A great many readers enjoy Clive Barker's novels much more than his comics, and most of those who play games also enjoyed Undying. (What, you've never heard of his comics? That's because they weren't successful, for reasons that will become apparent shortly after you pick one up.) This game seems to have been written more in the spirit of the comic books, but not quite the Vertigo-series quality that have been struggling to give the medium credibility. Rather, this shoot-em-up mix of occult and soldiering gives so little respect of the authenticity of either and mashes together so many contrived character and gameplay elements that it should've sought market appeal in the puberty-age range rather than in a 'Mature' title.
The gameplay is rather unique in a few ways, it is fun in switching characters and their respective skillsets and play styles, each with their own graces. The lack of any pick-ups means that any weapons the player gets are the weapons they begin with, and any new powers appear spontaneously and without justification whenever the plot calls for it. The lack of pick-ups also means that exploration off the shallow sidetrails is never rewarded, making the rail-shooter nature of the game more transparent.
The interface somewhat mars the gameplay, but it does even fewer favors for immersion. The lack of consistency in how they're used makes sense when comparing powers that are fired once and those that are sustained, but puzzling when comparing sustained powers that are toggled with those that are sustained by holding the appropriate button while trying to maneuver...especially frustrating for those with long start-up animations. Where immersion really gets ripped away is the push-button cinematics, the type that designers whose experience with 'video games' consist of the digital trinket called 'Simon Says' think is a good idea. I'll say it again -- Simon says can NEVER be associated with action, and only spoils a good cutscene. If you want the player to face a survival challenge rather than a cinematic, you first have to give them the means to do that with the same interface and controls available to them at all times, and then trust the player enough to do it.
A good rail-shooter leaves player control as much as possible, and gives the impression that their forward momentum is under their own will. Seizing control even for dramatic purpose is to be avoided, and especially if control is taken from the player in order to give the characters plot-induced stupidity. This is even less reasonable when there are a total of 6 characters, only one of which the player can control at any given time, so couldn't you give any of the other five temporary retardation? Plot-induced stupidity is a discredited horror convention even in films, so it's especially disappointing to see a veteran of the genre continuing to use it, especially in a medium where success or failure should be up to the player's efforts.
Another poor reason to seize character control is for extended infodumps filled with melodramatic phrasing and often repeated or obvious information. While forgivable in mission briefing exposition, the designers seem to forget that this is an interactive medium, and the same words aren't received as well as they would delivered as prose. Another quality of a good rail-shooter is to parcel out information in the environment and encourage the player to hunt it down themselves, and then it becomes another reward for hands-on investigation rather than, as it is in this rail-shooter, an obligatory 'sit and listen to storytime, children' session.
I'd give this game a 6 for gameplay, 10 for visuals and sound, 4 for immersion. But the storytelling is poor enough to be insulting to intelligence, so instead of scoring it, I'd simply drop the two best scores and leave the average at 5. That's almost as unfair as developers who get paid for crap games if they just dress it up in enough glitter.
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