Audio Atrocities (TM) :: Extermination (Playstation 2)

This game has a lot in common with Martian Gothic Unification, and, well, just about any of the countless survival-horror knockoff games.

There's not much to say here that hasn't been said before. There's a small cast, and most of them are really not much good. The main character, especially, has a weird vocal detachment from whatever's going on in the game. That detachment really rachets down any kind of dramatic tension or actual terror the game might try to deliver.

A production footnote: the sound engineering on this title is definitely broken. Compared to the Japanese release, the US voices are seriously overcompressed - the result being that the speech that IS in the game is much less dynamic than it should be, which I suppose is somewhat ironic, given the low-wattage voice acting on display here. See? Sony does have a sense of humor!

Exhibit A: “I heard that this facility has a number of areas inaccessible to the regular researchers.”
This clip is an example of what happens when the cast and director get hammered during lunch and then come back and make drunken love to ProTools. Over-enunciation to prevent slurring in a multi-million dollar production. Brilliant.

Exhibit B: “Will you be all right...Cindy?”
This wasn't edited. Another weird Grandiaesque pause where you least expect it to make the line sound as strange as possible.

Exhibit C: “Something's down here...I can feel it.”
Talk about cool as a cucumber! Either he's had a lobotomy, or he's a robot sent by the corporation to watch the 'splodin' chests when the aliens come. People are anything but monotone when it's clear scary things are about to happen.

The Rest:
Haven't had enough? Here's some additional clips for your amusement:
Clip 4, Clip 5, Clip 6, Clip 7, Clip 8, Clip 9, Clip 10

“I have to jump that crevice.”