Rise of Nightmares

I played Sega’s Rise of Nightmares at E3, where I killed loads of zombies and monsters using Kinect. It was a little jarring to be using the device in such a violent game, since most of the games that ship in those purple cases are geared for casual players and families. Core gamers have been griping about not having anything worth playing with the peripheral, and it looks like Sega is calling their bluff. You want blood? You’ve got it.

This time, instead of showing off the game’s combat, Sega decided to give Gamescom attendees a better understanding of its setup. Naturally then, we started from the game’s opening sequence.

We join Josh and Kate on a train. We switch to Josh’s perspective as he’s dozing off in his seat. Kate wakes him up, saying she has good news. Before she can elaborate, a flask falls out of his coat. Uh oh. Kate immediately lays into Josh for his drinking, and she walks out in a huff.

The player then gets out of his seat and walks around the train. Once out of their cabin, he heads toward the bathroom. Movement remains intuitive; to walk, players stick a foot in front of the other and hold it out. The farther out it is, the faster he’ll walk. To turn, players simply shift their shoulders to either side. Opening doors and other interactions are preformed by holding a hand over an “interact” icon and then performing the appropriate motion.

In the bathroom, Josh splashes water on his face and then sees a horrible face in the mirror. The screen momentarily turns black and white before returning to normal. OK then. It looks like Josh may have larger issues than a hidden flask.

He goes back to his seat and spies a note on Kate’s seat. She apologizes for overreacting, and tells him to meet her in the dining car. If players are feeling lazy, they can lift an arm up and Josh will start heading toward his next objective. Unfortunately, there are a pair of Russian ballerinas blocking the way. They laugh and tease him, forcing the player to crouch beneath one’s extended leg. How rude!

He passes by a few other groups before a ticket taker asks to see his ticket. Josh pulls it out but drops it. It slides beneath a red curtain. He walks behind them to retrieve it, and it’s held in the hand of a mysterious woman. She looks like a stereotypical gypsy, and she doesn’t disappoint. Josh gets his fortune read with tarot cards and, gasp, his future doesn’t look so hot. During these cutscenes, Kinect tracks the head movements of the player, letting them look around by simply moving their head.

Josh eventually glimpses his wife being led through the dining car by a strange man. Before he can catch up to him, a guy on a cell phone blocks the path, and Josh has to sidestep around him.
Once he reaches the dining car, a man runs up to the door, presses his bloody palms against the window, and then explodes in a shower of blood. Josh rushes in, and a young lady and the ticket guy follow.

A large masked figure grabs the girl and begins to walk away. The ticket agent chases toward the giant, which is a bad plan. The mask splits open, revealing a pale, demonic face. The creature then flings a chain/spear thing at the agent’s gut (Scorpion, anyone), and the man is torn in half. That explains what happened to Mr. Windows a few minutes earlier.

Before he can do anything else, the train is derailed. Now Josh has to work with the remaining survivors and track down his missing wife. He checks out a mausoleum-like room, which contains a corpse. It’s clearly the victim of some kind of experimentation, with several body parts replaced with clockwork-style counterparts. The thing springs to life, and Josh has to punch, kick, and stab his way through to freedom.

Many of the enemies have metal arms or other body parts, which means that Josh has to be strategic when attacking. Obviously, Josh should stick his knife into the squishy parts, since anything else is merely deflected.

The demo ends with the masked figure surprising Josh and flipping open his mask again. It’s a little more intense up close, especially when you’re lying on the ground.

I was a little surprised to see as many adventure-game elements in Rise of Nightmares, and it was a nice change of pace from constant combat. The fighting is a lot of fun, but I can imagine that it would get old quickly if there wasn’t anything else to it.

Now Sega just needs to convince the Kinect haters out there that it’s possible to have a core game with motion controls.