More Gameplay

It's all about Flow

Another excellent aspect of Undying is that weapons, spells, and enemies are really spread out. If the game takes 20 hours to complete, you'd see a new spell, weapon, or monster every 45 minutes or so for the entire game. For example, you don't get the Speargun or Pheonix until the last 20% of the game. A lot of games nowadays will give you all of the weapons and items in the first half of the game, while the second half is nothing but ammo management. In Undying you always have something to look forward too. Right when you've had your fill of weapons and spells, the game is over. I like games where you're constantly rewarded for your work.

Common death cut scene

Skeletons rip your heart out

There's always a catch

Unfortunately, there are a lot of loading screens. For the first few hours of the game you'll run into a loading screen every 50 seconds or so, no joke! Apparently the scripted sequences take a lot to cache, because farther into the game there are fewer loading screens. They can be a real drag too - while you're ready for a monster to pounce out of the darkness you have to sit and wait for the level to load. It takes away from the horror atmosphere a lot. Also if you have a slow computer, the loading screens can really drag on (luckily my rig is fast so it didn't bother me that much).

Lizbeth

Ruins of a monastery

Undying is also tragically short. For experienced FPS gamers, it's over in less than 20 hours. I played through the entire game on Nightmare difficulty in around 17 hours. For less experienced gamers it could take 30-40, but that's hard to gauge. I was disappointed when I finished it because I wanted more. Hopefully they'll make a sequel.

Undying's creature AI isn't that good. In fact, most creatures just run at you and attack. But the game really hides this well with scripted sequences. For example, you walk into a room and all of the doors slam shut. Edward Covenant appears and screams, "This is none of your business!" and summons a demon to kill you. Or you go to examine a body and see a howler run off in the distance. As you chase after him you realize you've just fallen into a trap as five more howlers jump down at you. This just goes to show that AI isn't the only thing that makes enemies worth fighting.

Hop in

A White Christmas?

Last of all, there's no multiplayer! The frantic fights you can have with dual weapons alone could have made Undying a great CTF/DM game. We got to see what they were planning for multiplayer a long time ago, and it's a real shame they took out the game completely. This doesn't get points taken off, as multiplayer is just like any other feature - if it can't be done right, it may be better not to do it at all (a lesson other developers have yet to learn). Undying is still a fun game, even if it's just single player.