Penumbra: Overture makes its creepy debut

Announced almost a year ago, the first installment in the Penumbra: Overture episodic trilogy has finally been unleashed. The horror adventure title relies on a proprietary physics engine that allows you to pick up and manipulate almost any object. Combat plays a small role in Overture, but you'll spend most of your time tip-toeing around corners and squealing every time you hear a noise. It's a genuinely creepy game.

While Penumbra manages to take a fresh approach to the 3D survival genre, the price and the game's length don't quite agree with each other. The first episode will take you less than three hours to complete, and with a price tag of $19.99, it feels a little steep. The game has remarkably high production value for an independent studio, making the cost a little more bearable. Just think of the warm fuzzy feeling you'll get when you support the little guy.

Reader Comments (14)

I don't think $20 for a 3hr horror experience is all that bad. Go pick up "Saw III" on dvd and you're paying about $15 for a 2hr horror experience that you just WATCH. For $5 more, you get this horror experience that you "actually experience" by playing through it.

It would take 3 hours if you rushed through it. I haven't beat it after about 5 hours, and I'm no video game n00b.

Yeah I mean, I paid $50 for Sonic 2, and I beat it in short order the other day on emulation. If the experience is good enough, it doesn't matter. Not like horror games have that much replay value anyway (outside of gimmicky "beat the game with just 1 weapon")

I've never understood it when some folks complain about the length of a game. I have tons of games sitting around that never got finished because they just took too damn long and I lost interest. There's something nice about buying a game and actually enjoying it AND finishing it, egardless of how long or short it is. I have no problems at all with games that are "only" 10 hours or less in game time.

I think it comes down to an "value per hour" sort of thing. I'd be hard pressed to drop $50 on something that took 3 hours, but $20 isn't too much of an issue. I figure around $5/hour of enjoyment is a fair deal, so I'd expect around 10 hours from $50 and 12 hours from 360 or PS3 games minimum.

So, given that, this title is around the expected value point and I'll probably be giving it a shot.

I'm just happy Joystiq is giving Penumbra some exposure. I know that other sites like TIGSource and Indygamer have said stuff about it, but Joystiq is a far cry from the indy blogs. Anyway, I picked up Penumbra the other day and it's fantastic. It has an incredible physics engine that not only lends itself to some crazy-cool puzzles but a more enjoyable combat environment, too. For example, I was running away from a wolf and I ran through a door, pushed a barrel in front of the door, and placed a giant rock on top of that. It didn't stop the wolf, but it bought me sometime to get myself together.

Anyway, it's a good buy. I hope to see more of this physics engine in the near future, too.

Thomas from Frictonal Games here, just wanted to add that you have to be pretty skilled to finish the game in 3 hours on your first try :) It usually takes at least double that time to complete the game.

We actually have a poll on our forum regarding completion time which can be seen here:
http://frictionalgames.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=714
according to this, the average time is about 7 - 8 hours.

Well I guess the rest of us just suck compared to the people at Joystiq.

Joystiq didn't do their regularly scheduled "New Games this Week" post. So I didn't know this is coming out. The original Penumbra was a free download from the site, so is this version in stores? On Steam? Or 19.99 from the developers website? What? How can I get this scary game. I loves me some scary fucking games!

i love horror games, and i hope this one turns out to be a good one. i suppose a trilogy at $20 per game comes out to $60, which would be a full length games regular price, so it may be worth it.

i cant wait to abuse the physics system.

Movie =
$9 ticket
$5 various overpriced snacks
endless kids on their cell
passive entertainment
2 hours + transportation time + gas + parking

Penumbra: Overture =
$19.99 (plus tax)
cheap snacks
no idiots on cells except the ones you invite over
interactive entertainment
3 hours + pants optional

I'd say Penumbra: Overture ends up the better value, but that's just me. Well, as long as the game isnt' horrible.

@comtar
If you live in Europe, it should be in stores now. If you're in the US or Canada, it's going to come out... at some point. Nobody really knows, but Gamestop lists a release date of May 1, so maybe then. If you live in the US and want a boxed copy and don't want to wait, Got Game Entertainment offers it, though you have to pay for shipping:
http://www.gotgameentertainment.com/penumbra/buy.htm
If you want to go the digital distribution route, you can pick it up for $20 at either GamersGate or Strategy First:
http://www.gamersgate.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&category_id=13&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=109&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=14
http://www.strategyfirst.com/en/games/penumbraep1/

Oh, also, if you wanna try out the tech demo on which this game was based, go download it and be freaked the hell out:
http://frictionalgames.com/penumbradownload/
It's short, but it's free and creepy and generally awesome.

Oh crap. It looks like I lied. You have to wait even if you buy from Got Game. The North America release is sometime in May (hopefully the 1st), so it's either direct download, import, or wait.

Penumbra: Overture makes its creepy debut

Reader Comments (14)

Posted: Apr 3rd 2007 11:23AM (Unverified) said

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Posted: Apr 3rd 2007 11:30AM WiNGSPANTT from TopTierTacticsco said

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Posted: Apr 3rd 2007 11:43AM LaughingTarget said

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Posted: Apr 3rd 2007 8:23PM elyscape said

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Posted: Apr 3rd 2007 8:27PM elyscape said

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