Penumbra: Overture -- Episode One

"An underground survival horror game that deserves respect."

Story: You play the role of Phillip, a college teacher who has received a letter from his supposedly dead father and a book of encoded secrets. Phillip could not decrypt the book even with help of college professors and decided to focus on the letter. Its clues led him to a bank account owned by his father, with various objects and a map in it. The map led him to the depths of greenland. When there, he stumbled upon an old mine and that is where the player assumes the role of Phillip. The story is heavily inspired on Lovecraft and the idea of a mysterious rural place with a secret. You will spend most of your time rummaging through pages and pages of diaries, memo's, reports and others from the miners who worked here. Its your objective--although secondary--to piece together the story of the miner's demise and the secrets deep inside the mine.

This story is presented without cinematic's and without ever seeing your face. You will unfold this story much like a point and click adventure game even though this is far from one. If you like your stories presented clearly, with narration and with closure and through cinematic ways you will be sorely disappointed. Penumbra takes its story telling roots from Silent Hill, Stalker, and system shock 2. Overall I enjoyed the story immensely: From its slow drip build up of what was going on in the mine and below, to Phillip's development and "Red". This is a scary game and you will find unsettling clues, diaries of mad men and even have to decode a cryptic Morse code message.


Graphics: Penumbra was originally released as a one level tech demo showcasing Frictional Game's engine "HPL". I don't know why they made a tech demo or why they cared, because this game doesn't look good compared to other games released in 07. Most of the time you'll spend your time underground in caves or in factory-like settings where people once lived. You won't notice striking bump maps on the walls or be amazed by the artistic design, but you will notice the brutal atmosphere and the striking lighting. Your flash light is a held and real time item, and when I first turned it on underground I was immersed in the setting, the rolling fog and smoke, and the shadows it cast.

That is where they made the right choices. Penumbra is a dark game, focused on lighting and shadows. You will always have your glow stick or flashlight out. You will always be reading maps and notes on the walls, or picking up memo's and using your light to read. And so while the textures are low resolution, and its an overall dark delivery, the game does not look strikingly bad. Its just average.

Sound: Penumbra: Overture features a full narrative. All characters in the game feature a voice actor, a lovecraft-esque script and a spooky narrative. When the story isn't being told or read, you will hear the mine. It is very much alive at times. Rocks shifting, equipment randomly going off, and moans and roars heard all around. Sometimes you can hear the cries of miners stuck in inaccessible areas which is devastating to hear. A gust of wind, almost stuck in the mine with you, will pass through tunnels now and then as rocks release pressure. Even things such as your foot steps, boxes breaking, and yells are very loud and expressed naturally. This game doesn't have the same technical prowess as STALKER or Bio-shock, but it was very technical back in 07. More-so than the graphics were.

Things to expect such as gunshots, explosions and the ratatat of machine guns won't be here. You're just going to hear the subtle movements of the mine, and your actions... and the other inhabitants.

Game Play: You are sitting in a corner of the mine. You are crouched, reading, with your dim glowstick lighting a small area. You're reading a recent diary you picked up, slowly detailing the degrade of the writer's mind. A vicious howl echoes from one of the tunnels nearby. You get up and run to a nearby door, frantic to escape. You jam a chair under the door handle and put a shelf against the door for good measure. You turn on your flashlight and look around: That howl came from the room.

Penumbra is a survival horror game in all aspects. You never get a gun, and your sole objective is to survive the many puzzles, clues and enemies that are thrown at you amongst the darkness. Unlike other games in this genre, you have full control over the physics and are given realistic every-day puzzles.

As you move about the mine you'll notice you can move almost every object that a human should be able to. Tip over barrels to spill its contents and rummage through them, putting a chair under a door will blockade it for a while. A mine pick can chip apart a wooden door, and bust down a metal one's hinges. These scenarios will all feel very primitive and barbaric, and intense. If you hear something outside coming into the room, you can stack random garbage and boxes and hide behind it. Sometimes you will be found, sometimes not. Alternately you can slam chairs, boxes, pipes and more into enemies to stun or maim them, allowing you to escape.

All of this is controlled with the mouse. If you grab a hold of a drawer, you must pull the mouse back to open it. Pull it fast to rip the drawer out. Take a hold of a pipe, and swing the mouse side to side to swing it like a bat. Thrust the mouse forward to stab. Get a grip on a valve and move the mouse in a circular motion clockwise to open it. Counter clockwise to seal it.

Its very simple, and it works wonders for the games atmosphere and game play. When you're not opening or closing objects or ambushing cruel enemies, you will be solving puzzles. The puzzles in this game are logical and bound to basic physics. No block pushing, no see saw puzzles. This is not resident evil. Dip a piece of rope in some oil, and dip that in some gunpowder at the end. Use a screw driver to break a hole in a barrel of gunpowder. Stick the rope in. Use a lighter, then run.

Light a match under a fire system to soak the room and open emergency doors. Put a piece of cloth in a bottle of vodka to get a Molotov. Attach a funnel to a aerosol nozzle, glue a lit match at the end of the funnel. Instant flamethrower to dee-thaw that valve. I could go on. The puzzles are expertly crafted, and are not push-block and weight problems like Half Life 2. Its more rewarding than it should be to solve these puzzles, and it actually requires thinking power to solve. Not wondering what shape goes where.

Now where does the horror come in? It comes in for the whole game. You will be wandering a lonesome, dark mine alone--Not counting some creatures that are very hungry. You can get so engrossed in just digging around for information and supplies, when all of a sudden a shriek comes from the tunnel you were just in. You primordially barricade the door and grab a hammer. You wait for it to break through...


Summary: Penumbra: Overture is very much a horror game. It has more brains than others in the genre, offering a full fledged horror story paired with intelligent puzzles and frantic action and chase scenes. You are almost never alone, and when you are you are uneasy. Very few games make you afraid without throwing monsters at you from around corners. But this game achieves that. You will always wonder whats around the corner. But something won't be there. You'll need to use your mind to solve the puzzles, and to escape from some of the monsters with your life. Penumbra is very much a budget game. It went underground--Pun intended. But I picked up on it, and I loved it. I recommend it to you if you like any kind of horror or adventure games.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/24/09

Game Release: Penumbra: Overture -- Episode One (US, 03/30/07)