Realms of the Haunting is one of those old classics that you can't help but pick up every couple of years and play it through. While the game is fairly dated, by today's standards, the story and experience are still as solid as ever. I'm going to break down this review into a few categories, because with it being an old game there are a few things you might want to know;
READ THE MANUAL:
We're going to start out with the basics here and say that everything you need to know can be found in the user manual. Steam actually ships this manual with the game. You'll find it in the game's installation folder. In the manual you'll find everything from the basic controls to how the interface works. It's critical that you read through this if you want to make it more than 5 minutes without becoming frustrated. This game was made back in the days of DOOM, when video games didn't baby their players with in-game tutorials. The manual IS your tutorial.
CONTROLS:
This is where a vast amount of negative reviews for this game come from. Too many kids out there, who have been spoiled by the WASD industry standard, are finding out how much they actually suck when faced with a real video game. Mastering the controls of RotH isn't actually difficult, you just have to get over your dependence on the WASD standard. To play this game you'll find your left hand on either the arrow keys (occasionally reaching for PGUP and PGDN) or surfing the number keypad. Your right hand will be busy on the mouse, clicking around the screen to interact with the world. Once again, read the manual. I'll give you a little tip here though. To drink a potion, open your inventory (which freezes the game) and left click the potion to pick it up, then immediately right-click.
GRAPHICS:
Interestingly enough, the graphics of this game are somewhat dated but that almost adds to the charm of playing the game. Think of the old-school DOOM style graphics, where you see an animated character but they are only displayed at certain angles and not truly a 3D object. The environment is first rate, bringing you both the atmosphere and anxiety of a mystery horror game. One special thing to note about this game is that every once in a while you'll run into a story scene that's done with actual live-action. I'm not going to say the acting is 5-star quality, but it's certainly good enough for the game. At the time I must admit it was probably quite the feat to put the live actors into the computer animated environment. I've gotta give them a lot of credit for that.
STORY:
This is, arguably, the best part about Realms of the Haunting. The story is extremely well thought out, however it constantly leaves you wondering what's going to happen next. You'll start out feeling much like the main character Adam; frustrated, just trying to survive, and having no idea what the hell you've been dragged into. Your only driving force is your father, trapped in some afterlife prison of the damned. As the story unfolds, and you meet allies along the way, you begin to realise your role is much greater than you could have ever imagined. By the time you reach the story ending you'll wish there was a sequel.
AUDIO:
There is a lot to say about audio done correctly in video games, and this game is the perfect example of that. The music is basically an old midi scale, without much definition of the musical instruments being played, however it's very well scored and fits the theme with perfection. As some examples; When you're wanding the dark mansion the music is low and mysterious. When you're in the catacombs the music is more adventurous and almost induces a bit of anxiety. When you enter a big fight the music kicks up into far more action-based. Some moments even see the music cutting off completely, to give you that feeling of anticipation that something is about to happen. While it's true that the midi music is fairly dated, in this game it's so well done that you won't even notice the lower quality.
All in all, I would say that if you can tolerate not being able to use WASD, this is certainly a game worth having. In addition, for any 40ish year old retro gamers, this is a must-have for your collection. You're not going to regret it.
