RETRO – Nobody likes to be in a hospital down with a sickness. However what our hero encounters in the Hospital after his car accident was probably something he did not expect.

In the dark, dirty tower, shifty-eyed crazy people sit, while our hero’s head is completely bandaged up, and not only does he not remember the circumstances of the accident, he does not even remember his own name. What dark secrets does the Sanitarium hold? How did our hero get here? Who is he really, and what happened to his face? These answers will be revealed through nine chapters in Dreamforge’s latest adventure game.

Don’t you remember?

The story of Sanitarium is a psychological horror where our amnesiac hero has to combat different foes through multiple visions, all the while he does not even know who he is. During the story everything is slowly revealed to the player. Our hero will eventually regain all his memories. The starting point only sows the seeds of the story, and the atmosphere for the later levels of the game.

The mental ward is an old moulding, and a rotten place, where the alarm siren blares constantly, and a crazy person is hitting his head against the wall. The game becomes more and more grotesque, and in the end the result seems like a Stephen King novel. The story is divided into separate chapters, and each chapter takes place at a different location. Each level has an objective that has to be completed, and the difficulty increases with each level – the objectives are mostly action oriented, and does not go overboard with the puzzles. Also these objectives fit well into the narrative of the story.

Atmosphere

The graphics are not the usual 2D as in most adventure games. Instead here it is 3D isometric, and reminded me of Blizzard’s Diablo. While the locations are not too big, the SVGA graphics are really detailed, from the temples, buildings, characters, to the smallest crushed soda can. Every level has its own themes, and atmosphere. This is achieved by using a different color palette for the levels. Some of them look like old black and white movies – it gives us the feeling as if we were watching an archive movie. The sound design is also one of the best in the genre, and the developers really gave it their best.

A lot of horrific sounds can be heard during the game: the sound of the wind, the playground swing’s movement “In the lost innocent children’s village”, or the screams of the crazy inmates in the asylum. If we listen closely, you can hear that their monologues are clear and authentic, they will also keep repeating what they said during the conversation with us.

Use your brain! (While it’s still in your head…)

The initial puzzles in the game are easy, but they become tougher over time. However the puzzles are not hour long brain twisters. If we talk to everyone and collect all the information then we will be able to figure out the answer. The puzzles fit well into the story and does not feel tacked on, and ends up being actually great. There are a few puzzles that are reminiscent to the old Myst game (for example assembling the old sewer system’s switch) that are not too difficult to complete. It is a game that has some interesting yet easy puzzles, however these are never too easy or simple to solve.

It seems that we reached an age when no adventure game can be released without action and combat. If this is a bad or good design decision you’ll have to decide for yourself. Luckily these are not marathon long click sessions, but a few fifteen minute sessions. Sanitarium regardless of its drawn graphics style is still a full blown horror RPG with lots of blood and gore. I do not think any of our readers would stop in social development, but do not pass this game onto someone who is faint of heart or to your little sister.

Stephen King can go into retirement

Sanitarium has such a well-crafted narrative, that even the Master of Horror would envy it. I was bound to my chair as the history of the protagonist was revealed. I was never bored during the game, and I was fully immersed into the story, and was way better than the recent adventure games that I played. It was also a good idea to have a bandaged main character, with personality issues.

A great way to counter the generic George Stobbard type of hero or like Tex Murphy / Jack Orlando. The puzzles are finally logical, fit into the narrative of the story, also the developers decided not to overcomplicate the puzzle’s answers, and do not require to think like the developer. I think a good adventure game is where we have to spend endless nights figuring out how to progress forward

The graphics are nice, and varied, the 3D isometric view method is a great way to enhance the level of detail. At the same time it fits into the game’s atmosphere, and we are not playing a coloring book. The animation is the most professional work I have seen, some of the different scenes seem like a real thriller, and luckily the developers were not stingy with these setups.

The surround sound is topnotch, and there were at times I looked out to street to check if anyone was screaming there. The mumbling also adds another depth to the creep factor, and not just an incoherent background noise.

Damn… too… slow!

Well that was the good part, now comes a bit of a bad. The annoying part comes with the lack of a running option for our character. It can take a lot of time to get to one part of a level. Sometimes we also get stuck in objects. Which can be remedied by the player just circling around the object (This was especially problematic in the Circus of Madness). Also we are only able to pick up an item if we are standing next to the item, otherwise we end up with an error message. I think these are amateur mistakes, and should have been fixed from the beginning.

The voice acting was great, however not every actor was doing their best. Unfortunately the main character’s voice was also a bit bland, and reminded us of the generic George Stobbard. Also another complaint is that the game is a bit short, however it is true that if they paced it out further it might have been to the detriment of the storyline. All in all Sanitarium is a contender for the Adventure Game of The Year.

-Bad Sector-

Publisher: ASC Games

Developer: Dreamforge Intertainment

Genres: Adventure

Publication: 1998