The Edgar Allan Poe Horror Game | The Dark Eye

[@dicewrites]

Weird how many times Edgar Allan Poe wrote about burying people alive or in his walls. You think any of his friends ever asked him about that? Just like, "hey man you sure have thought about burying people in walls a lot."

[@lukeb247]

I once read that Poe was so scared about being buried alive he wore a sign to bed saying he wasn't dead.

[@MokohiChan]

​@@lukeb247Makes sense, given the times (that happened quite often) and that he was a horror/tragedy writer. Many take inspiration from what they themselves fear.

[@jeniskindof]

That would explain his quote "sleep those little slices of death oh how I loathe them".

[@AthosJosue]

Or about marrying your own cousin...

[@moosenman]

You know, I think for people to ask that, he’d have to *have* friends

[@squirtleninja]

This is the kind of game I would have really loved as a kid and then it would have given me nightmares for years.

[@adamcope6890]

That’s what it was for me at 14.

[@fiyahspinnah]

Yeah that was me at 8. It was terrifying and I couldn't get enough.

[@JadenGregg-su9no]

​@@fiyahspinnah3 REPLIES

[@Kitten_Party]

Played this as a kid, can confirm, gave me nightmares 😂

[@DaveTerrasidio]

same!

[@tvinthetrashcan]

the woman that flashed on the screen that is supposedly montresor's wife is actually a woman that was enjoying the festivities in the beginning of the story if you spoke with the other revelers!

[@dungeonchill]

Oh! I didn’t make that connection

[@LazyCatIsFat]

I think the design of the characters really work well for this game. It makes the world seem more fictional yet still uncanny. It feels like they're puppets without strings, which I think works really well for Poe's style of story telling.

[@gaminggoddess85]

I must've beaten this game 50 or more times as a kid and it's criminal how unknown it is. But you only get half of the experience buying it online because it originally came with a huge companion book with lots of cool stuff in it. Now if someone does a video on Shivers my life will be complete.

[@convolution223]

what did it have in it? The original stories? Other stories? Art? It sounds so cool!

[@gaminggoddess85]

@@convolution223 I thought I still had the book in my room but couldn't find it, so I'll just have to do my best to remember. It starts with a forward from the game devs followed by a few pages on the life and legacy of Edgar Allan Poe. It then retells the original story that it uses as the vessel for the Poe stories (with Uncle Edwin and your brother and underage cousin's tragic love story), then goes through and retells the Poe stories from the perspectives of both the killers and victims tactically interspersed with screenshots from the game (in black and white though), and I think you're supposed to go back and forth between the Edwin story and the Poe stories when you read it. Then it has the Poe stories and poems that the game uses in their original glory. I feel like there's more I'm forgetting, if I end up finding the book I'll reply again.

[@anaraStar975]

Berenice has yellow wallpaper… nice literary nod.

[@bluelblock]

Absolutely one of the most formative interactive movies I ever played. My dad's coworker gave us a copy (how I wish I knew where it went) when it came out (Halloween 1995!) and it was scary to me as a 5 year old. I picked it up again when I was 14 and was hooked. I loved the art styles and I feel like they really hold up today. I play through it at least once a year. I've chatted with a couple of the artists who worked on it and I've had the great pleasure of meeting Richard Downs, who did the phrenological map, icons, and the Masque of the Red Death. The early-mid 90s seemed like such a great time to take risks and make media like this. It was a very special thing that fostered my love of user interfaces and art, even if I didn't know it at the time. God, I wish I could experience it all for the first time again.

[@thebadshave503]

Jeez, Cosmology of Kyoto and now The Dark Eye, you're rapidly running through my repressed childhood nightmares lately.

[@terrenceswiff]

A small thing but I love Cask of Amontillado for that "you never learn what the problem was" aspect, so don't personally care for it when a reason was given. My favorite interpretation is "his friend did nothing at all/did something that he perceived as offensive, but anyone else wouldn't call it offensive". That makes the story more frightening to me. This friend of yours who's secretly seething about actual nonsense and one day decides to kill you in one of the cruelest ways imaginable. Great story

[@KingKogi]

“But Entertainment Weekly, that paragon of gaming savvy gave it an A” 😂😂😂😂

[@olddeadlemons]

I've always wanted to live out my fantasy of bricking someone up behind a wall in a basement. Thanks to you, now I can.

[@JordanLittle-bb3yq]

I've done it a few times already and it's not that exciting. I mean... No I haven't.

[@cinnamondan4984]

I’d like a good bricking

[@knyght27]

I've always wanted to live out my fantasy of marrying my cousin

[@afonsomonteiro2003]

​@@knyght27Mine was of burying them alive. This is pretty close!

