Developer: Intoxicate Studios
Publisher: Lace-Mamba Global ltd.
Platform: PC, 360
AfterFall InSanity (extended edition 2.0) – Review
AfterFall InSanity is an indie horror survival game developed by Intoxicate studios and published by Lace-Mamba Global. The game has been released for PC and will show us a glimpse of what World War III could do to our world. Will this prepare us against a certain doom?
Story:
AfterFall InSanity situates itself in the republic of Poland after ‘Entropy’ a fusion bomb like the world has never seen accidently exploded. As a direct result mankind waged war once more and started the 3rd World War. In response and out of fear mankind created shelters to ensure safety for a select few. The shelter you will be a part of is ‘Glory’, a shelter that has been protecting people for around 23 years but now it seems an internal war is at hand. People are starting to suffer from a disease named the ‘Confinement Syndrome’ which pretty much speaks for itself.
You play as Albert Tokaj, a psychiatrist who seems to have a few disagreements with the higher authorities. Albert spends his days trying to solve this spreading ‘disease’ and seems quite consumed with certain issues himself. The game starts with him falling asleep during one of his sessions and he then dreams about getting framed for certain things. This does not prove to be a dream any longer after being sent on a recon mission to a lower level of the shelter to investigate strange happenings that seem to go hand in hand with the confinement syndrome. When investigating the matter it seems not only humans have gone crazy but some have mutated aswell. Upon his return he seems to be a wanted man, he believes he’s being framed by the colonel who is in charge of the shelter.
The basic plot is one that has been used in several other games but you will start asking many questions when the game gets going. It will prove to be not so typical after all. The game’s duration is only about 6 hours, which is fairly short, but the overall storyline will keep you interested untill the very last minute. Prepare to expect the unexpected.
Graphics:
AfterFall InSanity was played on my PC which should better be used as a toaster instead of a gaming PC, but surprisingly still looked very appealing. You will be able to run the game with a fairly old computer and it will still look good. On higher settings the game looks pretty equal to today’s standards with a few details that seem to be off. For example the faces of the characters tend to move like you’re watching the Thunderbirds once more and the overal movements can sometimes seem awkward and as if they just took a whole lot of drugs. Then again that’s all that is ‘off’. The environments really get the horror mood going and are filled with lots of details. You will spend most of the game in utter darkness and will not be dissapointed with the overal scene it provides you.
Even though AfterFall InSanity tends to throw the same enemy at you a lot of the times they did their effort to create a decent amount of skins for the typical human enemy – which in my opinion deserves a plus.
Sound:
The game presents us with a great soundtrack. It will get that little bit of adrenaline going more than once during your playthrough. The music goes perfectly with the horror mood the game is trying to set. It will get intense when it needs to and for some might be a clear indication that the game will scare you a few second later. A delight for a true horror fan.
However the voice acting wasn’t really a hit out of the park. The voices themselves don’t sound that bad but they miss those needed emotions to contribute to the overall setting of the game. The fact that the voice-acting happend outside their mother tongue probably has a lot to do with this. Overall some of the dialogues tend to feel a bit forced and unnatural.
Gameplay:
AfterFall InSanity is a horror survival game and will not dissapoint for the fans of the genre, however do not expect too much depth in the overall gameplay possibilities. The game consists out of 27 chapters each lasting around 10 minutes with several checkpoints during each chapter. If you log out of the game be sure to finish the chapter you’re playing because the checkpoints only seem to work when dying or reloading the checkpoint without actually turning the game off. I still have no clue if this was intended or not – but it’s a tip if you don’t want to get annoyed every time you start playing the game again. Also be prepared to lose all your collected weapons nearly every chapter again – so blast ‘em guns already!
Now we got the ‘negative’ part out of the way: AfterFall InSanity is played in a third-person view and is a linear game with hardly any backtracking, which is not really needed in my opinion because the game offers simple but solid gameplay. Pretty much each chapter you start with almost nothing when it comes to weaponry or sometimes even absolutely nothing. The game however provides you with loads of ‘melee weapons, so be prepared to find loads of fireman axes, lead pipes, hammers, wrenches and so on lying around for you to bash your enemies with. As the game progresses the few guns you find will start to become more important aswell because some of the enemies aren’t that easy to kill when you go full rambo.
Outside of the normal gameplay the game sets you out to do a decent amount of puzzles aswell. All of them fairly easy when you understand the system or what is expected of you. Simply put be prepared to try and solve a few puzzles more than once to figure out what you have to do. These puzzles mainly involve you hacking stuff with a system that pretty much revolves around you trying to remember ‘unlock sequences’ instead of sheer luck. Quick time events are a thing we are getting used to more and more (except for me) and it’s only natural AfterFall InSanity implemented a few of those aswell, which might be a welcome change of action for some.
I honestly have to say that the ingame AI left me with mixed feelings. For example they tend to read your moves quite decently if you just go around swinging your weapon like a madmen but they tend to back off when you’re beating one their allies to a bloody pulp, and pretty much stand in line for you to get up and fight again.
The game also offers you the use of your PDA to check your objectives, use a radar and check information about your enemies and so on. The PDA is a nice add-on to the overall gameplay but is something that will be rarely used to be honest.
Conclusion:
AfterFall InSanity is a game with a great story which tends to play with your mind more than you’d except of it. The overall gameplay tends to be kept quite simple but does not really dissapoint if you’re a fan of a decent horror survival game.
AfterFall InSanity (extended edition 2.0) – Review,
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