The Penumbra Collection

I had played the first two Penumbra games over 15 years back and I bought them again from GOG for the Requiem expansion, which I didn’t have. I replayed the first two as well. Each subsequent game starts from the specific moment where the previous ended, so I advise you to play them straight back to back. I consider Overture to be the best horror game I’ve ever played, in terms of fear and stress caused by enemies. The whole atmosphere is absolutely breathtaking and the feeling that you’re alone in a most desolate place of the world is devastating. And taking into consideration that there is no quicksave, just stationary save points, I found myself to walk in small steps at a time and to be always alert of any strange noise around me. Apart from the enemies, there are also many riddles, mostly environmental and some inventory based. Black Plague is focused more on the psychological part of terror. There are even more environmental riddles and considerably less enemies, than in Overture, BUT some of the encounters are really stressful, since they have to be dealt with in a specific way. Highlight of Black Plague: the amazing voice actor that voices the… voice inside the hero’s head! Requiem is a puzzle platformer, not a horror game. There are 9 puzzles/maps. No enemies. But it continues and concludes the overall story. Lastly, I had made a mistake in my Amnesia: The Dark Descent review (clearly I forgot, due to the years passed since I first played the first two Penumbra games): There is vision distortion when looking at enemies in the Penumbra games too.

These days people know Frictional Games for the masterpiece SOMA and the Amnesia games, the first two of which are excellent. I haven't played the rest of them yet. It's easy to forget how great this debut was. The graphics are not quite as strong which is completely understandable considering when it came out and the budget they were working with. The story and characters just don't quite grab you the way that the aforementioned three games do but you can see what they were going for and it is very much a case where they listen to feedback and improved. And the hook here is pretty good. Basically you play a character who is searching for answers about his father's past. What Amnesia 1 did with a Prussian Castle and SOMA did with an underwater science facility, this does with various structures underground in Greenland. It really captures the intense cold and isolation. There's a good variety to the different places you go without it ever feeling like you've just teleported to a completely different place or something. The meat and potatoes are the same here as in their later games, physics-based puzzles that start out fairly straightforward and end up getting immensely involved and challenging. In my several replays I always look forward to the very last major puzzle. We also have the element of enemies that you have to avoid and may not be able to look directly at in this. Sometimes you can defeat them and it's just very difficult, other times you do have to avoid them, maybe hide somewhere or escape to an area they can't reach. I think they actually handled that better here than in the Dark Descent. Personally I don't think you have to play Requiem but since it comes with the package you might as well give it a shot just don't feel bad if you lose interest quickly. The one thing it still has going for it are some quite interesting puzzles but it has nothing on the story and character stuff of the first and the atmosphere is not quite as good.

Before they streamlined their formula of horror walking simulators for Amnesia and SOMA, Frictional games gave us the Penumbra series. If you've played those, its easier to just describe what is different in Penumbra: 1. The puzzles are much more dynamic and numerous. No simple 'find the part, bring it to the spot' puzzles. 2. There is combat. It isn't very good. Thankfully, it is optional if you avoid the dangers. 3. The storytelling devices are more obviously Lovecraftian. It is practically a love letter to his style of writing. 4. Graphics are dated. 5. Though still unerving, it didn't feel quite as immediately scary as Amnesia. There are scary monsters that hunt you but the game is a bit more of a psychological horror. More dread, less jump scare.

Very cheap and optimized games, but can you please add other languages? This game had a brilliant Czech dubbing, I would happily buy it for extra

I love Frictional's games. When I bought Penumbra on Steam, I didn't know exactly what to expect, what I found was an amazingly deep game with some of the best horror elements and stories. I soon bought Amnesia. Be warned, Frictional's games are NOT for the faint of heart. I honestly preferred Penumbra over Amnesia (especially early on), primarily because of the story. Penumbra's story tended to draw me in very quickly, Amnesia seemed to do that less so, but it did get much better in the end. Overall, they are great games. Requiem is alright, just don't really expect much of a story, it's more just puzzles. There is a slight storyline to it (hard to call it that really) that works to "explain" some things, but it really doesn't do anything but add some atmosphere. I'm definitely buying Penumbra here on GOG and supporting DRM free!