

Penumbra was definitely a crazy roller coaster ride with plenty of ups and downs. Here's my break down:

Loved

• The physics system. The drag a door/spin the valve/flip the switch mechanics were just a whole lot of fun. It's something I had never seen in a game before and added a lot to the tension. There were a couple of moments for me that were made more awesome simply by my trying to move stuff out of the way and drag a door open in time.
• Old school feel. Penumbra felt like an old school adventure game. It had inventory combining, puzzles, and even a spot of pixel hunting. It truly felt like a throw back to the old days of adventure gaming. I think it was the only adventure game I've ever played that combined a first person view with world interactions in such a way.
• The setting. The whole cave/installation system was a great place to set this game. It was a perfect explanation for it being dark most of the time while definitely adding to the tension.
  
• Horror. This had both nervous, heart beating moments and as well as jump out your chair scares. It think it's incredibly difficult to make a game that is actually scary, but Frictional definitely did it here.
• Price. I paid $5 for all three on Steam... I declare that to be the deal of the year! Honestly, even at $10-$20 for all three, it's still a solid value, even if the individual episodes aren't more than a few hours each.
  

Hated

• Enemies. In Overture they were absolute pushovers and I dispatched every single one I came across with my pick. In Black Plague, I had no way of attacking them at all, and I just ran from all of them. They should have combined the trapping idea from Overture with the no weapons of Black Plague. In Overture, there were crates to trap the dogs in as well as fenced areas where you could lure the dogs and then turn on some steam. There was no reason to ever lure a dog into either, as the dogs were just so easy to kill. If that had existed in Black Plague, however, I would have gone out of my way to get rid of the infected one at a time.
• Inconsistencies Between Games. On a 1 to Scary scale, Overture was like a 5, Black Plague was a 9 or 10, and Requiem was probably a 1. The inconsitency in scariness made the games feel really disjointed. The enemies were another huge discrepancy. In Overture, there were spiders and dogs, in Black Plague there were infected only, and Requiem had no enemies at all. Seeing spiders in Black Plague or infected in Requiem would have helped tie the games together a bit more I think.
• Requiem. While probably not a bad game on it's own, Requiem was a HUGE let down after playing the first two games. I won't rehash it's short comings too much as it was the topic of a previous post, but they definitely should have done something different there. If Requiem was the first game in the series and it was used to introduce you to the game play mechanics, I think it would have worked a lot better. In fact, it would probably be worthwhile to play it as the first game in the series. The story elements won't make sense and could possibly spoil something for you (not sure if it would), but the excitement/fun would steadily ramp up as you went through the other two games.
  

All in all, the 3 Penumbra games are excellent. I would recommend them to anybody who likes a good scare and especially people who enjoy puzzle games.

Still not sure what I'm going to play next, but hopefully I'll have something for you all in another day or two.