Ghorpm: I've watched the video because I love Alone in the Dark. I may say it's pretty good. You described the game quite accurately, mentioned Lovecraft and the fact it's a granddaddy of survival horror games. It's good that you mentioned about clunky controls and great that you said that somehow jumping is not clunky at all because most people would assume it otherwise. It was also worth to mention that Lovecraft fans would probably value this game higher.
You made, however, a few mistakes:
- 25 second long, absolutely terrible intro. You know... I fell lazy today and I do like AitD. Normally I would have close your video after 10 second and would never ever return to it. Sorry for being rough but it's the weakest part of your video. I believe I can speak for everybody here - we have better things to do than watching a lame intro for 25 seconds. In this state it shouldn't be longer than 3-4 seconds.
- "a female, I can't remember her name" wait... what?! I though you were doing a review here?! It wouldn't hurt to prepare yourself a bit and check the name. It would've taken you just a few seconds. Emily Hartwood. She also appears in AitD 3, I think it's worth to mention too.
- you used the same part of video twice (opponent with a wooden leg). Avoid it ;)
- you talk about superb voice acting. You should have presented it right away, not at the end of the video.
- are you aware that you practically spoiled the mirrors puzzle? I know, it was pretty easy and at the very beginning of the game but still. Don't do that. EVER!
Anyway, the video was good. Just change this damned intro ;)
Hey thanks for the feedback and the constructive criticism.
Yeah I know some people don't like the intro. It's my standard intro for the other stuff on the site I do when I interview heavy metal bands and such. I agree it can be a bit long. Sorry you feel put out about that. I can work on the intro.
Yeah, the female character I suddenly drew a blank on when I was recording my voice. I'm kind of new to doing the video reviews of games so I recorded my voice all in one take with no script and when it came to where I was I naming the characters I was like..Oh shit! Sorry about that hahaha
And yes I did use double footage because with this recording I had such a hard time getting ti to record and getting footage at all I finally just used the double stuff...and also..the game isn't OVERLY long with a lot of locations and I didn't want to show everything.
And the mirror puzzle...yes I thought about this before I put it in..but I though too it was at the beginning of the game too so maybe not ruining a lot but I know what you mean. I didn't show where the mirrors were at though either or how to get them so maybe some people will have to do a little hunting hahah.
Oh I did put some of the voice acting at the very end and wanted to put it in where I talked about..but again..being kind of new to the video review stuff I was afraid to split my audio thinking it might mess something up. I'll try to work on that.
Thanks again for the feedback though. I appreciate it.
skullbone: Just in time for the black Friday sale for anyone who may be interested in this game. Here is my video review:
http://skullbanger.net/2013/11/30/pc-game-video-review-alone-in-the-dark-1/
I apologize for the way this video was recorded. For some reason I couldn't get the game to record right under the normal circumstances and had to look at other ways and this was the best I could come up with.
I hope you find the review helpful.
JudasIscariot: Regarding the voice acting, I had the floppy disc version of the first game so I never got to hear the voice acting but our techs deserve major props for that :)
I just got to the part where you were talking about the control scheme and yes, it's clunky but it's also used in the games you named that were inspired by Alone in the Dark, mostly the Resident Evil series :)
I am not sure why we had to use arrows for everything back then, maybe it was a DOS limitation or something of the sort?
edit: I would recommend that when you talk about the voice acting you give it a minute, if possible, to actually shine. It could go something like this:
"This game has some great voice acting etc. etc." pan to a book or something and let the game speak for a bit and then go back to reviewing it.
Then again that's just my way of doing things. Great review all in all :)
HI! Thanks for the feedback. Yes your team did a great job!
Yes I wanted to add the voice part in at where I was commenting about the voice work instead of at the end...but being so new to the video review stuff I was afraid to split my audio in fear it would sound all messed up. I recorded my audio seperately from the video. But will try to work on this.
Thanks again for the feedback I really appreciate it.
karacho: I enjoyed your video review. Voice was a bit muffled, but it was still clear enough to understand everything, even for me being not a native english speaker. 14 minutes is a bit long for a video review, but you never stopped talking and you had a lot to say, so the length is nothing i would hold against you. Was that all unscripted talk? If yes i am very impressed. The video was very informative and the length was justified by not only being a review, but also giving some backgroudn infiormation. Keep up the good work. ^^
Yes my talk was unscripted. I tried to write down some basic ideas to talk about but otherwise I just talked about the game then I recorded the video segments seperately.
I too would have liked to have kept it a bit shorter but couldn't seem to fit all the information in.
Thanks for the feedback I really appreciate the constructive criticism.