The Dark Descent Of Amnesia

What scares you the most? Is it the dark, the unknown, or death? Or is it Osama Bin Laden, Hitler, or George W. Bush? Maybe bestial creatures, like Twilight werewolves and Chucky, dreadful mice and viscous arachnids, or your mother-in-law and Justin Bieber? Or perhaps you fear starvation in Africa, the Republican budget plan, your future, the thoughts of your parents doing you-know-what, or the exam you have tomorrow morning?

Well, forget all of that. You’re about to immerse yourself in a world of doom; a world where fear and darkness are merely the front door mat, and where your most vivid nightmares will evaporate before the insanity of your own thoughts. You’re about to play the most terrifying game ever made, Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

If you’re brave like the few ones who have come back alive to tell their tales, you will put on a set of nice headphones, close the windows, turn off the lights, and pretend you’re the protagonist himself, Daniel. And, trust me, it won’t be difficult.

The game starts with Daniel waking up in the Brennenburg Castle with a self-induced amnesia, which, according to a note to himself, should bring him comfort in the reassurance that he chose it that way.

Now, Daniel — that is, your virtual ego — isn’t exactly your typical game protagonist. Daniel is in fact a lot like you: he fears, and when he fears, he doesn’t fight back; he runs, runs, and runs a little more, and then hides where he is most afraid, the dark.

Why on Earth would you ever want to play a game, in which when you see a spooky-looking creature stumbling towards you, there’s no way to pick a .50mm or even an old-school .44 and just blast his darned head(s) into the air? The answer is about experiencing the game.

In fact, before you start the game, it will advice you not to try to win it, but rather to immerse yourself within it. A simple-but-effective soundtrack and precisely detailed sound effects do the trick. You hear Daniel’s footsteps, you hear his breathing, and you hear his frightened sighs and his teeth grinding; and soon, your breathing will follow his breathing’s rhythm, and your sighs and teeth will accompany his, until you are completely in his shoes. And you will notice that your vision is also beginning to change… the disturbing effects of your sanity being drained away present themselves on the screen.

Still even though you might share Daniel’s sentience, to believe you are him and to truly experience the game, you must feel what he feels. Since both of you know nothing, you will both learn about the plot simultaneously, and will have the same reactions to what happens.

Helplessness is certainly a part of it. The vulnerability of having to run away, without entirely knowing why or from what, usurps the player’s superiority, violating his resistances. Yet, the real genius of Amnesia: The Dark Descent is simple: It is the only game that virtually submerges you into the persona who is on the other side of your computer screen, not simply because of its masterful realistic graphics and Lovecraftian atmosphere, but because you will intimately share the protagonist’s deepest feelings.

Caught in the ambiguity of not wanting to know because he chose to forget in the first place, the more Daniel tries to escape from the obscurity of his own memories, the more they come back to haunt him, and the more you immerse yourself in an intricate storyline that in and of itself would give you the chills. To the player’s mind, just like Daniel’s, entangled in the macabre depths of Amnesia, all that is left is the impetus to urge the most primal animal instinct: fear.

After you finish the game, and — let us be honest — after you regain your sanity, you can watch your friends play the game, and ridicule them about it, like the folks in this video. Even though the boy was playing it rather… frolicsomely, you can get a sense of the reactions you will have while playing this game. Have fun, and don’t forget to change your underwear before you go to bed.