Obviously graphics and controls are going to be dated by modern standards. But, it could still be worth it to see the grandfather of survival horror games. The first game holds up moderately well. Combat is pretty awful with enemies stunlocking you or you stunlocking them and no in between. You will have to save frequently because it is so easy to die from getting stuck in a corner or instant kills. Despite those flaws, the first game does have an interesting setting with a nice horror atmosphere and Lovecraftian influences. Overall, an okay, short experience. The next two games are frankly not worth playing. The franchise immediately nosedives after the first game which is probably why the series died out so quickly unlike Resident Evil, the franchise it inspired. The next two games basically completely abandon the horror setting for campy action and force combat way more frequently than the first one. However, there are no improvements to the combat system. So, you're forced to mess around with the tank controls trying to aim with no reticle while the enemies can track onto you. And Edward takes about 3 whole seconds to fire his gun, so the stunlocking issue persists. The Resident Evil series clearly understood the necessity of adding a lock on to this control system. Unfortunately, the Alone in the Dark devs were not as inspired, and so combat continues to suck and has become the main focus of 2 and 3 leading to an overall enjoyable experience. Likewise, the puzzles become more and more obtuse. The game feels like a point and click adventure game with the logical hoops you have to jump through to know what to do. However unlike point and click adventure games, there is no way to inspect the environment or your inventory to get hints about how you should be using your items. It's still worth it for the first game when it goes on sale for 1.49 (which it does frequently) if you really want to play old classics. I'd skip the next two though.
