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ObsCure is a survival horror game developed by Hydravision Entertainment and published by DreamCatcher Interactive for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox on October 1, 2004 in Europe, and April 6, 2005 in North America. It was later published by Ubisoft in China and by MC2-Microids in other territories. The Microsoft Windows port was released in 2005.

Plot[]

The story begins with Kenny Matthews, a jock and popular school basketball player, staying late in the gym to shoot some hoops. Ashley Thompson, Kenny's girlfriend, calls him and diverts his attention from the mysterious figure running off with his gym bag. When he's finished, he notices his bag is gone and goes to find it. He is led behind an iron gate leading to an old mansion. In the basement, he finds a secret passageway that leads to an underground corridor. As he walks further down under the mansion, he discovers glass cases with plants and other experimental subjects. He opens a seal locked door at the end of the hall to find Dan, a student who has been used as a guinea pig for the experiments and locked in the underground lab. Kenny convinces Dan to leave with him. Upon re-entering the corridor, they are attacked by a giant mutated creature. Dan gives his life to allow Kenny to escape. Hurrying up the ladder at the end of the corridor, Kenny is locked in by the mysterious figure.

The next day, Ashley informs Kenny's sister Shannon Matthews that he stood her up the other night. Shannon states that Kenny didn't come home either. Both girls concur that Kenny must be in trouble and they need to find a way to aide him. They visit Josh Carter, the school videographer and would-be detective, to ask him if he knows of Kenny's whereabouts. He does not, but suggests that they stay after school to look for him.

After everyone has left and all the doors are locked, they begin their investigation. First they go looking for the principal at his office in the classroom wing of the school. They find Stan Jones, the school stoner and slack student, if he knows where Kenny is. He does not, but upon hearing Kenny's missing, decides to join them in their search. When they enter the principal's office, they are attacked by a dog-like creature. This is new to Stan and Ashley, but not to Josh and Shannon, who encountered them earlier, where their Biology teacher Denny Walden showed them that the creatures react harshly to light.

In the principal Herbert Friedman's office, they discover that he has a twin brother Leonard Friedman. They also find a note informing the janitor that Herbert is in his office at the school library. Upon meeting him in the library, the four inform Herbert of the monsters plaguing the campus and of Kenny's disappearance. He then informs them that he will find Kenny and that they should leave immediately. He tells them to speak with Mr. Garrison, the school janitor, to let them out. When they visit the janitor, he has been ripped apart and is in a bloody heap on the floor. Josh takes the liberty of watching security tapes in his office. Josh finds out that Kenny is trapped behind bars in some unknown location, and that Elisabeth Lucy Wicson, the school nurse, is trapped in the nurse's office. They travel through the cafeteria wing to get to her and get some answers.

When they find Nurse Wicson, she appears to be out of her mind. However, in her mindless babble, she reveals that Herbert has been doing something "unsafe". The four then make their way to the opposite end of the campus. In the school amphitheater, they find class pictures spanning decades on the wall. In each one, principal Friedman appears to be the same age. They fire up the theater screen and watch the tape that's inside the player. It reveals the Friedman brothers doing tests on human subjects and the subjects mutating into monsters. It also shows Leonard Friedman injecting himself and watching the skin on his face rapidly changing into something grotesque. They make their way by service elevator to the underground corridor and labs. They search and find Kenny in the lab holding cells. Upon walking in, principal Friedman unleashes a toxin, rendering them all unconscious.

When they wake, they're all in behind bars. Stan discovers a metal hook left in his cell by the back wall. He hands it to Kenny, who reaches the circuit breaker and pulls on the cords, unlocking the cell doors. Kenny then informs them that they have been injected with a serum, and if they are exposed to light for too long, they will mutate. The five then fight their way to the surface and back to campus, where it is now the dead of night. They venture into the student dorm rooms where they find a safe that gives instructions to be opened to take down Herbert Friedman. They open it, and find a mountain of data compiled by Dan, and revealing the dirty secrets about the Friedman brothers. It reveals that they both were scientists born in the 1900's. They went to third world countries in search of a rare plant that, if correctly manipulated, would become an anti-aging serum. They needed to know if it worked, so Herbert tested in on himself and his wife Elisabeth Lucy Wickson, and it worked, keeping them the same age indefinitely. However, when Leonard injected himself with the serum, he became a monster. Herbert then founded Leafmore High School, and built a lab beneath it. He and Nurse Wicson would thieve students of the school and perform tests in order to find a cure for Leonard.

Knowing this, the five venture back down underground and find a massive door, sealed tightly. In Dan's notes, however, he outlined a machine that he believed powered the door's machanics. The five then locate and start the machine, resulting in the opening of the door. When the five arrive at the opening, they witness Principal Friedman there with a briefcase being threatened at gunpoint by Denny Walden. Herbert exclaims that the antidote (the contents of the briefcase) would not save Mr. Walden because his infection was already evolved to the state of no return. Denny then shoots him, opens the briefcase, and injects himself with the antidote. A large tenticle then spears through his chest and throws him across the room, ending his life. The five are left to fight the Leonard Friedman monster. In doing so, they cause the ceiling to collapse on top of him. They resurface back in the school gym and they all inject themselves with antidote, saving their lives. The Leonard monster then surfaces for another round. Day breaks, sunlight beams into the gym, killing the Leonard monster for good.

While Kenny and Ashley make up, and Josh and Shannon take a breather, Stan recovers the briefcase. While bending down to get it, the Denny Walden monster rises above to attack. Stan jumps back and pierces its head with a bullet.

Gameplay[]

ObsCure has a two-player cooperative mode that allows the player to complete the campaign with a friend. ObsCure also allows players to combine items, for example taping a flashlight to any firearm. Some critics, including X-Play, have stated that this was the only redeeming quality, and mocked id's Doom 3 for not implementing such a concept.

While each character has special abilities, none of them are necessary to complete the game. Each character can perform the same physical acts even if it takes some characters longer and/or more effort than others. If any characters die during the adventure, the player may simply continue with those remaining.

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