by Phoenix, HSM team writer

A horror game for the Halloween Season, pick number three.

It’s that time of the year when darkness promises a bump in the night that will make you turn that light back on, if you’re lucky enough to reach it.

I, for one, love to be scared. I love the adrenaline rush of not knowing what’s in the dark, foggy hallway, then laughing when it was nothing but the cat. Or was it?

The best horror movies and games must leave the watcher or player with a feeling of unease. They must transport the participants to the world laid out for them. Every element in the story — plot, setting, characters, cinematography — must leave us breathless with dread of going on, and wracked with fear of staying where we are. The endless waves of slobbering, lumbering demon minions, the decaying corpses and waist-deep piles of soulless mutilated bodies are never enough. Well…sometimes they are.

The third survival horror game I picked to play is Painkiller: Hell & Damnation, a remake and sequel to Painkiller. This is a supernatural horror game released in June, 2013. Painkiller is a first person shooter, like the first game I picked Aliens: Colonial Marines, whereas Dead Space 3 was a third person shooter. The difference in the two is that in third-person games the player sees himself in the game’s environment, while in first-person games you see the environment as the character you play would. I prefer to play a horror game in first-person. This perspective makes for a more immediate, realistically frightful experience. You don’t know what is behind you without turning around, just as in real life.

Painkiller is a nod to the old school horror games; it is a nightmare themed horror-fest. You must get through each level of play from beginning to end, slaying a massive number of monsters. These levels are found in various themed locations, everything from castles to graveyards. You enter a location and slay everything in the location to advance to the next area, making sure to pick up the dropped items.

Classic weapons return in this game, so don’t despair. The weapon of choice, the stakethrower, is available to impale more demons and monsters. To aid you in your quest there is a also new weapon upgrade — the Soulcatcher. The Soulcatcher has two modes of destruction. The first shoots a saw blade, slicing and dicing, while the second mode sucks the soul from the targeted monster.

You play the game in the role of Daniel Garner. After devastating the legions of Hell and Purgatory in the first title, Daniel returns, having been denied the chance to reunite with his wife. This new quest begins in a cemetery. Death arrives with another deal for Daniel. With this new promise of seeing his wife, Daniel sets off in search of 7,000 souls. During the course of game play, his old ally, Eve, shows up. From there the plot grows less twisted, much as it did in Painkiller: Battle out of Hell. Daniel will again be pitted against the Necrogiant, Alastor, and the Swamp Thing.

In this game, the plot is less important than a trip down memory lane. It’s a good bet for someone who is more interested in killing monsters than experiencing an immersive horror game, where maybe they don’t want to be frightened while playing a game. Being new to this game, I enjoyed the stakethrower, but I thought there were way too many unending throngs of enemies challenging me. I admit I choked a time or two, and found myself dead more than once.

Painkiller: Hell & Damnation is, simply put, a slaughter-fest-filled way of perfecting your target skills. The multiplayer modes available are deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag and duels where hordes of enemies attack you alone or in multiplayer mode.

Painkiller: Hell & Damnation is a multiplatform game, available on PC, PlayStation3 and Xbox 360. Developers: The Farm51, Publisher: Nordic Games GMbH. Game Engine: Unreal Engine 3. Game play modes: Single and multiplayer.

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