[@andyghkfilm2287]

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MONTRESSOR

[@RavenNewblood84]

The art direction is so uncanny i love it. Amazing work man loving all the content.

[@localocalocaloidic]

Holy shit this video is fantastic. I'm an avid watcher of videos on obscure/niche games but you really manage to dig up some absolute gems I've never heard of. I'm really jiving with your style of commentary and editing and this is such a good example of it. Really, really great work with your vids!!

[@HR-qv5ds]

Common misconception: The film Naked Lunch is far more a very loose mix of material from Burroughs’ early books, such as Junky, and a vague fictionalization of him writing thing those books, than Naked Lunch itself. I don’t think I was ever aware of this game, and I wonder if Burroughs was actually enthusiastic about voicing it, or if the devs were pretty cool.

[@Dana-pn1vy]

He probably needed a quick fix....of delicious kitty food for all his kitties.

[@turtleofpride4572]

​@@Dana-pn1vymhm the Golden Brown verity.

[@Dana-pn1vy]

@@turtleofpride4572 I hear there's never a frown with that brand.

[@micahfoley9572]

"i can think of two things wrong with that title..."

[@TheBeird]

This game looks like the kind of lucid dream that convinces you something was just sitting on your chest and blowing into your ear. Terrifying. I like it!

[@goatbone]

Sleep paralysis. I will never forget the blowing in the ear sensation.

[@KingOfChaos213]

More like sitting on my face 😫

[@afonsomonteiro2003]

I love this channel so much it's the perfect dive into niche media I have literally never heard about

[@modernmusic52]

You have no idea it exists and wouldnt care otherwise, but suddenly now it's the coolest thing ever. Good storytellers are good at that

[@kittenmittenkitten]

Everything put out by Inscape is absolutely worth checking out, they only put out a few before they went under but they are all gems worth talking about. As far as I can tell, they both acted as a developer as well as a publisher, with The Dark Eye, Bad Day at the Midway and the Devo game (yes, that Devo) being produced to a differing degree inhouse. Though The Dark Eye and Bad Day came out on the exact same day and don't seem to have much overlap in teams, beyond sharing an art director. The team behind Bad Days are by and large the same team that made the earlier Resident's collaboration game Freak Show, with the Dark Eye team later going on to make Devo Presents: Adventures of the Smart Patrol. As for what they exclusively just produced, there's Drowned God: Conspiracy of Ages (an endless rabbit-hole of a topic) and... the Princess Maker 2 PC port. Fun fact, if you've played Riven you might have recognized the art style for the Masque of the Red Death sequence, yep it's the same artist: Richard Downs.

[@SleepyDrummer]

I played this game when I was really young, and it inspired my love of Edgar Allan Poe's work and twisted horror in general. Thanks for covering it!

[@thronezwei4412]

New theory: the old man got killed over obnoxiously slurping his soup.

[@StubenhockerElite]

Ahead of the time, this stuff would win awards these days

[@lil_thang]

the pause menu really did make me think disco elysium

[@Anonymouthful]

Thats a pretty low bar to pass seeing as what kind of trash manages to win awards, awards that are nothing more than endorsment for products as their plastered as a giant wall of big numbers as if to make you feel good about your purchase.

[@campionpesate4647]

I first played this in 2016 and admit that while it was janky, there was genuine talent working on this game

[@ZeyTheDaemon]

Oh shit, I didn't imagine this and it actually exists? I had a dream about this when I was really into Edgar Allan Poe's work back in the day and thought I made it up for some reason

[@accountname-tu2om]

you did make it up. you manifested it into reality. good job

[@ZeyTheDaemon]

@@accountname-tu2om God damn it, brain

[@TJF588]

I am immediately enamoured with the animate visuals of the characters and even the _cursor!_ The stop-motion quality of the yet fluid motions is a treat itself, and the ascribed uncanny vibe really suits a horror game to displace trust in the unfamiliar.

[@Trevor_NewJerusalem]

How did I never know about this!? This is the combination of several things I really like.

[@torgo_]

rip burroughs, what an absolute legend. makes me remember Dead City Radio, i'm overdue to listen to it again

[@Dana-pn1vy]

Ah yes, ol' William Tell Burroughs. The Priest, They Called Him

[@goatbone]

This game is very nostalgic for me. Sought it out after reading Poe and was probably the start of sending me down the rabbit hole of experimental 90s PC games. Was sort of familiar with Burroughs at the time too. Played through it many times. Far from perfect but so unique with the use of stop motion in 3D environments. Can't really say anything more you covered it well.

