Alice
Tags: good versus evil, insanity, gothic, sadist, sci-fi

Plot synopsis:
=== Setting ===
The game's setting presents a considerably more macabre rendition of Wonderland than seen in Lewis Carroll's original portrayal. Wonderland, being a creation of Alice's mind, has been corrupted. Alice's primary objective is to save Wonderland, and in doing so, save herself.
=== Plot ===
Shortly after Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There, at the age of seven, Alice Liddell witnessed the death of her family in an apparently accidental fire that broke out in her home, which was destroyed in the blaze. Suffering from survivor's guilt, Alice began to lose her grasp on reality and was ultimately sent to Rutledge Asylum, where she is observed and treated by Dr. Heironymous Wilson for her catatonia. Alice's only possession in Rutledge is a stuffed rabbit. Ten years after Alice was committed to Rutledge, she finds herself sucked back into a Wonderland that has been twisted.
The White Rabbit summons Alice to aid a radically altered Wonderland, which became a twisted version of itself as it came under the horrible rule of the Queen of Hearts. The Cheshire Cat serves as Alice's companion throughout the game, frequently appearing to guide her with cryptic comments.
When Alice falls down the hole, she finds herself in the Village of the Doomed. This network of tunnels and caves is the home of the Torch Gnomes, and is patrolled by the Queen of Hearts' card guards. Beyond the subterranean village is the Fortress of Doors, where the main attraction is a school of insane children. Within the school lies an ancient book of recipes for magic potions, as well as the ingredients for one concoction in particular which will be useful to Alice.
Beyond the fortress and across a rough, uncharted landscape lies the Vale of Tears, where Alice's friends Bill McGill and the Mock Turtle reside, along with the Duchess. A giant river runs throughout the gloomy, mist-shrouded landscape, and another aquatic location is accessible through a well inside Bill McGill's house. The well is sealed until the Duchess is slain.
On the other side of the Vale of Tears lies Wonderland Woods, one of the largest regions in the game. The woods are initially filled by ponds, cliffs and jump mushrooms, but much deeper into the woods is a region of rock and magma. This section leads to several new regions including the Cave of the Oracle, the Pale Realm, the Jabberwock's Lair, and the Majestic Maze. The Cave of the Oracle is home to a wise entity that is revealed later to be the Caterpillar.
The Pale Realm makes a transition to the surface of a chessboard, as delving further into this area leads to the White Castle of Looking Glass Land, which is home to life-size chess pieces; the White pieces join Alice in the fight against the Red pieces, a deviation from her normally unhelpful "allies" from earlier portions of the game. Alice is twice transformed into a chess piece herself to pass certain obstacles.
Following this is a distorted version of Rutledge Asylum (where Alice has been incarcerated since her parents' tragic deaths). It is run by Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum and also houses the Mad Hatter's laboratory.
The path to the Jabberwock's Lair leads into the Land of Fire and Brimstone, a volcanic region of Wonderland and a reminder of the fire in which her family died. It is here that the terrible Jabberwock—a semi-mechanized servant of the Queen of Hearts and the incarnation of Alice's guilt—resides, in the remains of Alice's old home.
The Majestic Maze ends on the road to Queen of Hearts Land, a region heavily guarded by card guards, boojums, and other members of the Queen of Hearts' personal army.
Queensland is the final province of Wonderland. In it lies the Heart Palace from which the Queen of Hearts commands. Tentacles and other repulsive appendages are seen protruding from every organic wall in this area, and numerous areas even resemble body parts, giving the impression that Alice is travelling through her own body.
=== Characters ===
The game's characters are generally based on the inhabitants of Lewis Carroll's original novels, but they do not demonstrate the same identities. Many of them are warped incarnations of their conventional selves. The casebook of Heironymous Q. Wilson (a supplement included with the game and written from the point of view of Alice's doctor) suggests that many of the characters Alice encounters in Wonderland are symbolic of real life people who get through to the catatonic Alice in some way. Other characters within the game are metaphors for Alice's own feelings, and because she is unhappy, they have become twisted. Some people (Cheshire Cat, White Rabbit) help her; others (Mad Hatter, Queen of Hearts) try to cause pain, first by taking away those she loves and then by taking her down with them.

Review: Physically and emotionally disturbing....
Really because American McGee is a mysterious director to this project and how he has hand crafted the wonderful Alice in Wonderland, or Alice through the looking glass novels and movies is quite disturbing.
Alice is an excellent game.
Her character has been superbly created with the best graphics on offer in the year 2000, it still does not look outdated now.
The story is excellent and there is no wonder why Hollywood may be in talks of making a movie.
The dialogue is excellent, which has been written to the best of the writers abilities.
The voices are superb too, the girl who does the voice of Alice has not done anything before or after this, so it may make some of us wonder whether or not she was disturbed too.But throughout all this, what we should be looking at is how Alice has gone crazy.
Her parents have been killed in a house fire, and her world falls apart.
Look at what pictures you can from the novel and the movie made from Disney and compare it to the sets and character designs of this game and it is truly quite disturbing.
There is blood on the walls, floors and ceilings, beautiful lakes have turned into lava pits, the mad hatter has of course "gone quite mad", the Cheshire cat which was previously chubby and had stripes, still has its grin, but has rotted down to skin and bone and instead of using his wit to tease Alice, he uses dark riddles to help our character throughout the game.It doesn't matter what year this was made in, buy this game it is truly a work of art..
Step through the glass, enjoy the nightmare.
I finally beat it on Nightmare....oh the pain the pain.
Had 40 saves by the end.
A most excellent game but the jumping could use a little work especially during the end boss, gosh.
Definitely among the top ten video games of all time in the atmosphere and soundtrack department.
