Nightmare Creatures

Overview

Nightmare Creatures is a 1997 survival horror video game developed by Kalisto Entertainment for PlayStation, Windows, and Nintendo 64. A sequel, Nightmare Creatures II, was released three years later. A mobile phone version of Nightmare Creatures was developed and published by Gameloft in 2003. A second sequel, Nightmare Creatures III: Angel of Darkness, was cancelled in 2004.

A single-player only game, Nightmare Creatures allows the player to control either Ignatius or Nadia. Secondary weapons such as pistols, mines, fire bombs, and magic spells can be used in addition to each character's primary weapon. The game features an adrenaline bar which causes health to be lost if it runs out, and players are forced to continuously seek out and win battles to keep the adrenaline bar full.

The story behind Nightmare Creatures draws upon gothic horror elements of the 19th century and begins in 1666, when a devil-worshiping cult called the Brotherhood of Hecate were conducting sinister experiments in London so as to take over the city, and then the world. The Brotherhood tried to develop an elixir that would endow them with superhuman powers. However, rather than creating their intended superhumans, their experiments instead created grotesque monsters called nightmare creatures. When they decided to use these creatures as an army of conquest, one of their members, Samuel Pepys, set their headquarters on fire, resulting in the First Great Fire of London.

Nightmare Creatures was the first video game to be created with LibSys, Kalisto's own proprietary 3D development program. The game's environments were modeled from 19th century maps and blueprints.

Bidding for the game's publication rights was reportedly fierce. Initially Mindscape was slated to be the publisher, but the publication rights to Nightmare Creatures were acquired by Activision just before the 1997 Electronic Entertainment Expo. Nightmare Creatures was published by Activision in North America and Sony Computer Entertainment in Europe.

Nightmare Creatures was a commercial hit, with global sales above 1.5 million units by January 2000.

Official trailer

Trailer. Watch on YouTube

Screenshots

Game details

Genres

Adventure

Developer

Kalisto Entertainment

Publisher

Activision, Sony Computer Entertainment

Series

Nightmare Creatures

Platforms

PlayStation 3, Nintendo 64, Windows, PlayStation, PlayStation Portable

Age rating

ESRB M

Modes

Single player

Yes

Local multiplayer

No

Online multiplayer

No

Co op

No

Age ratings

ESRB

M

USK

18

ACB

MA 15+

Release dates

Playable today

Playable offline todayYes

Single-player only, with no online features.

Online

Plays offlineYes

Credits

Region

US

Time to beat

about 5 hours