Sanitarium

I played this game some years ago. It's a beautyful journey inside a man's mind where you will fight against its fears and feelings. It is hard to tell something about the game without spoiling something about the story, let's just say that you will need to change character often in the game (if i'm not wrong you will play as four different characters... or just one?) and every change will bring a turn in game's atmosphere and dynamics without ever going outside the point and click adventure style. Weel, to tell the truth there will be a pair of combat scenes but these are extremely easy and you will not pay any penalty dor dying, not ever starting the fight over.... but you will see it yourself. As I said this is a disturbing game, not much (well, not only) for what you see as for what what you see involves... but, again, I can't be too much explicit without ruining your experience. All in all, a game anyone in the right age (I would say the minimum age for playing is about 14) should play this game or, to say it right, make this voyage in a human diseased mind. Samuele PS: Sorry for my poor english, hope it is understandable

I have just finished Sanitarium. Since I had never played it before, you can be sure that my opinion is 100% nostalgia-free :) Sanitarium is an adventure game, and a pretty simple one when it comes to the interface. You don't have to navigate through long lists of verbs, you just click on stuff and on people, and the game knows what to do. I don't know about you, but I like it. The game isn't really hard, and you actually CAN get to the end without a guide. I also happen to like this, as I consider most adventure games completely insane at times (even though I love them). But the real selling point is the story. This is a pretty bizarre tale, where the main character fights through his own memories in a sort of "mental quest". Sometimes you'll be convinced that you are absolutely insane indeed. I like the way the "stages" are built. There is no randomness here, everything you see is there for a reason. It's a very psychological game, and a pretty good one at that. The only down side is that the game is a bit short-lived, but If you've liked Silent Hill, this is basically SH in adventure form, only without those weird nurses :) I strongly recommend it.

A cleverly thought out game integrating Max's dreamworld/druggefd world with his actual reality. I liked the way in which, in each new dream world, he learned more about himself, especially his little sister Sarah. The puzzles were interesting and challenging and had some relevance to that given scenario. There are Freudian dynamics hinted at throughout the game play. The only downside for me was the eccentric mode of moving the character about (using the right mouse key!) This made life difficult at times, especially when one had to move the character quickly and accurately (eg, the final puzzle: Morgan's Last Game).

I was having very high expectations on this and i must admit that playing the actual thing, have surpased them easily. The only (minor) flaws are 1) that the game needs some pixel-hunting and 2) the abuse of sequence puzzles. The isometric camera is an bizzare choice for an adventure but it works like a charm and its kind of odd that no oned used it again for the genre after Sanitarium. The graphics are very detailed, gory and top notch even for today. As for the creepy atmosphere and the disturbing script... well you have to see it with your own eyes to believe it. Highly recommended and probably my favorite GOG game so far.

Ok so before you judge the game by the graphics or how dated it might look, hear me out. This game is pretty much like a gamified literature or like a gamified story book. A deep story book. No, not like a visual novel either. It has much more interaction than a visual novel as it is a point click adventure with some action sequences that feel abit like a primitive isometric ARPG combat system. The game is something that would probably be perfectly described as a game ahead of its time. This game knows ATMOSPHERE. It does so so well with the sounds and dialogue. You will feel the confusion of the protagonist. That confusion when a person doubts whether they're sane or not anymore. This game is labeled as horror and rightfully so but its not the type of "scary" horror like there are no jump scares, etc. Its more like disturbing dark horror. It has lots of dark humour which feels alot like Shivering Isles DLC from TES 4 Oblivion. Since the protagonist is in a sanitarium apparently (or is he?), expect lots of crazy randomness in dialogues. There are so many dialogues, events and interactions you'd not expect to see which, imo, gives this game its own magic. Some chapters can be abit more tedious or boring than the first 2 or 3 chapters. The game starts really strong, btw. It feels like reading a very interesting novel or book and you're addicted to read 1 more page to know what happens next. As for the cons, this game is buggy on certain chapters like chapter 3 for example. To avoid this, I recommend saving manually alot as the game apparently has no auto save (as far as I've noticed at least). I can forgive these problems as its an old game but if they could ever fix them, that would be the cherry to the topping. Tl,dr: This game is like reading a rather engaging and deep interactive novel. It is a nice description for how insanity feels like and it has AMAZING ATMOSPHERE. It does great with the sounds specially disturbing ones. Buggy sometimes so save alot!