I wish I had a better window into DOS games. Specifically, early to late-’90s DOS, but all DOS in general. Technically, I hit the tail end of its era in my youth, but that well is about a million miles deep, so I only scratched the surface. And I like to delve into unexplored subsets of video gaming, so DOS is really tantalizing. 

However, whenever I boot up a DOS game, I usually have to make a bunch of adjustments to get comfortable. Then I have to learn some often overly-complex UI or arcane control scheme. Or both. And even with GOG releases that are designed to be playable from most setups. By the time that’s out of the way, I’m usually at the edge of interest and drop it after a few minutes.

Also, DOS games are often longer and slower than console games of the era. It’s a commitment. But that also can mean that connections with the games are more meaningful.

So, Realms of the Haunting was one I hadn’t really heard of before, which is the best kind of game to dive into. Especially when you land feet first into a niche that you love. I’m not sure it counts as diving it you go feet first, but it’s too late to back out now.

PLANES OF THE VISITING

The niche in question is 2.5D first-person games. I just love the aesthetic of ray-cast walls and the sort of technical trickery that would be attempted to make things that are essentially 2D look like they’ve got an extra axis.

Realms of the Haunting (awful name), is a (late) 1996 game by Gremlin Interactive who, occasionally, were known for their technical trickery. Unfortunately, 1996 was the same year that Quake launched, so 2.5D was quickly being supplanted by full 3D.

However, Realms of the Haunting isn’t an FPS. Well, it sort of is. There is shooting from the first-person, but it’s more of an adventure game. There are puzzles where you rub stuff against other stuff. Large portions of it involve walking around in enemy-bereft environments, and there are very few instances of focused, sustained combat.

It’s a good thing that it is a decent adventure game, because it sort of sucks as an FPS. Enemies are brain-dead and can’t cope with your circle-strafing. Since most of the environments are tight corridors, they get stuck in doorways a lot. I was playing on normal difficulty, but I doubt that higher difficulties make them any smarter. Probably just makes them absorb more ammo.

BIBLE CAMP

One of the game’s unique properties is its use of FMV involving real, human actors. Whenever a cutscene happens, you get a good look at David Tuomi playing Adam. He’s some dude who gets called to a mansion by his dead father. I, ugh… It’s not a very good story. There’s a lot of background depth, but it steps all over my nerves.

I don’t want to get too deep into it, but a lot of its background depth is drawn from the Abrahamic religions. That’s not one of my nerves, but they tie in a lot of magical MacGuffins and there’s a prophecy. I hate prophecy stories. MacGuffins, I can tolerate. But it piles on the MacGuffins, even though a lot of them are basically just guest passes to certain areas. And it’s impossible to care for the characters, since they’re all just generic and stiff. And maybe the cliché wasn’t so well-trodden in 1996, but it would be a surprise if we got a protagonist named Adam who isn’t an allusion to Genesis. For the love of J.C. Denton.

On the other hand, the acting isn’t terrible. The dialogue can be goofy, but it’s capable enough. The worst part of the cutscenes is how obvious it is that the whole game is shot in front of a blue screen. And, clearly, the room they were in was pretty small since there’s rarely much movement. They also didn’t mic the room very well, because voices will sometimes sound distant or echoey. That’s not a major issue, it just kind of makes it really feel like the time period it was released. In fact, the story, as a whole, just feels old rather than bad, prophecies aside.

EDGING

But despite the lacklustre combat and awkward story, I really got absorbed when I started into Realms of the Haunting. The atmosphere in the house is pretty remarkable, with its darkened hallways and sparse light switches. Even with what I said about the combat and MacGuffins, I enjoyed the sections that were more straightforward key-hunts. It’s really at its best when you’re dealing with a mix of key-hunts and adventure puzzles. Early on, when all its facets were intermingling, I was excited to start raving about this game.

However, if there’s a game that overstays its welcome, Realms of the Haunting is it. It’s really good when things are mysterious, and you’re not entirely sure what’s going on. Later on, when it’s clearly angels telling a dude how to beat the followers of Satan, it starts feeling dumb. You get a companion for most of the game, and while she’s neat to have around, she seems to know everything, which further dispels any mystery.

I’ve said this a few times, but I’m not sure I’ve said it on this site: Once the climax kicks off, things need to start wrapping up. It needs to be a whizz-bang instead of a pbbbbt-splat. Realms of the Haunting continues adding new details to the backstory and big set pieces long after it’s been established that the only thing left to do is tie a bow on things. If you’re adding lore after the big revelation, you’re just doing it for lore’s sake, because the part that the backstory was setting up has already happened. Extra lore is just vestigial.

And all these last-minute details are set between big puzzles that really add nothing. The longest, most isolated puzzles happen in the final hours of the game, and one of them sucks so hard. It just becomes a slog when I should be racing toward the end.

ET TU, GREMLIN?

I hate that. I hate it, especially because that’s the lasting feeling on a game. Everything was butter right up until that point, but I spent so much time mired in bad feelings that everything turned sour. I went from being excited about discovering that a game I previously knew nothing about is actually really great, to wanting petty revenge for the torture it put me through. And this is all within 12 hours. I suppose I didn’t see that twist coming.

For the price you can get Realms of the Haunting these days, it’s worth seeing the stellar opening areas. Just be warned that the back nine is full of water hazards and sandtraps. Except in this case, those are analogous to a painfully slow conclusion and an overall unpolished feeling. I feel flimflammed.

On the other hand, I did learn that the 2.5D engine was created for another adventure title, Normality, which I also have not played. That’s next. Hopefully, it won’t let me down like this one did.

5/10

This review was conducted on a digital version via GOG, which runs on a preconfigured version of DOSBox. It was paid for by the author.