Then you have combat, which is a tactical affair. You can get the drop on your enemies by playing patsy until it’s time to strike with a quick surprise kill, taking out the gun wielding enemies first if you know what’s good for you. You can intimidate people with your gun, especially if you have bullets in the clip...but don’t wait too long or they get wise to your ruse. You can also force them back towards environmental dangers, forcing them near holes and so on...

The temptation to scream: This is Sparta, during such sequences is pretty high.

There’s also the bow and a few other tricks which we’re not going to spoil. That kind of wraps it up in terms of gameplay, the game does a good job of introducing the systems and how they work though, so you’re never left in the dark about how any element functions.

Then we come to the graphical side of I Am Alive. It’s bleak looking and does a good job with a grim palette, to bring the atmosphere of a post-apoc world to life. The Dust settles everywhere and the sky is a horrible melancholy colour which adds to the oppression and helps drive the graphical aesthetic home. It’s not meant to have a wonderful happy effect on the player and their mood, so it works for us.

The animations are solid and there’s a lot of time/effort/thought that’s gone into the movement and traversal animations for the game. Combat is pretty quick and decisive and there are some nice set-piece stealth and surprise kill animations.

Physics plays a pretty minor role in the game and it’s the environmental based stuff that appears, swinging ladders, crumbling ruins and so on.

The music is designed well enough and again has that haunting post-apoc feel, melancholic and soulful.

Sound is solidly designed and the voice work is nicely done, with some pretty decent script and storytelling thrown into the mix.

Overall: I Am Alive has a few issues, the combat system could have been tweaked a little better and response time often feels somewhat sluggish in the bigger encounters. There are no noticeable frame-rate issues or screen-tearing though, so it’s a pretty good. The game has 21 Chapters with around 7-10 hours of play depending on your chosen skill level (Survivor or Normal) and how much you explore the world around you.

All in all, it is worth the money and definitely needs to be experienced at least once. Try the demo, if you like it, grab the game and experience the desolate struggle for survival.