[@goatbone]

Although sorry if you mentioned it and I missed it but I think worth noting the music was by Thomas Dolby.

[@xsplashdashx]

When my family got our first PC in the 90's, my older brothers bought a lot of games for it. This was one. Even as a kid I was a big Edgar Allan Poe fan and this game was so cool to me. Honestly, though, the cool compendium book that came with it was better than the game itself. Glad to see another obscure gem on the channel, Dungeon Chill.

[@Burner-ce7oq]

Love this game, so stoked to see someone make a video on it 😮

[@AdKrispies]

So glad you've reviewed this. I first played this game in 1995 when it got out and it succeeded at both creeping me out and getting me to delve into Poe's litterature. The puppet design was masterfully grotesque and to this day remains (to me) the ideal incarnation of all protagonists in Poe's stories. The art direction, music and narrative did a great job at immersing you within the tales - and the minimalist staging set the perfect mood for the macabre creepiness to happen. The Cask of Amontillado and Berenice were my fave parts, but I also immensely enjoyed the victorian darkness imbued in the 'Annabelle Lee" poem, masterfully read by William Burroughs. The game was unfortunately too short - more of an "interactive experience", but it did a great job at incarnating the very essence of Poe's universe.

[@hemangchauhan2864]

This game terrified my ever since I first laid my eyes on it. Your coverage was great!

[@musicobsessive123]

i love burroughs i was so excited to hear his voice wtf. this is perfect for him

[@matildarose]

I remember playing this in the early 00s! It was circulated around on abandonware sites even back then. The Berenice segment gave me chills.

[@nathanielalexander8928]

I remember playing this as a kid in our basement, in the dark. This game truly scared the crap outta me & I've never had another game affect me like this one. Such a classic..

[@Robrt476]

i have gone through just about all of your videos out so far and all i have to say is that this quickly became one of my favorite channels (ive watched the lunacy video like 3 or 4 times already, i fell in love as soon as i saw it and now i need to play it. I love games like that) thank you for this, i cant wait to see what else you come out with because i need more now. You've created a monster with an unsatiable apatite for dungeon chilling.

[@herniagaming]

90s animation is unmatched in how detailed ununerving it is, such a unique and distinctive vibe

[@oscar5226]

what a fascinating little game. i never would have heard of it if you hadn't shared this. thanks for posting your videos!

[@cpt.straginski]

The look of this game, amazing puppetry! And voice work, wow man, there is so many gems in a infinite ocean of PC gaming. Great video! Thank you for spotlighting such an interesting oddity this project is

[@mmdgamer7746]

I know its a great day when Dungeon Chill uploads . great video as always

[@DeadEyeDucky79]

Every time I come to this channel for some reason I think of this game. Never played it but found out about it years ago. Always intrigued me.

[@huh4344]

Wasn't expecting to see a video of this game on my feed. I haven't played this game since I was a kid. Takes me way back. The art direction has always stuck in my mind, and really left an impression. Thanks for the content.

[@lil_thang]

oh my GOD how have i never heard of this, AND WILLIAM BURROUGHS DOES VOICE IN IT??? thanks for sharing friend!

[@ThePhantomSafetyPin]

I did a playthrough of this game on my KZbin channel many years ago, back when I did Let's Plays and game reaction vids. What a strange, unnerving, and unique little game The Dark Eye is... I learned about it through a SomethingAwful Let's Play myself, and getting it set up was kind of a nightmare of basically, running a Windows 3.11 Virtual Machine in DOSBox. It took months to find the ISO, get it running, and play it. I'm glad I did and I'm extremely glad to see someone else talk about it.

[@LaBibliotecaEterna]

So cool that someone its finally talking about this game, also thanks for the link it makes the job of running obscure old PC games easier.

[@kayeplaguedoc9054]

I'm glad this game is starting to get some attention, I discovered it by chance around 2011 and I've never forgotten it.

[@eyeoftheosprey6678]

I played this when it came out in 1995. I absolutely loved it! It holds as much nostalgia for me as Myst! I used your link to get the game! I played it I think 3 times back then so time for another playthrough! Thanks again!

[@RyanTheScar]

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December and each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor

[@HerbBrid3]

This game has been my favorite for a while and I’ve barely seen anyone talk about it or make videos for it. It’s such a creative and unique game and I haven’t been able to find anything similar enough.

[@deanolium]

Loved this game ever since I saw it at Home of the Underdogs. I really miss that time in gaming where people were just trying things to see what works, and you got arty things like this being made. The teeth part in the Berenice section is just so well done.

