Few buildings can be entered, and this is meant to be allowed without any load times. Oakmont is a rather large town indeed, divided into districts with each of them having their own theme and slightly different atmosphere. Coupled to those elements are the third person combat, involving firearms and melee weapons, and a character progression system that can be best described as "light RPG."Įxploring Oakmont can be done in multiple ways, from basic on-foot movement to using motorised boats to cross the flooded lower quarters of the city, and finally by fast travelling between phone booths after they've been discovered. This is however more of a surreal game than a horror one, which just happens to pack a damp, misty, cold atmosphere to it that fits the themes it touches upon. Then, of course, the overall atmosphere, events and themes fall into the fantastic/horror genre, being not a direct adaptation of but heavily influenced by the works of H.P. For all intents and purposes, however, it belongs mostly in the exploration/investigation genre, since this is what most of the time spent playing is focused on. It does indeed blend together elements from multiple genres, and therefore is a bit hard to classify. For fans of the GameCube game, there are indeed some similarities to draw in the themes, and even a bit of the atmosphere, but no more than that.īefore going into what makes The Sinking City tick, it is important to understand the type of game that it is. In fact, the Lovecraftian themes and use of sanity effects are eerily similar to Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, although the latter put more emphasis on action and destroying evil God-like beings, and not so much on investigating them. In that regard, The Sinking City nails it perfectly. Lovecraftian horror is indeed a very specific thing, driven more by the fear of the unknown, instead of plainly horrific displays of gore and scenes of panic deriving from them. It's never really made clear, but it does provoke a surrealistic feel that can be indeed attributed to Lovecraft's works falling a bit more into the fantasy genre rather than horror as it is traditionally accepted. As a result, the only currency of value now in the city is bullets, not dollars.įunny enough, despite the fact that people know of their existence, the atmosphere of the city is not so much of dread towards them, either from a lack of consideration for it in the writing stakes, or maybe intentionally because the whole city is being driven to madness by the proximity of those hellish creatures which have psychological effects on people. Upon his arrival, the city is already partly flooded and with the flood came monstrous and deadly creatures that attack people on sight. A letter he received in response to his queries on such visions to one Johannes Van Der Berg, leads him to Oakmont, MA. This is however accompanied by disturbing visions of underwater beings and monsters. He suffers visions and is blessed, or cursed depending on one's perception of it, with psychic powers allowing him to see into the past when examining scenes. Charles Reed, the protagonist of The Sinking City, is a US navy diver who survived World War I and is now a Private Investigator in Boston, MA.
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