Eternal Darkness has an outstanding storyine, excellent graphics and great sound. Unfortunately, the gameplay itself isn't as spectacular. Let's look at the breakdown:
Gameplay (6+): Eternal Darkness starts off with little more than hacking at zombies, but soon enough learning how to target enemies becomes crucial. Then you start gaining quite a few magick abilities that add another layer to the strategy. Unfortunately, as much as there seems to be to it, the best way to fight features little more than lopping off a zombie head, shielding yourself from a horror so he runs into it, and timing magick attacks against the later enemies. If you want to exploit the game, you can do it far too easily, just walking in circles boosts your magick, which in turn can be used to boost your health and sanity whenver it lowers, which is tragic, because the effects of insanity are so well done. Indeed, a main focus of Eternal Darkness revolves around actually "playing the player". No spoilers here, but the white-flash clues you in that the last few seconds of play didn't really happen. However, seeing how this is just a part of the gameplay, the rest of it is just too simple and slow-paced to warrant anything above a 6+.
Value (7): The game isn't all that long either. It takes about 20 hours to finish the first time, and while the game encouages you to play it another 2 times (which I did), it truly feels like playing the same game over and over again (at least gameplay-wise).
Graphics(9-): While not perfect, the graphics in Eternal Darkness are excellent considering it's all done in 3-D. The game revolves around 4 settings, which all have a nearly identical atmoshpere, but look quite different. As you progress through the game's timeline, you'll go through the same setting about 3 times apeice, but since time as progressed, most look different each time you go through them. In all, there aren't many complaints with the graphics
Sound (9-): Eternal Darkness has a lot of good sound effects, which get more intense as sanity decreases. In keeping with the mood, most levels feature little music, which is all fine and good, but once you've played the game for a while you start getting bored of listining to the ambience. The voice acting in this game is just perfect, accompanies the game's excellent storyline.
Misc (9+): Eternal Darkness's storyine is nearly impeccible. I really don't want to explain it at all here, but it starts off with you being completely confused and draws you in to the very end. The storyline is the main reason to play the game over: the second time you play you'll understand what's going on in the earlier chapters, and once you've done all three alignments, a very staisfying ending is given. The storyline is easily THE reason to play Eternal Darkness.
Multiplayer (N/A) : An absence of multiplayer in a game like this is perfectly acceptable.
Overall (8+): Eternal Darkness is all about it's story line and insanity effects. While it's true that the game has a targeting system and magickal powers, it's all pretty basic once you get used to it. However, that doens't have a huge an impact as it normally would on the score, because this game isn't out to revolutionize gameplay, it's out to create a gound-breaking sanity system and incredible stoyline, and that's what it's done. You can buy this game or rent it a few times, it all depends on whether the repetitive gameplay matters to you.
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