""It's just a game... It's just a game... It's just a game...""

Do this for me. Imagine you're in a room at night, sitting at your computer very much like you are now. The lights are out. You're concentrated on whatever's on the screen. It's quiet. There's no one around, or so you think. Everything seems fine. And then – “BOO!” – one of your family members grabs you from behind. You know, just for a laugh.

The incident startled you, right? You probably jumped in your seat and yelled out. Of course you were startled. But were you really scared? For a split second, maybe. And you were probably a little shaken a few seconds after it happened. But you weren't really frightened. You were taken by surprise, that's all. And there's a huge, huge difference.

Can you see where I'm going with this? Sure enough, most developers that try to make “scary” games only manage to churn out “startling” ones, and it's very distinct. See, most developers think that startling someone is the same as scaring them. But being startled only lasts less than a second. A true scare is a feeling that relates to doubt, or that the future does not hold something positive. You can praise Doom 3 all you want, it's nothing more than a bunch of red-eyed demons jumping out of dark corners and making loud noises. These kinds of cheap, soulless “frights” litter the industry.

The guys at Silicon Knights are, from that perspective, geniuses. They've managed to understand what horror is. True horror isn't about shocks – it's about feelings, emotions, and mental images. These people have created a game that messes with the player's mind in ways I couldn't possibly go into detail about. I will say this – Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem torments not only the minds of its characters, but into the minds of its players. After a typical play session of Silicon Knights' survival horror game, I walked away shaken and out of breath, my heart pounding through my chest. This is the most frightening videogame ever made.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Eternal Darkness is a rather intricate tale told in Tarantino/Nolan-style out-of-sequence format. The story begins in the present, when Alex Roivas is investigating her grandfather's mysterious and gruesome death. She discovers a book that holds some sort of dark power, and page by page, she is taken through the lives of everyone who has had an encounter with the book's evils. Some survived their confrontations; others did not. Each chapter takes place in a different time period and with a different character, yet oddly enough, these events seem to be occurring in the same three or four places. As the game progresses, the player learns more and more about the book and the mysterious monsters and villains that turn up in its history. Unraveling the details is one of the many things that will lead you on, and Eternal Darkness is as much a detective story as it is a survival horror adventure.

And it plays marvelously. Straying from Resident Evil's tank-like movement, Eternal Darkness sticks with a control scheme that is both easy to learn and simple to operate. The environments are rendered entirely in 3D and look great, and while the camera is automatic, you'll never have a problem seeing what you want to see. Battles are varied and intense, ranging from the typical zombies to the more… uh, unusual types. And the targeting system works very well, allowing players to pinpoint specific parts of an enemy's body. (This can be great for combat strategy – you can blow a zombie's arms off to limit its attacks, or go for the head and eliminate its sight. The really powerful zombies can grow limbs back, though, so watch out.) The weapons are interesting and of course reflect on the time period. There's a spell-casting system. Puzzles are challenging, but they never defy logic. It all works beautifully and smoothly, which is especially great given the rocky history the survival horror franchise has been through.

But here's the thing: The game is scary. Not startling, not creepy, but honestly, genuinely frightening, and it has a very specific way of doing it. You see, having three or four zombies stumble down a hallway, moaning, with their arms outstretched and their mouths open… Well, that's kind of scary, but we've seen it before. Eternal Darkness takes it one step further. Every time a character encounters an enemy that they don't kill, that enemy's stares are locked into his or her mind, and they start to lose their sanity. What they see, you see. And it ain't pretty.

Let's say you're fairly low on health, and you've been avoiding battles until you can get healed. This has caused your sanity meter to drain. You're running down a hallway, and then, all of a sudden, your character's arms explode. Then her head. Then her torso. Her legs fall to the ground as the “game over” screen pops up. Then, without giving you time to think about what just happened, there's a blinding white flash, and everything's back to normal. And you think: “Wait, what?” It was all a hallucination, set up by the game to make you think you were dying. Brilliant.

But Silicon Knights takes it even further than that, by going straight for the player's mind. One possibility would be for the TV's volume meter to pop up and start depleting, reducing the game's sound to a mute. That's a very lightweight example, as I couldn't possibly ruin the better moments. Take my advice, though: Don't read too far into this game. Don't let a review ruin a major surprise. It's far scarier if you experience it yourself. And if you think that knowing about the sanity meter will allow you to predict when the game is playing tricks on you, think again.

I can't write a review without mentioning a game's flaws, and there were moments when the game did chug along at too slow a pace for my tastes. It will take a few chapters before Eternal Darkness even starts getting into the deeper stuff, and you'll have to play long and hard to see some of the best sanity effects (unfortunately, the way the system works, the game is actually encouraging bad playing). And while the sound effects and voice acting are perfect, the music gets pretty repetitive, what with the creepy-but-overused thump thump theme. But the thing is, it doesn't matter. When Eternal Darkness is at its best, it's one of the most intelligent GameCube games in existence, and a fantastic achievement in the world of survival horror. In the end, Eternal Darkness will be remembered for its many triumphs, and not for its few shortcomings.

Pros

+ It's the scariest game I've ever played.
+ The sanity effects are pure genius.
+ Great, smooth, simple play control.
+ Fun combat and good enemy variety.
+ A compelling and well-told story.
+ Smart, logical puzzles.
+ Looks and sounds great.

Cons

- It can be quite slow-paced at times.
- The sanity system actually “rewards” cowardice, if you think about it.
- Repetitive music.

Overall: 9/10

It's a shame that Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem didn't sell well, because I really would like to have seen more games like this. The sanity system that Silicon Knights has established contains infinite possibilities, and while it is put to use in a variety of fantastic ways in Eternal Darkness, we could see ten times as many wonderful ideas in a sequel. What's especially great about Eternal Darkness is the fact that, beneath its scary interior… This is a very good game. It's smart and enjoyable, albeit a bit slow-paced at times. The story is interesting, and the graphics are quite lovely. There's rarely a flaw to be found here, as Eternal Darkness swiftly dodges many of the obstacles that have plagued the survival horror genre for so long. I only hope that Silicon Knights ignores the game's poor sales and keeps pumping out awesome experiences like this.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/21/06