#164: Alone in the Dark 3
Trilogy finisher fixes a lot of what’s infuriating about the series — but not all of it
This review was originally posted to Twitter on August 23, 2019
Initial release: 1994
Platform: PC/Mac OS/PC-98
Developer: Infogrames
Much like Resident Evil escalated the stakes in its sequel then dialed it back for Code Veronica (which, let’s be honest, is the real Resident Evil 3 — the game actually bearing that title feeling more like an expansion pack for its predecessor), so too did the third entry in Infograme’s landmark horror series Alone in the Dark, a game that took how silly and action-packed its piratey predecessor was and went back to basics, though not entirely.
In terms of tone it’s sort of between the first and second game. While your enemies are numerous, encounters are more spread apart and trickier to deal with — often requiring solving a puzzle to banish them; the setting is also much moodier and creepier than Alone in the Dark 2’s monster mobster mansion.
It’s 1925, and our mustachioed mystery solver Edward Carnby gets a call from a Hollywood agent, asking him to look into the disappearance of an entire movie crew that was filming a western at an old ghost town in the Mojave. Among the missing is Emily Hartwood, the alternative heroine from the original game, now an actress in the Golden Age of Hollywood. The reintroduction of Emily is a cute throwback to the original game. She was never really supposed to be there; her inclusion was insisted upon with the logic was it would appeal to a female audience. (Jury’s still out on that one, at least as far as that game is concerned.) Anyway, Emily or no Emily, the series has been effectively Carnby’s show, even through the various sequels and reboots.
When he gets to the site of the film shoot, he finds the equipment abandoned, the cast and crew missing, and — you guessed it — undead cowboys wandering around. And instead of Lovecraft or voodoo, you’ve got magical Native American stuff. (And also a plot to blow up California. Yeah.)
The engine is pretty much exactly the same as the last time; only, in this case, the 2D backgrounds are much, much nicer looking, representing a major step up. It’s a far cry from the simple colors and shapes of the original game, that’s for sure.
That being said, the character models are not appreciably better than that in round 2, and no texture modeling either (not a surprise — the home console ports of Alone in the Dark 2 came out two years after the trilogy ended!) In the end though it doesn’t matter; for 1994, it’s pretty good.
Combat has been improved somewhat, as well. It’s still clunky as always, with no autoaim or anything like that, but it moves more smoothly and the margin for error is a little wider. One new addition is difficulty settings, allowing you to set hitpoints for you and the enemy.
With the right settings you’re nigh-invulnerable for most of the game, which can be a blessing given that in spite of its improvements, Alone in the Dark 3 is still a clunky, infuriating game. On the plus side, there are quite a few save slots, so judicious saving can get you out of a jam.
The sound design, as always, is ahead of the rest of the game in terms of quality, and this time, they’ve actually gotten some decent voice actors in here for a change. There’s also more great music, more ambient sound, just more and better sound design overall. The overall presentation is better too, complete with a cinematic intro (sparsely animated, but effective,) a more visually interesting action menu (which otherwise remains unchanged from the first two games) and just better art overall. There’s even an FMV ending!
Unlike its predecessors this entry got no console ports whatsoever. Other than the prerequisite Mac OS and PC-98 ports, there was also the very first Windows port for the franchise, though due to timing errors on modern PCs, the DOS version is what digital distribution services use. It’s kind of a shame that this never made it to console; overall, it’s the strongest entry in the franchise, even if it doesn’t reach the creepy heights of the original.
While at heart it’s still the same old adventure game bullshit, it’s much more fun this time around.
