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Penumbra: Overture - Episode 1

Framing the action

Penumbra: Overture is a story-driven game, where the player's actions serve to push the narrative along. The player is inserted, rather abruptly, into a mystery involving a deceased father and a strange mining operation in Greenland. Not far into the game, a third party who calls himself "Red" directs the action via a walkie-talkie. The mystery is expanded through each of Red's subsequent communications, and the atmosphere builds as the narrative progresses. The voice acting is to be commended, but as with the writing, the work is a bit over the top – exaggerated may be the right word choice.

It was a merciful death for the blind, ice-skating dog.

Unlike a school exam, it's alright to refer back to notes.

Thankfully though (and intentional or otherwise), the writing is a bit tongue-in-cheek, with the occasional wordplay and other bits of humor. To anthropomorphize the game: it doesn't take itself too seriously. The story does a fine job of providing a mix of suspense and mystery, and the gameplay complements the story with action. Overall, the atmosphere is well-developed, but don't look for any overtly frightening moments or gory episodes. Like any good thriller, Penumbra: Overture relies on the player's imagination to generate the element of fear.

As clues are collected, a notebook is filled with them; a to-do list and the contents of the various notes picked up throughout the game. The notebook must be referenced at certain times to decipher a clue or to solve a particular puzzle. This works well when the next path is clear, but a couple of times I felt left down by the story and unsure of what to do next. Puzzle-solving isn't as involved as it could be. While I certainly wasn't looking for the obscure and tedious clue-hunting of the Myst series, I would have appreciated something more than searching for keycodes and toting objects to destinations. The story is interesting, if not entirely compelling, but the game is almost completely linear, with no branching paths or alternate options. Level design follows suit, with confined and bland environments that leave little room for exploration.

Finding your way in the dark isn't all that easy.

Collect everything that you can pick up.

With such a capable story and more-than-adequate engine backing it up, the game would have benefited from a more spacious, detailed environment. An approach to more open-ended exploration would give the story the richness it deserves. This may be a minor point for some, but the game lacks a save-anywhere feature, instead relying on autosave points and a handful of manual save points. While limited and structured save points may be part of the allure and design of a point-to-point shooter or platformer, they have no place in this genre. Arguments abound against save-anywhere, but the point is now moot. Unnecessarily punishing the player by not allowing save-anywhere is unacceptable and a bit arrogant. Put restricted saving in a higher difficulty level, but don't force this mechanic on all players.

The task here? Don't get burned!

Some nice level detail here and there.

It's important to note that Penumbra: Overture is intended to be part one in a three-part episodic release (the second and third episodes are currently slated for release in Fall 2007 and Sprint 2008, respectively). Given the fickle nature of the game publishing business, this seems like a risky proposition. Episodic content in the video game business is still relatively uncharted territory, and a couple of big players have been unable to deliver on the promise of completing a storyline. In this case, though, given the relatively low costs of development when contrasted with a big development house, unit sales don't need to be as numerous for continued development to be funded. I'll give Frictional Games the benefit of the doubt, and it seems likely that the story will be fulfilled in this instance. Just know this: if you're in for the first episode, be prepared to purchase the next two and surely Frictional Games knows that their reputation is closely tied to the completion of this series.

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