Eclipsed Review

Eclipsed

Created By:  Hipbreaker

You know what I really hate?  Being scared.  Honestly.  Yeah, I know I’m always ranting about how much I love zombies and anything that involves undead creatures ripping things limb from limb, but that’s not really scary- that’s just awesome.  What I hate is being honest-to-God scared out of my mind.  That feeling where the hair on the back of your neck stands on end and you’re looking over your shoulder every half a second like someone in the witness protection program even though you’re just sitting in your room reading and the biggest danger that could possibly befall you is standing up too fast and hitting your head on the ceiling fan (wait…MY GOD I’D BE KILLED!).  This is why to date I have beaten none of the Silent Hill games*.  This is why when I get to the “dark zone” section of “A Night in Rocksbourg 3″ I mute the game and crank up an “all Celine Dion” playlist (I FIND HER MUSIC SOOTHING, SHUT UP).  This is why when I saw the movie “Paranormal Activity” I stayed up all night clenching a crucifix.  But as much as I can’t stand the quivering mass that being truly terrified turns me into, I tend to love the things that manage to bring that feeling on me.  This is why I loved Hipbreaker’s latest thief 2 FM “Eclipsed”: because of it I am now a 24 year old man-baby who is too afraid to walk through his house at night, is convinced he’s under attack by demonic forces every time his pets knock over something in the next room, and is probably going to sleep with a  light on tonight.  THANKS HIPBREAKER!
*...and once bought and returned one for the purpose of it being too scary, and yes, that did require the simultaneous refunding of my man-card.

But first, it’s time for me to take my shirt off and get sexy with the storyline (or…y’know…talk about it and stuff).  It starts with Garrett deciding to head out to the town of Port Aerinth, since  supposedly it has great beaches, lots of unguarded homes, and only minor problems with demon invasion.  Of course on his way out the keepers stop him with a cryptic warning which he of course shoots down with sarcastic one liners (it strikes me that the keepers might actually get through to him once if they just stopped with the roundabout stuff and were just like “YOU’RE GOING TO GET TORE UP BY A DEMON, MOTHER F—ER!”*).  So Garrett goes anyway, but something definitely feels off about this job- and it’s not just that demon chewing on his foot…but it is mostly that.
*Which brings me to the point of this article: Samuel L. Jackson should totally be a Keeper.

I have a bad feeling about that vortex into hell...

What I think I like most about this mission’s story is how much controversy and debate it caused among thief fans.  All of it centered around the fact that Garrett isn’t really his somber anti-hero self and is more of a…well…a total douchebag, honestly.  Okay, starting here, HUGE SPOILER ALERT FOR THE REST OF THIS PARAGRAPH AND THE NEXT; if all you want to know about the story is what you already read at this point, stop reading now and just skip a couple paragraphs ahead.  So basically, at about the halfway point of this mission, Garrett has seen 0 demons (well okay, HALF a demon, tops) and has acquired enough loot to leave the town happily.  However, he has read about powerful relics buried underground that are used in some way to keep the demons out of our world, and yeah, sure it would be a good idea to leave them there but have you SEEN how much those things are going for on E-bay?!  So he goes underground into a Silent Hill-esque rusty walled demon menagerie and steals these relics only to find, not so surprisingly, that doing so re-released all of the demons on the town.  He then skips through town passing out “How to Serve Man” cookbooks to the head demons and opens the town’s main gates while yelling out all the names and locations of earth’s major cities and how full of fresh meat they are (more or less).  When a keeper asks him why he did all this douche-baggery he responds with “BECAUSE I’M A SURVIVOR, NOT A MARTYR.  AND YOU’RE A BIG DOODY HEAD! *insert childish pouting noise here*“.  Anyway, back to the debate, some people are saying that this doesn’t come off as heroic.  Go figure, right?!

