Trivia / Alone in the Dark

The video game series:

• Creative Differences: Disagreements over the direction of the original trilogy sequels led to most of the 1992 staff leaving Infogrames to form Adeline Software International under the Delphine Software International umbrella, creating the Little Big Adventure franchise.
• Creator's Oddball: Eden Games, the French studio that made the 2008 Alone in the Dark, primarily makes racing games, which likely accounts for the primacy of driving sections in that game. Their only other non-racing game is the 3D platformer Kya: Dark Lineage.
• Divorced Installment: The original Alone in the Dark was initially going to be the first Call of Cthulhu game released by Infogrames, hence the abundance of Lovecraftian elements present in the game, and was intended to be called Call of Cthulhu: Doom of Decerto. When it was rebranded into its own IP, Shadow of the Comet (which is still referenced in the final version of the game) ended up becoming their first Call of Cthulhu title instead.
• Dueling Works: While Alone in the Dark served as a direct inspiration for Resident Evil, the Japanese series undoubtedly proved more successful in the end. Many of the Resident Evil games were released to some kind of acclaim and were very popular with audiences, while Alone in the Dark is mainly remembered for the first game in the series, with the others remaining largely forgotten. While Resident Evil successfully revived itself twice when most people were getting tired of the ongoing formula, Alone in the Dark failed to do so both in 2008 and 2015, effectively making itself, for all intents and purposes, dead as a franchise.
• Feelies: The original trilogy boxes include fictional printed newspapers from the 1920s, which expand a bit the setting and sometime contain subtle clues for the games.
• Follow the Leader: In The New Nightmare, the controls, presentation, and gameplay are a little too similar to Resident Evil to be coincidental ("a little" being a major understatement). Note that Tropes Are Not Bad, and this also means the game is much more faithful to the first game's spirit.
• Franchise Killer: The 2008 game was most likely this, as even a rerelease on PlayStation 3 to fix some of the bugs from the Xbox 360 version couldn't save it. It's even worse when you consider that even though the game developers delayed the release of the game for three years to try to stave off the bad publicity generated by Uwe Boll's failed film adaptation, some elements from the film still made it into the new game. If not the 2008 game, then Illumination finishes the job.
  • Years later, the revived THQ (as THQ Nordic) would purchase the rights in 2018. And in 2022, they announced that they would be re-imagining the first game featuring an over-the-shoulder gameplay similar to the remakes of Resident Evil 2 and 3.
• Franchise Zombie: Both games after New Nightmare. Prior to THQ Nordic's acquisition, Illumination looked like it may be the final nail in the coffin.
• What Could Have Been: Capcom was supposed to release Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare for the Japanese market through the Playstation and Playstation 2, but decided not to go with it. Cyberfront published it for the PC.
  • There were also plans for a remake of the first game after the 2008 Game but it got canceled with only a really early internal trailer/walkthrough remaining. The concept of remaking the first game looks like it'll be revisited, though it's unknown how much, if any material from the first attempt will make it into this one.
• Working Title: The first game went through many working titles, such as "Nightmare in Derceto" (from the name of the mansion), "Doom in Derceto" and simply "In the Dark".

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