[@theunbearablejuan]

I played this for the first time when I was 16. Still have the big box and all. The fact that it isn't on GOG is downright criminal. Such a scary game.

[@izwrex5782]

The line “For the love of god, Montresor!” Is probably my favorite Poe line, and the voice actor really nailed it

[@FredrickCarlsson]

Really good stuff. You’ve got a good structure to your videos and keep things focused on what’s interesting (and I also enjoy the Mr Plinkett-audio)

[@beefgravystudios]

I played this years ago and when I tried to tell anyone about it, no one had heard of it. I started to think I had been a victim of the Mandella Effect. Thank you for giving me peace.

[@santerihuida4215]

I had this playing in the background while doing other things but once you said that William S. Burroughs is a voice actor in this game I could not believe my ears. That has to be one of the most absurd things I've heard in a long while Subscribed

[@yourcommander3412]

Being slowly bricked in like this was very comical. "Ooooooohhhh ... noooooo"

[@Cadychan]

Oh my God, I watched my roommate play this game one night like nearly 20 years ago. What a fascinating, unnerving game.

[@bengarrisson]

That game really left an impression on him after I finished it. I loved every second of it.

[@MRDLT00]

Damn what a cool little game. I love how many of Poe's works they crammed into one game.

[@mateuszbalacki3676]

Scared the shit out of me as a kid. Absolutely stunning visual style

[@comikachi]

Fun fact about Edgar Allen Poe: we know his dark/horror stories well because they aged well. When he was alive he mostly did critiques and even did quite a bit of comedy but it was so specific to the time period it just didn't have the same lasting effect.

[@criticalt3]

It's actually a crime you don't have more subscribers, your content and quality is top notch!

[@JellyJman]

One of the scariest games I ever played as a kid. This was was crazy

[@childofcascadia]

This is one of the coolest channels Ive found. I am an old. (Well. Not a super old. But old enough I remember the 80s as a child) i love late 80s-early 90s DOS and windows games, and have my own collection of obscure games. Thanks. Subbed!

[@barry-allenthe-flash8396]

The Collection Chamber has a KZbin Channel. They (he?) either hasn't updated it anymore or does so very infrequently, which is a shame - you're right in that that blog does great work and their old KZbin videos were pretty good retro gaming KZbin content that spotlighted a decent number of obscurities. Glad the CC got this game working; at first I thought I _was_ familiar with it but then I realized I was thinking of The Dream Machine, so I'm happy to see someone cover this one. Great job, Dungeon Chill! So cool to see a game like this get some coverage for Halloween month.

[@wildonionchase3934]

New Dungeon Chill AND Grimbeard videos on the same day? Rad as hell

[@adamcope6890]

Thank you so much for doing this review. This game has mostly been forgotten.

[@sulfreez]

Clay models evoke "The Dream Machine" vibes.

[@rpm4513]

This was my first exposure to these Poe stories. Berenice in particular really stuck with me; that bit with the teeth flashing on the screen is so freaky. Later looking up the original story, I was shocked how short it was. If you open the Wikipedia article for it, the entire short story is embedded right there as a gif, just a single page with a few paragraphs. It felt a lot bigger when I first experienced this game.

[@Jello_Criminal]

11:17 That's nuts. I use to do a lot of "breaking bad drug" and when I was awake for 2-3 days my mind would be so cooked I could stare into the darkness and stuff would move and whisper to me and I could sit there and stare for hours. Not a good time.

[@Tunade5]

The figures in this game reminds me of an obscure stop-motion tv special that I would probably only see once on tv when I was young and would probably not find until some extensive google searches, or if someone made a KZbin video talking about it. Amazing video though!

[@Kenagalaz]

So cool you covered this game, I ended up buying a psychical copy at an antique shop and got it to work on my previous laptop through a windows emulator, sadly the laptop got destroyed along with the disc

[@afm9405]

😱😨 The strange claymation movements and the figures themselves are absolutely horrifying to me--especially their hand and arm movements! Something about this is truly unsettling me to the core. Some moments of the game where the figure comes in to the room or is just standing in the back of the already disturbing scenery...oh man, giving me mega chills of terror that I can't explain. That being said, what a wonder, great video on this creepy, horrid game haha. Your channel has quickly become one of my top favorites so cheers and looking forward to more chills like this!

[@ObMeitse]

I've always had a fascination with this game through seeing it mentioned on various abandonware sites, but I've never actually played it or seen it in action before. Very cool, and a great review of it.

[@DAv2003]

A good insight into an obscure horror game here with some really interesting art direction and atmosphere. Nice to see such hidden gems come to life. Also, was that Kelsey Grammer voicing Fortunato?

