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Clive Barker's Undying

The Specs

The developers at Dreamworks are putting Trespasser behind them by using the Unreal engine to create a first person horror game. Undying is set in the 1920s in and around an English manor, but there are also some strange extradimensional jaunts. The game is loosely divided into interwoven sections in which you take on a series of undead siblings haunting the manor, each with his or her own theme, as well as a necromancer named Kiesinger. The two-fisted combat involves using weapons on your left hand/mouse button and spells on your right hand/mouse button, with an almost Diablo-esque scheme of building and customizing your magical powers as the game progresses. Clive Barker was brought in fairly late in the process and has served as a sort of consultant and creative advisor.

The Speculation

Mark's Comments: The last horror game to sport an author's name was indeed horrific. Stephen King's F13 from Blue Byte was a hastily assembled collection of screen savers, whack-a-rat mini-games, and a story that King apparently couldn't sell elsewhere. At least Undying looks like a game. What Undying really looks like is a first-person shooter, which will probably be as faithful in capturing the feel of Barker's writing as GTI's Wheel of Time did in representing Robert Jordan's voluminous work, which is to say, not very.

Tom's Comments: I'm skeptical that horror can really fit into a first person shooter, especially when it seems to be as combat-oriented as Undying. The horror setting in Blood, which was more comedy than horror, worked because you were one of the monsters (I'm talking of course about Monolith's first Blood - the words "Blood 2" and "worked" do not belong in the same sentence). But Undying just looks like a combat shooter with some imaginative spells as weapons. Although Clive Barker's name is attached, the kernel of the game began with Austin Grossman (whose credits include System Shock and Trespasser, so it kind of evens out) and a relative newcomer named Dell Siefert. Grossman has since left the project and Siefert has been left behind as the creative impetus. The technology looks solid and Barker's name recognition will undoubtedly sell a few copies, but whether it's a good game depends on the strength of Siefert's creativity.