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At What Cost?

Review by Sean Penn: writer, actor, world stage

1/2
Jul 25
At What Cost?
Claire Atherton

Never actually read it.

Just so everyone knows. The cover is cropped from the cover of the Xbox 360 launch title Condemned: Criminal Origins.

It was a decent game. From Monolith, the same people that made F.E.A.R. Condemned: Criminal Origins is that game where you’re an FBI agent, except instead of doing cool CSI stuff or arresting bad guys, you mostly wander through buildings that look like they were condemned during the Civil War, hitting deranged hobos with rusty pipes. You play as Ethan Thomas, a guy who constantly looks like he just woke up on a bus bench. The game throws you into these dark, rotting environments filled with creepy mannequins and guys who seem like they’ve been waiting their whole lives to jump out of a closet and beat you to death with a broken 2x4

The combat system is raw and clumsy, but in kind of a perfect way. You just grab whatever’s around, every fight feels like a prison brawl, with enemies snarling and charging at you like they haven’t eaten in days and think your face is food. Sometimes you get a taser, which is basically “God Mode” for five seconds, but most of the time it’s just block, swing, pray. You have to check it out on YouTube.

There’s a story somewhere, buried beneath all the drywall dust and blood spatter. You’re chasing a serial killer, or maybe a bunch of them, but it goes off the rails fast. The deeper you go, the more people talk about voices and visions and birds, and by the time you’re fighting a shirtless man in a meat locker while hallucinating your own mental breakdown, you’ve sort of accepted that none of this is going to make sense.

It’s janky, repetitive, and deeply unsettling and… I kinda love it. No game has ever made me this scared of a guy with no shirt and a pipe. It’s not refined horror.

It’d be crazy if this book was related. But nope! Hope you read this and can go watch some videos about Condemned! Considering they took the time to steal its assets.

Sean Penn: writer, actor, world stage
At What Cost?
Claire Atherton
1/2
•Jul 25
At What Cost?

Never actually read it.

Just so everyone knows. The cover is cropped from the cover of the Xbox 360 launch title Condemned: Criminal Origins.

It was a decent game. From Monolith, the same people that made F.E.A.R. Condemned: Criminal Origins is that game where you’re an FBI agent, except instead of doing cool CSI stuff or arresting bad guys, you mostly wander through buildings that look like they were condemned during the Civil War, hitting deranged hobos with rusty pipes. You play as Ethan Thomas, a guy who constantly looks like he just woke up on a bus bench. The game throws you into these dark, rotting environments filled with creepy mannequins and guys who seem like they’ve been waiting their whole lives to jump out of a closet and beat you to death with a broken 2x4

The combat system is raw and clumsy, but in kind of a perfect way. You just grab whatever’s around, every fight feels like a prison brawl, with enemies snarling and charging at you like they haven’t eaten in days and think your face is food. Sometimes you get a taser, which is basically “God Mode” for five seconds, but most of the time it’s just block, swing, pray. You have to check it out on YouTube.

There’s a story somewhere, buried beneath all the drywall dust and blood spatter. You’re chasing a serial killer, or maybe a bunch of them, but it goes off the rails fast. The deeper you go, the more people talk about voices and visions and birds, and by the time you’re fighting a shirtless man in a meat locker while hallucinating your own mental breakdown, you’ve sort of accepted that none of this is going to make sense.

It’s janky, repetitive, and deeply unsettling and… I kinda love it. No game has ever made me this scared of a guy with no shirt and a pipe. It’s not refined horror.

It’d be crazy if this book was related. But nope! Hope you read this and can go watch some videos about Condemned! Considering they took the time to steal its assets.

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More Reviews by Sean Penn: writer, actor, world stage
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Knee-Deep in the Dead
More Reviews bySean Penn: writer, actor, world stage
Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again
Roadside Picnic
Knee-Deep in the Dead
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The Hellbound Heart