With Amnesia Rebirth coming out soon, I’ve been kind of interested to replay (but maybe not finish) The Dark Descent. I have always liked A Machine for Pigs more than TDD, though by ‘liked’ I mean that I consider that game to be mostly bad except for its very interesting thematizing of the 20th century as itself a horrifying thing. Anyway, this is a strange opinion to have I know. TDD was good, I remember, but I never cared that much about it even as someone who likes the walking sim horror game template. The thing I forget about my time playing TDD when it came out is that I was playing it in the worst possible set up, CRT monitor on milk crates, sitting on a dining room chair, middle of Nevada summer with sun blaring straight through the blinds behind me. I had to mod the game to give me infinite lantern oil just to be able to see anything at all… so not an ideal encounter.
I launched the game last night and noticed there is a new hard mode that, to my delight, actually adds intense mechanics and conservation into the game? Basically, saving cost 4 tinder boxes (ink ribbons!!), damage is pretty much lethal and max insanity kills you. I do not like max insanity but I do like the other two features that mode adds.
So as I’ve been playing it what I’ve been forced to do is move fast through some areas, kind of exercising some of my RE pathing skills, akin to a bad speedrunner, flying through the dark, taking big risks to trail behind or past monsters because to stay any longer risks total insanity and the last time I saved was three rooms ago… It’s actually been really fun this way. There isn’t the degree of mechanical involvement I prefer horror games to have (I love true survival horror, this is just closer but no cigar) what is here is facilitating a better time. Sanity, as a concept and mechanic, sucks but it’s not proving too annoying. The save system is what’s really making it a lot of fun I think.
I had to do the water-flooded hallway all at once in a really rushed sprint, hopping from box to box, hearing splashes approach me from behind, desperate not to have to repeat the past few rooms and to avoid getting grabbed by the invisible water walker monster. That room was amazing in my first run through the game and, probably because this difficulty, it was still exhilarating. Love that monster. Love that encounter. Amnesia is a good game!