Surreal Software's The Suffering

The ultimate horror

Usually to scare someone you don't have to be extremely creative about it, it's enough to jump from around the corner at the end of a long hallway, and your friend will suddenly realize that now he has enough bricks to build a wall. But, more to the point, the entertainment industry for many years is trying to send chills down our spines in much more elaborate ways. They flicker the lights in dark corridors, make otherworldly noises, gauge someone's eyes with a rusty spoon and force someone to gargle mayonnaise. And the interesting thing is, that we love it and ask for more. Cinema halls are always full, be it From Beyond, Lost Highway or Event Horizon, and the survival horror genre flourishes since Alone in the Dark. Well, technically it wasn't called survival horror back then in 1992, but that's not important right now. What's important now, is the game called The Suffering - that manages to be very cleverly designed anthology of inspirations, homages and horror techniques tied into a single game. Surreal Software are capable of quoting almost all classic and modern horror, at the same time remaining self sufficient to tell us their own story, not falling into the grave called cliche.

I kick arse for the lord!

The Suffering gives you very little or no time at all to get comfortable with it's atmosphere. The acclimatization occurs on the go. In Abbot - maximum security prison located ten miles offshore of Maryland, arrives our main character accompanied by two guards. His name is Torque, he's the man himself, and he shived half the arian brotherhood. A big burly man with heavy eyes is accused of murdering his wife and two children. He's being placed in a death row awaiting for his execution. The next couple of minutes of the opening you witness a surprisingly well written "Tarantino level" dialogue with prisoners cursing almost as good as your grandmother. However, their creative use of the word "shit" is quickly interrupted by the actual "shit" that hits the fan. All hell breaks loose as the unnatural disaster unleashes it's mighty grasp, embracing the whole Carnate island.

Evil in Carnate

From this moment begins the game. The storyline of The Suffering breaks into a whole bunch of little stories strung to the main intrigue - about what actually happened to Torque's family. Literally cutting our way to freedom, we will get acquainted with island's history and it's inhabitants. The lore includes a visit to the underground mines in which prisoners were buried alive, a shipwreck that long ago held chained prisoners that were eaten by rats, the forest in which some American general killed on suspicion of treason a detachment of innocent people, and even a medieval town where two young witches burned twelve people. Abbott itself is filled with no less colourful characters. A prisoner that loved his wife so much that he cut her into little pieces using kitchen utensils, the hangman that locked himself in a gas chamber because he loves his profession of violence way too much, and the mysterious doctor of psychology who conducted experiments on prisoners, putting stuff in their surgically opened cranium. Brain salad surgery, no less. Writer constantly departs from the main storyline to open us a few more pages from the history of the island. Just like maestro Kojima, Richard House the Third incorporates the fictional world of The Suffering into "our own dimension", I mean reality, thus making it a lot more believable. By setting up the game's events off the coast of Maryland, mister House had the opportunity to draw real facts from the dark historical legacy from up and down the east coast - to cause a logical impact on the world of the game. The events of New England's witch trials are logically spreading through Carnate. During the events of WW2 the island is acquired by the government as a POW (prisoners of war abbreviation, not Eddie saying Pow) camp. All game locations are researched by the in-game character Consuela Alvarez. She documents all her discoveries in her journal which can be accessed from the main menu, to learn more about the island's dark past. Another in-game character keeps a habit of documenting the island's bestiary. Clem speculates about monster's morbid appearances, trying to explain their looks by tying it to the Carnate's violent history. The local terrarium consists of a whole brood of creepy and conceptually consistent creatures. Each of which has it's own beginnings. Wormlike creatures wrapped in cloth and chained represent buried alive people, little green midgets filled with syringes from head to toe are the manifestation of lethal injection. Uncovering the rest would be a crime if you haven't played the game yet.