[@AdamTheCoop1]

this game had really high production standards based on what ive seen here, the 1990s were really interesting with all of the animation studios experimenting with adventure games

[@falgalhutkinsmarzcal3962]

I found this game on cd-rom somewhere I cannot recall. I still have it, being a Poe fan.

[@isabell3462]

Dungeon Chill and Grim Beard posting within 24 hours of each other? Not beating the same person allegations

[@TheZackofSpades]

So it’s been awhile since I read it but it seemed like the overarching story was a riff on ‘Fall of the House of Usher’…could be wrong but it’s a nice way of keeping the overworld in-universe with Mr. Poe

[@lunartears6761]

In high school, I had a morbidly humorous interpretation of the cask of amontillado, in which montresor was bricked-up alive for being too annoying.😅

[@arknark]

I wonder if Fortunato had to watch Montresor mix the mortar he used to brick up that hole. Torturous.

[@pastelfan9730]

Dude I wish I could play this as someone who’s a fan of Edgar Allen Poe’s work (and the fact that the Tell-Tale Heart is in here and that’s my favorite EAP story makes it even better). Also this game looks so much like a Tim Burton movie

[@tfwspoiledcat]

I'm laughing out loud at the cousin name and the spontaneous dancing 😂

[@TheZackofSpades]

Even having never played this, I saw a clip of the “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD” moment and boy did they nail that one. 10/10, Poe would’ve been pleased

[@shards-of-glass-man]

Man, Dark Eye. It's like coming home.

[@Leader1138]

Great video as always. One note: 3:19 Poe died in the early Victorian era. Late Victorian would be near the turn of the 20th century.

[@annenonimus6709]

In 3:20 , when talkinga about the music, you call it "late victorian", when actually Poe's writings are very EARLY victorian. The victorian era goes from 1837 to January 1901. The clothes of the female characters are also early victorian. Edgar Allan Poe most known works like "To Helen" (1831), “The Raven” (1845), “Annabel Lee” (1849), "The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843) and “The Cask of Amontillado” (1846); and the supernatural horror story “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839) are all early victorian or PRE victorian, from the Romantic Period. I just wanted to mention that.

[@nathanclark8430]

I was starting to think this was a childhood fever dream...

[@MintyCow101]

the stop motion is so disturbing and creepy, makes this game very unique because i dont know any other game that looks like this. its making me feel so unseasy.

[@jasonblalock4429]

Along these same lines, last Halloween I stumbled onto a free game on Steam which is a walking sim recreation of HP Lovecraft's Dagon. It was pretty good, especially for a freebie.

[@Redfoxe]

Kinda interesting that Edwin and Elise are the only models with eyes. Everyone elses models give such creepy vibes. EDIT: Forgot the old man in the Tell-tale heart Title appropiate atleast!.

[@somethingcleverhere]

Poe's wife, who he married when she was thirteen, died of tuberculosis, and seems like a clear part of how they composed the frame story. Nothing as dramatic as this was Poe and he made up everything he saw, but still an effective and evocative way to set the mood.

[@borediideath6526]

I remember seeing this game on Xplay a long, long one ago and I never knew what it was.

[@christianhighii9882]

I FUCKING LOVE THIS GAME. I had it when it first came out! NO ONE. I mean NO ONE seems to know it (except you)! So happy for this!

[@goatbone]

That's cool. Do you remember how much it cost or where you got it? I only discovered it later and downloaded it from some abandonware site.

[@thesidneychan]

Finally a new Grimbeard video.

[@Jxnxdoe]

Ah yes Gri-😅

[@joshuahemmesch8159]

I like to think that Dungeon is grim without all the skit stuff that is now a big part of his videos.

[@oziaus]

But with a lot less...cringey retarded humor.

[@StubenhockerElite]

Ngl i like DC more

[@bigsam69]

How dare you compare that loser to DC

[@orwellianson]

Would love to play these games on modern consoles/terminals. Love these older bits to death.

[@KiuiartiiMusic]

3:57.. YOU KNOW IT'S THRILLER!!

[@ms313city]

Classic! I can't believe I found this video!😊

[@superspy6]

Quite surprised you didn't mention the framing device, was an adaption of "The Fall of The House of Usher", one of my favourite poe stories.

[@bobbobinton5106]

2:14 my brain can hear beetlejuice saying “nice fuckin’ model!” Is that just me

[@blake6248]

I love youtube channels like yours cant wait to watch more video's

[@nocapsbb]

hell yeah, let's get spooky