Realms of the Haunting PC Game Review 

A few years ago, I dug out my original disks and was determined to finally finish this game, as I was totally in love with its concept back when it came out, but never got far in 1997. So I printed out a walkthrough, and sat down with it every night after work for several weeks (around 2009), playing on my old Win98 Packard Bell Pentium II 266. Damn, I was still in love with it. The atmosphere was incredible throughout. However, even with the walkthrough, I reached a point about Chapter 16 where I was hopelessly stuck. I had apparently left something undone a long time before, but I had no idea what it was that I needed to do. Frustrating as hell, but I still count this among my all-time favorite gaming experiences. Oh, and I had a big crush on whoever the girl was that played Rebecca. I thought she was so beautiful. Gggman, if you actually finished this game (and it appears that you did), you have my respect. It is no small feat. Loved your video examples of many of the locations I remember so well. You covered a wide variety. Also, it is rare that I can agree with every word of a game review, but you nailed it here. I was nodding my head sagely all the way through. Well done, sir!

Protaganist reminds me of anakin skywalker from episode two

I will always remember this as the game where you make a bong for a supernatural water being.

The weapon fire and reload sprites are exceptional. They look better than some 3d animations in more recent games.

I recently checked up on the actors in this game. Most of them have fallen by the wayside when it comes to acting, according to IMDB. A few, like Emma Powell (Rebecca), have gone on to do a lot of voice acting. Go check out her GAMES demo reel. It's fabulous.

Poor Gremlin. They did some great games back in the day, but sadly lie forgotten now. I hadn't even heard of RotH, so thanks for the review Chief!

very interesting, never heard of this game before

Locked... Won't budge. Stuck fast. Stuck fast. Won't budge.

One of my all-time favourites which I still come back to (thanks of course to GOG). The dynamic atmospheric lighting absolutely wowed me at the time, and still impresses, and the scope of the mythology (Cornish myth, Egyptology, Gnosticism, Dante, and good old haunted house horror) is truly epic. Also, I was stupidly amused you could turn off all the textures by pressing "M" (A useless features, as the textures are often informative, but a nice little look at the raw mechanics of 3d gaming).

It's really cool that you reviewed this game and liked it. I had so much fun with it back in the day, playing it all night with the lights off.

I played this game maybe 20 years ago. I always wanted to know what it was in adult life but never remembered the name then suddenly during the night it just popped back into my mind. So here I am!

Nice review! I bought this game when it first came out 20 years ago and just completed it for the first time today. Finally!

I'm so impressed by how much personality the reload animations have and how good the weapon effects are. Best 3 dollars I'll spend on Steam

awesome review, one of the most underrated games ever IMO

GOG is my go to site for video games; love the variety.

The cutscenes look like green screen RU-vid movies run through a "full motion video" filter. And I'm here for it.

This was hands down my favourite game as a kid, even if certain bits did scare the shit out of me (like the cave section with the flying enemies). Way, way ahead of its time, even if it did come on FOUR compact disks! For context, this game came out the same year as GoldenEye on the N64.

ACTUALLY, you can press Right and then left mouse buttons together and just let go the left one, while holding the right one to have a mouse look, then ya just use the CTRL for shooting. EDIT: Also the US version lets you change controls. The UK one doesn't have that but can be patched up to the version i've mentioned.

Shilling a bit there in the end, were we? Great review as always!

I played this one all the way through the end and was extremely surprised with how many different elements it had and the firing system was better than a lot of shooters. Glad you reviewed this one.

(Leofair) One of the most atmospheric game I ever played. It is really nice someone pays attention to such an emmersive classic game :)

This looks like it has all the charm of a mid 90s VHS b movie while also being a pretty cool looking game.

Holy old school, how come i've never seen this video?

what the enemies in this game WERE a real threat, died tons of times

Protagonist kinda reminds me of Anakin

RoTH used the same engine as Normality, which is also smacks you in the face and pisses in your mouth instead of holding your hand. I kept the boxed edition of RoTH I bought back in 1998 (it's a in bin in my attic, somewhere... LOL). Hell, I even bought a Tseng 6000 and SB AWE 64 for DOS games like this that played well with the VESA 2.0 spec.

I had the game on disc. Or rather, discs. :p I always found it amazing, the adventure + FPS gameplay made it one of my favorite games when I was a teen. BTW, do you know the Tex Murphy games? I would love it you did a review of them (even if it's one video for all games in the series).

Great vid yet again! I recommend checking out IRON Storm isn't ANZAC but its a decent shooter within a creative setting.

