Penumbra: Overture - First Impressions

Alright, here we go. Time for another " First Impressions " post. This time about the game Penumbra: Overture, a first-person action/adventure title from Swedish developer 'Frictional Games'. Visit the game's website here.

The basic idea of the game is that you receive a letter from your father, who left before you were even born, shortly after the death of your mother. After all the pleas for forgiveness comes a set of directions to a bank, and the information required to access a safety deposit box there. When you arrive, you find that your father has been legally dead for over 30 years, and that you're the executor of the deposit box. Inside you find many documents and papers, which you were instructed to burn and forget about completely; however, curiosity gets the best of you, and you decide to nose through them. After finding a book filled with indecipherable text, you notice in it a map of an uninhabited area in Northern Greenland, and decide to head there as soon as possible. After on year has passed, you finally leave on a plane to the mainland, and presumably you then board a boat, as that's where you gain control of your character.




After stumbling around in the snow, you eventually come across a hatch in the ground which is frozen shut. Backtracking a small ways, there are small stones you can pick up; the interesting thing about this game, anything you can picked up and lift around freely (assuming it isn't too heavy), you can swing/throw, or place gently down. After shattering the ice on the hatch with one of the stones, you begin your descent; by which I mean you fall and get knocked out, coming to your senses a little later.



In this game, you don't play as an American, so obviously you have a real reason to be hesitant about progressing through a dark, deserted cave facility. In all seriousness though, the game does a good job of making you think twice before just running around like an idiot making all kinds of noise; crouching and trying to be stealthy seems to be useful, as when you crouch your eyes "adjust" to the darkness, and you can see better(pictured above). After a bit of exploring, I quickly came across a nest of spiders(which killed the dog, also pictured above). Apparently they're some badass spiders.




After reading the diary of a scientist who spent 300 days in this basement eating said spiders, you learn that they started out as normal insects, but grew in time. The scientist ran out of food at one point and began feasting on the spiders reluctantly; by the end of the diary you'd almost assume the spiders have some addictive quality. The diary then tells of a self-performed surgery, where the scientist apparently cut out his own tongue after it became coated with a blue, glue-like substance(that's his tongue I pick up and stuck in the drawer). As you leave the spider-basement and back into the main cave shaft for more exploration, the floor above shakes, and you hear what sounds like violent, bloody murder; upstairs is a trail of blood leading into a hole in the wall that no human could have made.


My main first impressions of this game are that it's very well presented to be an " indie " title. The voice-acting isn't exactly Hollywood-blockbuster quality, but it's got a charming touch to it that you really only find in games from smaller developers. Though I haven't had any combat in the game yet, I'm sure there will be. I found a hammer, and it seems to be sufficient enough when you thrust/swing it that it could work as a weapon. The physics in the game are great, the graphics aren't top-notch but they're appropriate. That's about all I can really say now. Keep up with the blog, though; later on when I finish the game I'll rate it and do a complete review.