Alone in the Dark

Alone in the Dark is a 1992 survival horror video game designed by Frédérick Raynal. Developed and published by Infogrames in 1992 for MS-DOS, the game was eventually ported to Mac OS, the PC-98, the FM Towns, the 3DO, RISC OS, and iOS. Alone in the Dark is set in 1920s Louisiana and challenges the player to escape a haunted mansion. To advance, the player must solve puzzles while banishing, slaying, or eluding various ghosts and monsters. The player can collect and use weapons, manage a weight-based inventory system, and explore a partially nonlinear map.

Raynal was motivated to create Alone in the Dark due to his interest in 3D animation and his fondness for horror films. The storyline was inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft and the work of directors like Dario Argento and George A. Romero. Raynal's programming team worked to convey much of this story via key texts scattered about the game's environment. To overcome technical limitations, the production team also employed a fixed camera angle system to dramatically frame the movement of three-dimensional characters on top of two-dimensional background images.