Why have i never heard of this before? It looks great visually and sounds great

I played this when it came out, but I had consistent problems with the video playback, and if I remember the screen just went black until you skipped it. It was funny as I had quite a good computer at the time and graphics accelerator, so I couldn't effectively play the game (all the other graphics worked). I was also about eleven years old at the time, and remember being quite scared of the catacombs and the bit when you take the scepter and all the skeletons come out. But all in all the game was really cool and pretty memorable to me. I took a while earlier trying to remember what it was called as I know the shortcut was just called "Roth".

Hey, ross scott did a video about this game too, though that one is about 30 minutes, loved the review though

God i love this game. Still have the original cds. I don't know how many hours i have played that game over and over. Great review as always!

Though there may not be in game ways of changing the key mapping, you should be able to use the DOSBox key mapper to set whatever controls you like.

Who else wore a brown duster in the '90s and had that same haircut? Ever see the movie 'Crossworlds'? It came out in 1996. Rutger Hauer's in it and he wears a duster and uses a staff that he describes as "a cosmic chainsaw."

Woah, this game and engine look awesome

Such an amazing game ! The story is a bit convoluted and the level design somewhat confusing but the game as a whole is incredible even today !

i remember playing this way back in high school but could never figger out what it name was called when i finished school thanks iv been looking for this one for a verry long time.

This game looks super neat! Thanks to this review, I am going to buy this.

I just found an original copy in a "throw away" bin on the street here in Bremen Germany... Good condition!

On sale at GOG for $0.59, thanks for the recommendation.

OK so this is sort of an interesting concept. I just think it could of had just a LITTLE more spit and polish by the looks of things. Great review.

SuperGreatFriend did an exhaustive LP of this game, and he spoke about using Xpadder or some other program to reconfig the controls to work with a ps4 controller, because of the touch pad.

Hey ggg id like to see a review for Warhawk: Red Mercury Missions for the ps1 by SingleTrac. The same team that made Twisted Metal

this is good review ^^

People forget what a powerhouse Gremlin was back then, as much so as Bullfrog and Blizzard.

Very good review. I watched a Let's Play of this game some time ago and would like to play it, but I would probably get lost in the mazes and the *'spoiler'* downer ending *'spoiler'* demotivates me somewhat.

One of my favourite old games. Still have the original big box and discs. Gameplay holds up for the most part although the first part of Sheol is both metaphorically and literally Hell. As for the FMV cutscenes, I think the only 90's game that has them beat is Wing Commander. It has pretty decent acting and overall it's not all that cheesy, plus it helps that it has a compelling story with twists and turns and some pretty obscure references.

Is the head-bob adjustable, I wonder? I'd love to play this, but I can see it would give me motion sickness within about 5 minutes.

best game i´ve ever played. it is simply perfect. played it in 1998 and it took me 1 month to complete it, cause some of the riddles were so damn hard

Was on steam for less than $4 had to pick it up, this games better than most newer games being released today.

I'm in love with this Shaded Lighting software rendering (CPU-only) 3D was a lie... almost everything looks better in 2D

I've still got this game from it's release. Really have enjoyed it several times but it's been years. A reboot onto console would be nice-same story/same characters [[well, new actors I suppose]], same everything but new graphic/engine and controls. Next to Blade Riven, Runner and Oddworld Abe's Oddysee it is one of my favorite older games.

Freaking cool review

Interesting.... I shall try this game out.

I was watching a Resident Evil retrospective the other day, and it said in early development for the first game they planned it to be a FPS with puzzles. I wonder how similar it would have been to this game.

This is a great game. I wish somebody would remaster it...

Lost a lot of hours to this game. I remember the fun and frustration fondly. Might have to look up how to install this game on a modern PC and give it another go.

Did you play Will Rock, ZenoClash or Pariah? They aren't really good but I think they're pretty fun to play.

There was a steam giveaway for this game not too long ago.

This is such a good game. I feel like it's a transitional game, like the end of the adventure game era and the beginning of the FPS era... I mean, yeah, lots of FPS games had been out by this point, but maybe you know what I mean. If there is one thing I didn't like about this game, it's that I feel like some of the enemies look too cartoony when compared with the style of everything else. But I think that's just nitpicking.

