Amnesia: The Dark Descent

This is a /v/ related article, which we tolerate because it's relevant and/or popular on /tg/... or we just can't be bothered to delete it.

Amnesia: the Dark Descent is a fuck scary horror survival game that is so nightmarish and terrifying that it will either give you a heart attack or severely traumatize you (if you are below 10 years old or just very cowardly). You play the role of Daniel, the player character. Its spiritual sequels are Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs and SOMA. Another sequel, Amnesia : Rebirth, came out later in 2020. This was followed by Amnesia: The Bunker, which is set in the French trenches during World War 1 and actually has you using a pistol, in 2023.

Gameplay

The game really makes the game literally a horror "survival". You don't have any weapons, and you are virtually defenseless. The only thing you can do when a monster attacks you is to run like hell (they can kill you with either 2 or 3 blows) and hide inside closets or behind crates like a scared little girl. The game also has an sanity mechanic. Insanity will increase if you stay in the dark too long without any light (Daniel has a serious case of nyctophobia, due to the Shadow), seeing horrifying sights like corpses or the physical features of the monsters (seriously, they're not a pretty sight), and the fleshy stuff that grows out of the walls and floors along with huge fleshy balls that look like ball sacks infected by syphilis. When in insanity mode, Daniel's vision will become distorted and he will begin to hallucinate, the screen will show insects crawling about, and Daniel will also begin to talk to himself insanely.

Plot

So first, the game starts off after Daniel drinks some liquids that make him lose the majority of his memories. He awakens to find himself in Castle Brennenburg, and at first, everything seems quite tolerable. You're just there in a dark and spooky castle with tolerable atmosphere. Sure there's a bit of creepy there and a bit horrifying there, but its tolerable....That is until you hear growls, shadowy figures lurking in the dark, wrecked furniture, skeletal remains (with some hidden inside a table drawer), that creepy looking statue on the fountain etc. the castles content's are just endless and horrific.

Anyway, as he ventures deeper and deeper, evading the twisted horrors he encounters and recovering various fragments of journals and entries, Daniel slowly pieces together his past:

He was once an archaeologist who discovered an orb somewhere in Africa. However, it was soon discovered that an ethereal and demonic entity, the Shadow, had followed him back to London and killed many of Daniel's colleagues merely for just examining the orb. Daniel was certain he was to become next, but received a message from a mysterious German lord named Alexander of Brennenburg offering help. With no other choice, Daniel accepted his offer and traveled to Alexander's castle. Alexander's "help" was tutelage in certain mystical rites that would ward away the Shadow. But, such rites require fuel; Vitae, a mystical compound extracted from the blood of people experiencing extreme pain and fear. Desperate to save himself, Daniel soon became a willing accomplice in torturing Alexander's prisoners, expending their pain and life-energy in dark rituals to ward himself against extra-dimensional horrors. But when Daniel realised that Alexander was torturing whoever he could get, rather than the vile criminals he had claimed, he was stricken with guilt and grief -- and outrage with Alexander for coaxing him into partaking in such evil. Wanting to erase his monstrous acts, he drank a dose of an amnesia draught he and Alexander had used to make their torturing regime more effective. He also left a note to himself for afterwards, in hopes that his new self would be strong enough to kill Alexander. Ironically, it didn't turned out as planned, considering that he keeps hiding from the monsters without at least gathering the courage to at least get a fucking weapon and bash them to death.

Driven by this knowledge, Daniel continues making his way through the castle, slowly piecing together the truth about Alexander; he isn't human, but some sort of exiled alien being, trapped on Earth. Alexander has been harvesting Vitae for centuries, building strange, unearthly machines to convert it into a way of returning to his own world. His interest in Daniel was because Daniel's orb can be used to make the transition; Daniel was never anything more than a pawn, to keep the Shadow at bay and help him recover the last of the Vitae Alexander needs to make the transition to his own world.

In the depths of the castle, Daniel finds an ally; the hideously undead form of Agrippa, a famous scientist from centuries ago, who had been coaxed by Alexander to Brennenburg long ago for similar purposes then left condemned in an eternal living death. At Agrippa's behest, Daniel prepares a revitalizing elixir and cuts off Agrippa's head, carrying it into Alexander's secret chamber after managing to reassemble Agrippa's depleted orb and use it to temporarily lower the barrier.

There, Daniel has three choices. If he destroys the portal mechanism by toppling the pillars conducting its energies, the Shadow devours Alexander and then spares Daniel. If he does nothing, Alexander escapes and Daniel is consumed by the Shadow. But if he throws Agrippa's head through the portal, the Shadow ensnares both Daniel and Alexander - but Agrippa, having ascended to a higher plane, is then capable of saving Daniel from its clutches and freeing him from its curse.

Characters

• Daniel - A british archaeologist who sounds like the younger version of Terrence Stamp. Daniel is manipulated by Alexander into brutally torturing people in order to avoid the shadow from killing him. Despite him being the protagonist, he was no better than a sick fuck like Alexander due to the fact that he started to enjoy torturing his victims ("Paint the man, cut the lines. Cut the flesh, watch the blood spill "). He's the sort of type that could catch Slaanesh's attention.

• Alexander of Brennenburg - The Big Bad and a huge dick. Some kind of alien who was banished from his home-world for unknown reasons. He had since been working for centuries to return to his home-world through desperate and gruesome means. He tricks Daniel into believing he could save him from the Shadow by manipulating him into torturing human victims. After that, he abandons Daniel to prepare for his departure to his home-world. His hobbies include floating naked in his orb chamber, despite the fact that he claims he's just meditating. The Gatherers know better. Due to his manipulative nature, it's possible that he's actually an Eldar. Rebirth gives a big possibility to where he was exiled from, and suffice to say, his actions are small scale in comparison to back home. It also means that even if you chose the ending where he gets away scot free, he is not going to have a good time when he gets back home..

• Agrippa - Alexander's former best friend who is left imprisoned in a dead husk of a body and is missing his jawbones. He is also very talkative, and I mean he just can't shut up. Some people go crying to Agrippa for comfort and safety, despite Agrippa not actually gonna be doing anything but to keep on talking.

• The Shadow - The other big bad, who is chasing Daniel because he stole its orb. It leaves lots of fleshy substances around the castle as Daniel proceeds further. There are some hints that it's actually not initially mad at Daniel, but it is driven to protect the orb... which Daniel keeps showing people, and ultimately allows Alexander to exploit. This would explain why it is appeased if Daniel helps it to devour Alexander, and why Agrippa can rescue Daniel if he is sent through, when earlier Daniel found notes that just jumping through the portal himself would have merely delayed his death at the Shadow's hands.

• The Gatherers - Alexander's monstrous servants, and boy are they butt ugly. They come in two types. Grunts (Named Mr. Face by the fans) are hideous looking guys with their lower jaw taken off and flopping out over their chests and hands replaced by iron claws. Brutes (Named Mr. Tall by the fans) have almost vagina-like split heads and have blades in place of their arms. It's generally presumed that Alexander created them by using torture and alien alchemy to mutilate humans into these more... suitable forms. Despite the fact that they are terrifying and blood-hungry beasts, some fans portrayed them in a much lighter tone. They were shown as being more gentle and actually pretty nice guys to hang around with. The only offset is that they still kept Daniel scared shitless.