Sanity: Aiken's Artifact

Sanity: Aiken's Artifact is a 2000 action adventure game by Monolith. It uses an over the head view similar to Diablo (a first for the LithTech Engine).

Plot

The game is set in the near future, where a discovery made by Dr. Joan Aiken made it possible to access an unused portion of the human brain, giving a person superhuman and paranormal powers, refered to as psionic. However fully developed brains of adults were not able to handle the powers, so most of them went berserk. However, Dr. Aiken came up with a sollution, by injecting the serums into still developing minds of babies. The experiment was a success, with brothers Cain and Abel being the first humans being able to control their powers.

In time both Cain and Abel were recruited by the Department of National Psionic Control, which is funded by the government to battle psionic criminals. In time, Abel began acting overly aggressive, disobeying orders and eventually turned to a life of crime. Cain on the other hand stayed on the force, but was implemented with an agression control chip, after an unfortunate accident caused by him led to multiple civilian casualties.

The player takes the control of Cain right after the procedure, and is ordered to investigate a series of psionic crimes. However, Cain eventually realises that all of the crimes are tied together and are part of some evil scheme which involves his brother.

Gameplay

The game is played from an over the head isometric perspective. The gameplay is very similar to those in various dungeon crawlers such as Diablo or Baldur's Gate, however with a futuristic setting. The world also features NPC which you can talk to.

The combat is focused on using various spells or 'Tallents" seperated by classes or 'Totems' including Fire, Sun, Illusion, Science, Demonology, Death, Storm and Truth. These range from basic attacks such as fireballs, lightning bolts and other projectiles to complex class specific abbilities such as creature summoning, mind reading and flight. Each tallent uses up a certain ammount of sanity which is essentially your mana. If Cain loses his sanity, the game will end.

Some tallents are are acquired by killing an enemy, while others are gained by interrogating people by showing your badge or reading their minds and completing puzzles.