Sanitarium

I don't know when I first played this gem but I believe it was a long long time ago. Even after so many years I can still smell the fumes coming out of the gas tank, hear the voice of the Mother, see the disfigured children and all the little details in the game. That was an unbelievably fantastic experience for me when I first played it. And I can't remember how many times I've played Sanitarium over and over again with different speach choices. Those puzzles were challenging but it was also so much fun to solve them. For me ,this game set the bar too high, almost too high none of the new games could reach that yet.

One of the greatest adventure games I've ever played. I still remember how I randomly bought it when it originally came out. Mostly because of the cover. Yet, both my little sister and I were mesmerized by the game. Up to this day we still quote it from time to time - particularly the Mother quotes. Get it, and get lost in the Sanitarium. Pants optional.

So, I bought this game a few months when it came out (after playing the demo, back when games actually had demo's) and NEVER could beat it as when I would get to the children there was a specific part that it would never load after. I had tried multiple discs (as they used to let you return opened games) and new save files, nothing helped so I never played it. Thanks to GOG, I was able to play through finally and it was a masterpiece. All I can is, you'll have a lot of WTF! moments. Absolutely stunning visuals for it's time and the controls work well. I'm really glad that I was finally able to beat this game but be warned it's a whirlwind and some crazy locations!

A great point and click adventure! I enjoyed myself Pros: The story line is unique. There are some tropes that you see right away, but the setting and the eventual reveal are not cliche. The atmosphere of the different areas are what really sells this game. The story line is excellent! One of the few games where I got sucked into it wondering what will happen next and where I will go next. Cons: Clunky controls. Some areas got frustrating because the controls weren't super responsive. I know it's horror so it's not supposed to be super responsive, but I'm talking about the characters moving jarring while walking backwards in certain spots. The "key" items may also be hard to spot. Maybe because I'm not used to seeing this level of resolution in a game. But if you just use a walk through to get through frustration, the story line and settings are totally worth it! BTW if you have graphics issue where the pixels start showing up funky, all you have to do is bring up the display resolution window....and leave it up when you start the game.... I don't get it either, but it worked for me. You don't have to set your resolution to anything, just open it as if you're changing resolution, leave it as the top window, and then start the game. It fixed it for me.

This game is, truly, a masterpiece. I'll start off by saying I have never been too much of a fan of adventure games, but I actually had enough patience to play through this completely, or rather, this game did a great job at keeping me hooked until the very end. The story is definitely the main point of this game. It begins simply, you end up in a car crash, lose your memory, get locked up in an asylum... or not. You end up in a village with kids... wait, no, that's not it either, you are in an asylum after all. Or are you? The story makes you question what is really happening and what is just a product of the character's imagination. It's well-paced and has a good length. Not too long, not too short, just right. If you want a psychological game, Sanitarium is definitely worth a play. Pros: - Amazing storyline - Simple control scheme (right-click to move, left-click to interact, Escape for menu -- and that's basically it) - Varying environments with different themes - Looks good for its age Cons: - A little glitchy. There are several locations in game where you can get stuck and the only way to fix this is to load an earlier save or, if you're unlucky, restart the whole thing. Save often. - The AI of your character's movement could use improvement. You'll often end up clicking on a door and the character will proclaim that "the path is blocked" if you're just an inch further from the door than the game expects you to be. You may also end up walking up/down stairs by accident quite often. - It's a Windows 95 application. As a result, this game will expect admin priveleges, which is rather unfortunate. Verdict: Amazingly good game, a must play.