Game Complete - Condemned: Criminal Origins

The Good

• First person investigation makes for amazing game mechanics 
• story puts you on the trail of a deranged serial killer
• great character design
• Excellent presentation.

The Bad

• Dull level design (if your not running around in circles looking for the next area your constantly looking behind you to see if an enemy is sneaking up on you 
• Not to clear on main character's "powers" (why he has them)
• some kind of supernatural/evil being stalking player (no explanation)

The Ugly

• combat very limited and repetitive much worse than super smash bros 

Scariest Moments :  Mall mannequins, Mr. Tibbits, Man pops out from landing

Condemned: Criminal Origins  is a psychological horror video game, published by Sega. The game uses a first person perspective. Condemned places an added emphasis on melee combat and puzzle solving, including searching for fingerprints and gathering evidence. 

You play as Agent Ethan Thomas, an F.B.I. agent assigned to the Serial Crimes Unit. As such, you spend most your time tracking down serial killers and crazy druggies going insane from some "supersonic" sound wave. The game opens as you investigate a murder scene set up by a killer known as the Match Maker. Soon after you arrive, strange things begin to happen around you, and you'll suddenly find yourself framed for the murder of two F.B.I. agents. Your only option is to track down the real killer and clear your name. 
as you play you collect dead/dying birds and pieces of scrape metal to unlock achievements and its a lot of running around in circles hoping some guy doesn't sneak up behind you while your trying to sneak behind the next guy. the main satisfaction i got from this game was the fact that certain points of the game you completely stopped being a bad ass with a pipe you broke off the wall and look for clues to progress the story. Unfortunately, you're always told when to pull out your forensic tools and it's predetermined which tool you're going to use. It's still cool in some of the sequences to uncover evidence that leads to the confirmation of certain facts, but it would have been way better if you were free to search around on your own accord instead of having to follow someone else's rules. The game even goes so far as to include directional arrows on your tools that point to exactly where you need to look. Even though you can only pull out certain tools in certain areas, they're still neat tools and produce cool graphical effects. You'll get UV and laser lights, a digital camera, a 3D scanner, a Gas Spectrometer and a Sampler. How exactly they're able to transmit data to Rosa so fast is unknown, but it can be ignored for the sake of making the game playable. Nobody wants to play a game where you need to wait two to three days for express shipping every time you find a new bit of evidence. 


Every now and then you go thru moments of insanity (no clue why cause they don't really go into detail whats going on except between levels they tell you something is going on with the dead birds your collecting and your supposed to have some kind of connection to that) There are also special graphical effects that accompany your breaks in sanity. When you're about to have a psychotic episode or premonition, the screen will be blanketed in a grain filter. You'll soon after suffer from hallucinations and see shadows and strange shapes of characters flitting just beyond the periphery of your vision, much like in F.E.A.R. You'll need to stay alert in these sequences since in some of them you're attacked by horrible looking foes that can deal actual damage to you. The hallucinations are yet another example of how this game is able to draw you in and (supposed to) scare the crap out of you.


There were only three spots in the whole game that scared me and all three of them were cheap jump scares
Scary!


Scarier!


Scariest!


and no i didn't get those out of order when your playing this game in the dark and the mood is just right you can end up shitting your pants on that last one. mr tibbits.... that one is expected the moment she tells you to do a close up i knew what was going on . the mannequins are the creepiest you walk in and they just appear behind you. BUT THE LEDGE!!!!!!!!! let me set the scene.....your walking around after you just killed several bad guys, no one is around its dark your constantly hearing something move behind you, so you keep looking behind you.....nothing is there. then you come around a corner and its quiet....to quiet then you think "i know something is gonna come running up im gonna check over here just to be suuuUUUUURRRRR OMG WHAT THE FUCK *SWING* *SWING* *SWING* OH GOD DIE!!!!! ohhh god *breathing heavy* this game is fucked up" and for the rest of the game your wondering what's gonna jump out when your climbing a ladder or looking down a hole....but nothing happens.



So in the long run Condemned: Criminal Origins is a real fun game to play but its not that scary there are a lot of things that pop out but halfway thru you get used to it and everything  gets repetitive. the investigation parts were the saving grace of the game but it could be expanded. There is a sequel Condemned 2: Bloodshot that i haven't played yet (so maybe ill play it at a later date) and a lot of things i don't like may be fixed but ill have no clue of knowing till i play. Time to move on to the next creepy game!