What we said about it:

The world of Oblivion is big. Really big. It takes a really long time to walk across it, though you can buy a horse to ride and save yourself some time. There are a dozen major cities, a multitude of smaller villages, untold numbers of dungeons, mines, caves, ruins, forts, temples, shrines and camps. I've run across many different weapons, pieces of armor, a couple of dozen potion ingredients, magic rings, necklaces and jewels. I've battled imps, goblins, bears, boars, spiders, rats, crabs, fish, orcs, ogres, giants, mages, thieves, wolves, and the lists go on and on. Oblivion is by far the closest I have come to playing D&D Sunday afternoons with my friends (yes, I did that, though I'm on medication now), all wrapped up in a stunning package with tens of thousands of lines of spoken dialog and good music. Oblivion is supposed to have hundreds of hours of playtime inside. As I've solved about 20 quests, have another 10 open in my quest log, and have yet to even get involved in the plot, I find that very easy to believe. What more could an RPG fan want?

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What we said about it:

Despite Lovecraft's wide cultural influence, there's a distinct atmosphere to Dark Corners that's difficult to find elsewhere. Being set in Massachusetts during the 1920's definitely helps, as does the explicit focus on sanity. Beyond anything else though, I think it's unusual for horror games to treat their enemies as more than expendable. How many games have us blowing away demons and zombies without a thought? Dark Corners obeys the principle that people are most afraid of the unknown or the indestructible. As a result, it's probably one of the scariest games released in the past five years.

I should add that for all its frustrations the game is still plenty of fun to play, and furthermore, it's long. Extremely long by current standards. At a point when I expected to be two-thirds through, I discovered that I was less than halfway. I would estimate an average completion time of 20 hours, which is a far cry from some of the 6-hour wonders marketed at the same price.

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