I Am Alive made me think back about two very complex games. I�m talking here about Alan Wake and Spec Ops: The Line. I Am Alive seems to have that awkward Alan Wake atmosphere, attitude and a bit of that fight for survival. On the other hand, Ubisoft Shanghai�s game has retained some of those hard call decisions that made a difference in Spec Ops: The Line. These two connections made me understand from the very beginning of the game that I Am Alive isn�t a pure linear game but rather a gamers� directed adventure where the producers only sketched the map and some targets, the rest of it being left on the player.

The Event

A city in ruins, cars and trucks smashed and abandoned in the utmost disorder all over the city�it�s all a very graphic and realistic image of an inexplicable tragedy that came all of a sudden over a flourishing, unsuspecting town. But the producers didn�t limit the effects of the tragedy only in the city limits of Haventown. No, this tragedy seems to have hit the whole America and even the entire world. It�s a blurred up side of the script, left like that both because it would have no relevance what so ever to the action and because this way the Event gets to feel even more mysterious than it really is.

The city scenery is quite impressive and the dust fog that stays on the city floor makes everything look even more dangerous and full of mystery. In fact this fog was a stroke of genius from the Chinese based developer as this preserves a great deal of unknown over the map while the game�s entire adventures take place on a rather limited area.

Huge buildings were torn from the half up and others were just leveled to the ground, nothing is safe and the whole situation is enhanced even more by the presence of a huge ship in the middle of the city, thrown there by who knows what kind of earthquake generated tsunami.But while this looks like a completely deserted place, Haventown is still there with lots of people trying to survive another day in this horrible place. But most of them denounced any kind of social order, some of them becoming even cannibals. Still some are still there because they had no chance to escape the city before or after the event so they just stayed there hiding in the mall, trying to find something to eat and hoping for the best.

With all this stuff going on, I must say that remarkable about this game is not the apocalypse now concept. This stuff gets more and more used every year. No, this is something better: it�s getting to survive the apocalypse and learning how to deal with it, the whole story is going on at some time after The Event, at least a year, as the main character says a couple of times that it took him only 4 hours to reach the East Coast and a whole year to go back.The thing is that I, as a player, got to forget that this was just a game. In fact I must admit that the term �immersive adventure� is a way better description for I Am Alive than anything else. The whole world is just�so real, so close to what you might find in your day to day life if this kind of Event would really take place. And keeping this idea in mind, the simple climbing on an almost shattered building, each race thru the ground dust or even the interaction with other NPCs in the game is just fantastic.

Still, one thing that didn�t make me all that happy was one particular event, a meeting with a female NPC in need for some food. You know, in I Am Alive, for every man or woman that you help, you get a bonus retry, something that can prove to be very useful in some situations. Anyway, I met this lady, that seemed to be in her 40s, and I gave her a can of fruits. She was sad but what the hell, most of the people that you meet in the game are like this so I just continued my mission. Yet, later I got to come back the same road (actually a sewer) and I saw her again, hanged from a rope, a completely senseless self inflicted death. This i

s something that had no place in a game, even in this depressing environment.

However this episode was singular and except for that, the whole combination of elements, starting with the post apocalyptic city and ending with the help the ones in need tasks was more than successful.

Surviving in a harsh environmentTo be a survivor means to fight, to think and to act without hesitation but at the same time, surviving means to show compassion to those that are in need, to protect and to save. It might sound weird but there are people who believe in scenarios like the one depicted by Ubisoft Shanghai in I Am Alive, and now I understand why.

In fact, speaking of the above, the main character of this game is exactly that: a survivor, gone all the way to the other coast of America, wounded in the Event and still powerful enough to come back on foot and try to find his lost family.Speaking of this I must say that for me, I Am Alive tends to look more like an RPG even if the producers speak of it as a true blood action game. Why is that? Well, the main reason is that personal component depicted in the game thru the lenses of the video camera that records all the key moments in the game as a visual diary.

Actually, speaking of retries and video recordings, each retry in I Am Alive is symbolized by a small video camera, both the ones earned from the NPCs and those found scarcely over the whole map.

Just the first one

I must admit that since the first words of this review I�ve put a powerful accent on the fact that I Am Alive gets its best features from the brilliant combination of action, suspense and terrible decisions that the gamer must take.

But I�ve also seen another interesting element, found most of the times in the American TV series: that set of loose ends left there on purpose in order to create a sequel, of course if the first game sells well enough. My arguments are the relative small coverage of the map, that dust that prevents the player from seeing more of the town and the grand finale that doesn�t get to tie up all the plot. In fact, looking behind, the whole game is centered on a single �campaign� of missions and in the end none of them aren�t quite related to the main character�s quest to find his family.

Dropping the ball

Sadly, most of the good vibe of the game is often torn to pieces by some of the choices the developer made. If the life or mana lines (both of them installed in the worst place possible if I may say so) drop under 30% you�ll get to see a lot of red in front of your eyes as the whole view becomes surrounded by a red cloud that will refuse to disappear until you�ll get some pain killers or other kind of health restoration items.

Now back to my case, after losing lots and lots of hours in front of my PC, devouring American made TV series, I can sense that future sequel intention. So many paths that remain out of reach, so many places to explore. I rest my case.

Just to end this review

I Am Alive developed in an intricate story line with a mysterious background that failed to be completely unveiled. It�s a good story and a great adventure, that you shouldn�t lose, especially if you�re into role playing game adventures.This is not a top game but in many ways I must admit that I Am Alive is one of the best titles I�ve got to play this year. So, I�ll give it a 9.