The game is great and i am playing it now ..just got it from GOG ...but i have one question .How to drink health potions ?

make a Nosferatu the wrath of malachi review pliz :)

ROTH does a good job combining adventure with fps, and it's a long and complex game -- not for casuals or people looking for an action shooter; as it's adventure first and foremost. It can be difficult in that areas are large, hub based, and there's no automap (just "paper" maps you have to read yourself). It's possible to screw yourself by missing items, but all the puzzles do make sense and the game throws in enough hints and info if you read the documents, examine the items, etc: There's none of that "90s adventure game logic", and though items don't glow or anything, it's not a pixel hunt either. Weapons are neat, but combat can be clunky; as are the controls in general _(NOTE: The US patch allows you to change resolution and remap controls to the conventional wasd & pseudo mouselook)._ Also a strong point is that the art direction and atmosphere are *top notch*, and the story is pretty well written and interesting especially if you're into the occult... It delves into everything from religious history to the Templars, ceremonial magic, summoning, seances, magical artefacts, persistence of the soul, dream interpretation, alternate dimensions; even getting into gothic architecture, the apocalypse, angels and demons... Most of the major historic and popular occult beliefs are at least touched on if not integral in some way. It does get a little fantasy-like in some later areas, but most of the game is you basically playing occult detective in a creepy old manor house complete with hidden passages and secret rooms... It's not going to scare you to death, but it avoids most of the silliness and cheese of the FMV adventure era and does a good job being eerie and sucking you in to the story. In all, a highly underrated retro gem that remains one of my favorites -- if not one of the greatest horror/occult adventure games of all time. Just take my advice and find the "US patch" before playing. Due to the primitive BUILD-like engine the mouselook is limited as in original Doom, Duke, etc, but being able to use wasd+mouse to move around makes a huge difference vs. the default scheme.

Why does this dude looks and acts like Dante from DmC before DmC even existed?

Props to the actor of Belial. Awesome villain.

There is a patch for the GOG version that let's you change the controls and difficulty.

Another game I would really like a reboot of.

Why have you not done any of thebDevil May Cry games

I got this game for 74 cents on steam and the atmosphere is amazing very glad I got it.

At the time? Now they have some?

I got this game free years ago and enjoyed it, cool game.

This was pretty awesome.

Are they making a sequel? Or a spiritual successor. We need more point n click adventure FPS games

someone uploaded a package of Textures used in this beautiful game to idgames to be used on Doom mods... so use it!

I Get this game in my GOG Piñata today...

i luvd this gam

Do an L.A. Noire review!

Love this game. If there is anything to complain about, it's how the art style of the enemies clashes with the rest of the game's art style. They look a bit cartoony sometimes. This game still creeps me out, and that's an accomplishment. Oh! The platforming was a bit of a pain in some areas.

No mouse look?

Amnesia of 90’kid!!

I once saw a let's play of this game, where a ps4 controller was used, which should make the game a little easier to control.

Still have the game in its box as new, probably worth about £2 but loved it when I played it

You can get it on GOG for 59 cents atm, go and get it. ;)

Rebecca is hella fine

This is still a really fantastic game. You can change the controls to make them easier for modern players. You can find the patch here. www.gog.com/forum/realms_of_the_haunting/transformation_patch_uk_us_version/page1

looks like a bad ass cross of Blood and Killing TIME

If you are planning to add another genre to your reviews the please consider third person shooters since there are even more games and it will be familiar to you.

Looks like a pretty cool game, although 90s FMV can be incredibly ridiculous, I'll just have to see.

Okey, I'll be a creep! Who's the girl in the thong (intro)?!

Seriously, this game is $.59 cents on GOG now. This review is helpful to see if it's just worth spending time because money is not an issue. I'm not sure I want to watch the cinematics though. This does look like it controls much better than System Shock.

I never knew this game had an FPS element. I might have looked into it if I did, but it never got me interested for some reason... I think I may eventually correct this mistake thanks to you.

that shotgun looks and sounds really punchy. like, brutal doom punchy

PC PowerPlay demo disc

You thinking of reviewing S.T.A.L.K.E.R or Pathogenic?

Utterly brilliant game. One of the few games I have purchased. But it's hard, REALLY hard and you do die a lot. Puzzles are fun if not frustrating at times but like you said you spend a lot of time going back over the levels to try and find what you have missed. Just a shame that the engine is dated and I know this sounds funny but there are NO cheat codes so you cannot pick it up again and quickly slog through it. Speaking of dated engine it's a real shame that some company has not picked this up and updated it. It would be awesome on a modern game engine. I mean, what game give live action cut scenes?

Mmmh... I think the combat is missing some gore but other then that it looks really fun.

Ok what you said about missing crucial items and not knowing what you missed until later levels is a big turn off in games like this.

Gremlin Interactive rip

Looks like Doom. =)

quite grainy