
	Platform PC Genre Survival Horror/FPS Publisher Electronic Arts Developer DreamWorks Interactive Released 2001
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Clive Barker's Undying

Horror junkies the world over recognize the name Clive Barker and the numerous contributions that he's made to the genre in print (Everville, Books of Blood, Thief of Always) and film (Hellraiser, Lord of Illusions, Nightbreed). Video games should have been a slam dunk for somebody who knows how to creep people out with the weird and the malevolent. And contrary to the opinions of another staff member, I think Clive Barker did so admirably with Undying.

The game opens in 1923, just off the coast of Ireland, with a tramp steamer carrying a lone passenger, Patrick Galloway. As the game progresses, playing as Galloway, we find ourselves drawn into the final chapters of a story that began years before. The five children of the Covenant family went digging through their father's occult library and meddled with things that full grown men should not know, to say nothing of small children. As the years passed, the five siblings were blessed with tremendous gifts, and each was cursed to suffer a horrible fate. Now, only your friend and former commanding officer Jeremiah Covenant is left, and his life is quickly slipping away. Worse, his brothers and sisters have come back from beyond the grave to bring their oldest brother's soul with them and complete the horrible ritual they so innocently began as children. And if saving your friend's soul isn't enough to keep you occupied, there's also a small matter of settling up with a devious German occultist named Otto Keisinger, a loathsome nemesis who killed your wife and got you banished from Ireland for the crime. You have a sprawling estate to explore, mystical weapons to acquire, spells to conjure, and the ultimate evil of the Undying King to vanquish if you hope to save your friend, your sanity, and the rest of the world in the bargain. No pressure there. Really.

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Visually, I'll be the first to admit, the game could use some help. While the architecture is appropriately grand and gothic, or baroque and chaotic in some otherworldly sections of the game, the character textures do tend to suffer badly from pixelation once you get into an extreme close up situation, particularly in the cut scenes. However, the user interface is simple

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enough to stay out of your way and stylish enough that it doesn't detract from the foreboding atmosphere of the game. Moreover, the use of lighting, shadow, and color help strike the right mood at the right moment. Finding yourself plunged into darkness, then lighting off the spell you need to see in the dark and discovering yourself surrounded by horrific monsters is an excellent twist to what might seem like an old movie cliche. Yeah, you laugh at the poor sod on the movie screen when it happens to him. Not so funny when it's your own hide in the dark. Finally, the signature spell Scry demonstrated some of the completely off-the-wall visual effects that could be achieved with the Unreal engine. Looking at a lamp post one minute, then scrying that same lamp post and seeing a dead body hanging from a gibbet is one of those "damn, that's cool!" sort of ideas. The trick never really gets old, whether it's altered paintings or seeing the faces of otherwise incorporeal assailants. It's that rarest of things in video games: a visual effect that is actually useful to the player.

Undying makes absolutely terrific use of sound and voice to not only bring the characters to life but to offer hints to the player, as well as scare the ever-loving daylights out of you. Even with the lights on, the shades open, and full sunlight streaming through the window, it's hard not to jump when you hear one of the howlers (one of Undying's vaguely humanoid monsters) calling to his packmates as they begin to swarm towards you. The very spare musical score only adds to the creepiness, letting your ear strain for those tell tale sounds that let you know you've found something important or you're about to get bloody. The mix of subtle and not-so-subtle sound cues keeps you always on your toes, and more often than not ready to jump out of your seat.

And now we come to the big bone of contention between myself and Tazman (the staffer who submitted the original review for The Armchair Empire): gameplay, and those elements which are or are not extraneous to it. First, while it appears that the quick reload key (F7) does seem to be broken, that does not preclude the player from hitting the Esc key, then choosing the Load option. It's an extra step, but it works. Secondly, I will not deny that the constant saving/loading screens are kind of a pain in the ass, but it's not absolutely intolerable given the cards and CPUs of today. Less than fifteen seconds in most cases, and that's on my "old & busted" rig. It is the amount and detail of literature within the game that I'm going to call "shenanigans" on the original review. Looking at survival horror games as a whole, there's all manner of journal pages, diagrams, schematics, cryptic notes, and other items that the player has to read in order to survive. Undying is unquestionably a survival horror game. The big difference between it and another game such as Silent Hill or Resident Evil is the use of first-person perspective instead of third-person. As far as the use of literature in the game, whether it's short letters or copious diary entries, I would argue that it's not only important for the player to read, it serves as a valuable way to let the player catch his breath, and help further immerse the player into the game world. By reading the journals left behind, we stop seeing the ugly creatures and start seeing the tragic figures. Without the literature embedded in the game, Undying is unfairly demoted to the realm of a mindless shooter. It is not mere filler, but information and motivation for the player. It lends weight and a sense of perspective to the game. With all the mindless shooters running around, it's quite wonderful to see a game making use of the written word to such a degree. Add in the literally two fisted gameplay of weapons and spells (done well before Halo), and you have a game that gives you just enough space to catch your breath before the next scream tears it from you.

For all the flaws in the game, Undying serves to show players and developers how to make something better than a mindless shooter, and gives us a well realized world which is a frightening shadowy mirror of our own. It spins out a tale of childhood innocence and hellish corruption, of the loyalty owed to family and friends and the price we must pay for it, of life and death and that which lies beyond those states. No, Undying is not for the impatient or those who lack an affinity for reading. That, perhaps more than anything, is what made this one of the best games that you've never played.

Axel Cushing

(January 14, 2007)


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