Obsessed by cruelty

The Suffering is the kind of game that plays in one breath, because of it's extraordinary drive. It's not your typical survival horror, despite the fact it's been officially marketed as such. It's filled with continuous action that keeps you on the edge of your toilet seat, but unlike it's colleague - Resident Evil 4, The Suffering's action is of different breed. You can categorize it's gameplay mechanic as something between Silent Hill and Max Payne, also a little flavoured with Call of Cthulhu: The Dark Corners of the Earth. The gameplay is built on constant deficit. At first you desperately miss rounds, then batteries for your flashlight, and eventually painkillers. When you have only a couple of bullets for your revolver and you hear the monsters creeping from behind, and you see their creaking blades from afar, and Torque covered in blood, limping and clutching his shoulder, hobbling out of the building, while behind him, slowly, three huge beasties carving blade sparks, to scare the hell out of you, you just want to turn the game off and never start it again, because it's really scary. In the first third of the game it is revealed that Torque, the man himself, can turn into a huge ugly beast with a long blade instead of his left hand. He then literally tears to pieces anyone who is in immediate vicinity. At times like that The Suffering starts to resemble some sort of anatomical theatre.

I hate, therefore I am

Almost as always, a story boils down to the human struggle with his inner demons, which not everyone can keep under control. By using a classic technique, with a protagonist suffering from amnesia, game designer allowed gamers to reach one of the three endings, by playing the game in their unique style. From a design concept perspective, The Suffering's morality system is similar to Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II - The Sith Lords or Silent Hill 2. Player's own actions lead to well deserved consequences, or in our case, to three different moral and psychological states. Main protagonist's journey itself, plays a role of psychotherapeutic session in which Torque sorts out his emotional luggage baggage cabbage.

Or - Surreal Software cleverly uses Torque to guide players through his story leaving them freedom to speculate about his amnesia and then suddenly, Pow (now it's Eddie's Pow), you start to realize that, hypothetically, Torque knows what happened to his family from the very beginning of the game, it's the player that must reveal all his past deeds by acting depending on his personal moral qualities, Torque just adapts to the player. Simply put it's not Torque who suffers from amnesia, it's gamers that are just not familiar with the character. Yet.

Bent forks in my eyes

From a technical point of view, The Suffering, to put it mildly, is outdated . His nearest neighbour - Silent Hill 3 is crafted using way more polygons. Suffering may lack resolution in textures and shaders in water, but the picture pleases the eye nevertheless, with greatly done post-render effects, especially very beautiful fire. This alongside almost perfect lighting model can create a believable and smooth picture that never ruins your game. As already been said, the competent monster and level design can do wonderful things with the looks of the game and how your humanoid eye perceives stuff. Surreal organically hide technical flaws with the design assistance. And it's not a reproach. The game manages to convince us about what's happening on the screen. Looking at three polygons corpses with detached heads and limbs, you somehow, believe. Plus, Torquenaturally covers himself in blood after each fierce battle. In such minutes it is better to keep nervous relatives away from the screen, or you'll risk to remain misunderstood and without dinner. You just can't risk a bowl of borscht with roast beef pierogi.

Till deaf do us part

The local sound is a real treat. Actors that played their roles must be issued with a personal Oscar. Secondly, get ready for a never ending stream of cursing. The prisoners trapped in sheer hell communicate so, that the whole gangsta scene from the working quarters of New-York, blush. The guards are not lagging behind, using only select english cursing vocabulary, those and others build absolutely stunning designs and variants, in which the word "fuck", plays far from the most important role. But, what sounds produce all local monsters, is something quite indescribable. Players must strictly wear good headphones (it's alright if you'll use bad ones) and play with the lights off (or bulbs removed, in case you don't have a switch, I don't), then The Suffering will pick you up in it's atmosphere. After a couple of game sessions you'll be breaking in agony, choking in your own insides... well not really.

Ultimately, the most important thing that the game achieves is to scare us until our knees shake. From foreign movies, games and books, Surreal Software scrupulously built their own little man-made hell. Yes it is a console project ported to PC and it uses an old engine, but local gameplay perfectly holds the selected pace not slowing it's momentum until credits start rolling, and the artistry behind the design of the game is far more important than counting polygons. The Suffering is one the three main horror games that shined on e3 2004, the other games are Silent Hill 4: The Room and Call of Cthulhu: The Dark Corners of the Earth. Observing the watered down horror trends of today, for me it will be twice as interesting to further inspect these classic titles, because in author's humble opinion, contemporary iterations of horror games are worse than Satan's behind.