Sat down christmas morning. Began to open my presents. My horror arose when I opened up one present to see Alone In The Dark for 360. Then Far Cry 2. Not so much FC2 but Alone In the Dark had all the reviews of the game flooded to mind instantly.

Heres the thing I'm disgusted to be associated with the gaming industry. Has anyone played the same game as me? Did the reviewers even understand what Alone In The Dark is as a game? It truly baffles me to no end how such an amazing experience such as this game gets recieved so poorly. Do gaming journos have 5 year olds working for them?

Alone In The Dark has me captivated for all the right reasons. It's more like a interactive TV series than an out and out game. Graphics are much much better than I expected, mood setting is perfect and the music is top drawer. The controls are also absolutely perfect for a suspense horror game. Look at the best Resident Evil games. No I'm not talking about Resi 4 which didnt make you panic or scared once, I mean the originals. The controls were slightly clunky, giving you a sense of panic that you would not get had the control system been like Gears for example. Same applies to AITD. The controls are slightly clunkly, whether intentional or not this creates a feeling of urgency and panic like what you get when screaming at a horror film to run (when it's blatant they wont).

I'm shocked that Alone In The Dark is sat on shelves. It is a breath of fresh air in a stale Horror genre in gaming. Resi has moved to a 3rd person shooter and never builds any tension in it's games anymore. Silent Hill is still a strong series for the scare factor, but AITD certainly did everything right as a game to intrigue, scare and captivate you, the same way Lost TV series did the first time you watched it.

FC2 is another one. Easily this years best FPS. If you dont like open game worlds this wont change your mind, but the game is superb from start to finish. Graphically, how anyone is dismissing this this year is beyond me. On a technical level alone it is pushing so much in boundries. Throw a grenade next to a couple of guys, who are near a jeep, tree and vegetation, sandbag wall and be ready for the most realistic explosion youve seen. Follow that with the entire camp catching alight and the visual splendor is massively overlooked. In some cases is the closest jungle graphics Ive seen to Crysis in some dense areas. Majorly overlooked game that will not get the sales it deserves.

So thats off my chest now. Hype is a very bad thing for gaming. I have realised that because of hype I have missed games which have been a significantly better experience. Damn the industry is in a mess of hype.

Reviews = Irrelevant. I've never based a purchase on what a review tells me, and I love some universally hated games. Strange thing is, I can't really explain what helps me decide what games to buy. I just always end up enjoying them.

EDIT: I've probably missed a few good games due to an unbearable amount of hype, however.

I don't played alone in the dark but I heard there were really a lot of issues with the game. 

Far Cry 2 got good reviews, it deserves it, but it certainly doesn't deserve GOTY FPS award, after a few missions you will find out it is always the same and gets boring. I like the game aswell but can't play it more than a hour a day because it is so damned repetetive.

yeah. I played the demo and was quite pleased with it. Personally I'll be buying Left 4 Dead before Alone in the Dark, but from what I experienced I would be happy to have it in my Library. I was wondering if throughout the game or near the end there was something that caused the reviewers to feel that way.

Could you let me knoe what you think when you get through it? Thanks!

While I haven't played any of those games, except AitD on Wii(which kinda sucked), I completely agree. I also think there is alot of under the table money involved. Just look at last years Gamespot scandal. It's obvious that game "journalist" are becomming less and less trustworthy. I do want to say to their defense, that most of them are at least at the maturity level of a 12 year old.

But I think with the new expanded gamer base, we will see more grown up, serious publications shoot up. I'm just seeing this whole thing as a clean-out.

i agree with you , i recently bought Alone in the Dark for $10 dollars, and its such a good game, i'll rent Far Cry 2 sometime