I’ve previously referred to overly selfless characterizations of Garrett as “Saint Garrett”.  Well this is “Danger Junkie Asshole Garrett”, and you know what?  I like this guy more.  “WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT YOU EVIL EVIL MAN!?” you shout at me, tears streaming down your face as you clutch your homemade Garrett plushie.  Why?  Because this guy is interesting!  This Garrett is in it for the thrills, only he has seen and survived so much, the thrill is starting to wear thin.  So he takes on a job that has “guaranteed death and dismemberment” stamped all over it, just for the challenge.  A lot of people have complained about the fact that Garrett doesn’t just turn back when he accomplishes his loot goal.  I thought the reasoning was pretty obvious: he’s not in it for the money, he’s in it for the danger and he hasn’t seen a damn thing yet.  To put it frankly, it’s not always easy to watch and probably isn’t even true to the character that was established in the official Thief games, but this guy has been in hundreds of missions and when was the last time he had a friggen character arch?  Exactly.  Basically, I really liked it because I’m a bitter person who despises all that is good and cheery and will never, EVER give Bob Cratchet Christmas day off.  Now if you will excuse me, I have to go chase some happily playing children off my front lawn.

I, personally, can't think of ANY reason to not follow the trail of blood into the ominous doorway.

Anyway, three paragraphs of story discussion aside, there’s also some gameplay here.  CRAZY I KNOW!  Eclipsed is a heavily exploration based horror mission.  As you all know, half of what makes great horror is build up, and this mission certainly has a whole HELL of a lot of build up.  For almost half the mission you don’t fight any monsters, however: lights go out by themselves, you see things run by in your peripheral vision, strange sounds echo from nearby rooms that are mostly empty when you investigate.  To put it as eloquently as I can, it’s pants-crappingly scary.  Then the monsters actually do show up, and despite what you may have heard from others, it continues to be pants-crappingly scary.  Maybe I say this because I’ve never been much for horror, or maybe it’s the much more reliable reason: everyone else is wrong*.  Sure these monsters aren’t anything completely unlike what you may have seen before in other games, but they follow the simple rule of “dirty + no face =  scary”, and who am I to dispute fact?  The first time one ran out of the shadows howling at me, I felt something that should have been much lower in my body rise up into my throat.
*…except anyone who has the power to erase this review from wherever you’re reading it.  They are not only right, but extremely good looking.

Still, all the monsters in the world couldn’t make up for shoddy level design (well okay, maybe ALL of them could- no one could stop that much synergy).  Fortunately, the level design here is top notch and full of the kind of evily creepy moments that get under your skin.  There are at least a couple chilling scenes that will stick with you until long after you have beaten it.  One area in particular where a man hangs from a noose in a candlelit room while a music box plays is almost beautiful in a disturbing kinda way.  Another area with corpses hanging from the ceiling that aren’t quite as innate as they appear is awesomely sick and twisted.  It’s fantastic, but as anyone who has read my reviews knows, I am a master of nitpickery.  With that said, at one point during the first half of the mission in order to make further progress you have to pass through a small hole in a wall that’s covered by vines and pretty much has to be found by accident since no one who isn’t half hawk could see it otherwise.  An extremely minor complaint I know, but I had to pick that nit…it was eyeballin’ me, YOU ALL SAW IT!

To wrap things up, I loved this mission.  Not only did it admirably perform its job of scaring me out of my friggen’ mind, but it offered an interesting take on a pre-established character which I found pretty damn intriguing.  It’s definitely going to split people, however.  It turns a beloved  gaming icon into a total jerkwad, and after a fantastic slow-burn setup suddenly starts throwing gobs of monsters at you with little fanfare (they’re just kinda like “Yo wassup, we’re the bad guys” when at that point you’re expecting them to burst through a wall like some herd of demonic Kool Aid men and instantly melt your face off with their incredible terrifying-ness), but it just all worked extremely well for me.  My advice is to stop being a big sissy and download it.  Now if you will excuse me, I have to finish boarding up my windows to completely demon-proof my house.  Never can be too careful.

This, friends, is how you do "moody".