Kudos to American Mcgee and Chris Vrenna.
The only time I've ever bought the soundtrack to a video game he he.
I love the way the moon looks in one of the scenes through the window.
It looks just like the Cheshire Cat grin and now every time i look at the quarter moon, i think of the cat.
Superb scenery throughout with shifting illogical puzzle like backgrounds.
Combine that with the sinister yet eerily beautiful soundtrack and you have yourselves an experience that puts yourself in a nightmare version of Wonderland.
Simply wonderful..
they're all mad here...
and gothic killers, of course....
this was the most shocking game ever (in a good way) : to see one of the happiest stories ever, filled with nice charcters, turned into a demented land, filled with killers, freaks, and mad children.
the plot is : alice's house caught fire, killing both her parents and driving her insane.
as wonderland is actually a part of her, so does wonderland turnaround.
alice will have to go back, and unfortunatlly kill almost everyone.
(with an exception of the gryphon, the cheshire cat, the rabbit, and the caterpiller).
fill with gothic design and horrible violence, this is a must have..
Brilliantly Twisted.
Ex-id software designer American McGee has definitely come up with the goods...this movie combines the bizarre, surreal setting from Lewis Carrol's book with a dark, gothic irony, a la the original Quake.
Just listen to the story...
Alice has been committed to a mental institution following the untimely death of her parents in a housefire.
In the book, Alice visited Wonderland in a dream...here, she has no choice but to venture back to this place as a result of her insanity..but now it's a much darker Wonderland...the queen of hearts is now a domineering dictator, and all this is because of Alice's own lack of a sense of reality.
Ingenious.Another brilliant part of the game is the visual factor..the Quake 3: Arena engine has been put to brilliant use, and Alice is now a decidedly perturbed, sickly looking goth, which adds to the fantastic twisted, dark, and kinetic humour of the game..
Disturbing, but brilliant!!!.
I got this game as joke from my mum, because she claimed the game was about me!
Furious, I loaded it, and played it.
Four hours later, I was still playing.
This game follows the book, as if it were from a goths, or insane  persons point of veiw.
And that's what makes it rule!!
The graphics are smooth and perfect, and there's tiny little gorish details which make this game fantastic, such as whenever Alice is injured,  she actually bleeds!
If you love the book, play this game.
If you hate the book, still play this game.
This is one of those things that stays with you and makes you want to play again, even when it's long been over..
Hi hi hi, little Alice!
American McGee has done himself proud with his video game Alice.
I love the Alice In Wonderland story, always have, always will.
The characters like the Chesire Cat, the Mad Hatter, The White Rabbit, the ideas behind it, the whole ingenious sum of it's parts.
Whatever that means, but it sounds good.
Lewis C.'s tale and brilliant imagery has influenced countless other artists.
This is a good video game that is in the Tomb Raider vein.
But it is too linear and at times it just comes down to fighting enemy after enemy and not much else besides.
There's a few simple puzzles to solve and plenty of incredible graphics.Some of the bosses are a bit too easy to beat.
Game makers these days should come up with other video game climaxes then the cliched final confrontational fight with a boss though.
Also the final cut scene movie at the game's conclusion is horribly pixelated in parts.
I have a very fast computer so I know it wasn't my system.
The final cut scene cinematic was almost even worse then the ending of Thief II.
Alice is still a very imaginative game though.
Let's hope the sequels will be even cooler!.
If Lewis Carroll had seen this....
I really enjoyed Alice: a true innovative game design.
The game design and level design are excellent and the graphics are perfect.
This game is really enjoyable, the only major flaw is that there aren't many puzzles.
Your job is to go straight and straight until you reach the next level.
The conversations aren't monotonous and many voices along the game fits very well the characters.
The game is rather dark and scary, and the intro movie is really thrilling.
The Quake III: Arena engine runs very well with beautiful game stages.
I really liked the game.
Now, what would be if Lewis Carroll had seen Alice with a knife full of blood....
Frabjous Game!.
This is such a bone chilling funny cool gory game!
Basically, Alice returns to Wonderland to find it twisted and horribly wrong.
She has to battle her way to the evil Queen of Hearts, and kill her to save wonderland.
The monsters include card guards and boojums.
And the first toy Alice recieves is the Vorpal Sword, made famous by Lewis Carrols' 'Jabberwocky' poem (He took his vorpal sword in hand, long time the manxome foe he sought, so rested he by the TumTum tree, and stood awhile in thought).
The levels are colourful, and they get harder as you hack your way through.
A very enjoyable game!.
A highly entertaining journey with great graphics!!!!.
This is a great, mesmerizing, game that will keep anyone occupied for hours.
I didn't stop playing it for three days.
It's creepy, dark and disturbing but, most of all fun.
The graphics in the game are also very beautiful.
Alice is lost in Wonderland only it's a dark wonderland.
The game play is smooth.
There are hidden rooms and hidden caverns that are even fun to explore once you've completed the game..
A game about one of the most magical and surreal places ever designed made by the same person who made a video game about a hare-trigger, NIN-nail-gun toting marine killing demons in Hell.
Is it beautiful?
Fun?
sort of.
The gameplay is above mediocre, but barely.
If it had been about any other subject matter in any other environment, it would not have received marks nearly as high as it did.
Personally, the only reason that I completed the game was to see what tragic misfit of Wonderland lurked behind the next corner.
I still suggest playing the game to the end, if only to see what has the to be most spectacular end boss I've ever heard of (and I doubt ever to be topped.) Alice is immortal as long as there are people who care about the surreal, and American McGee has clearly shown that he is one of those people.
He is merely carrying on the torch of Carroll, only this time the creator has better nightmares..
It's January 2009 and I am playing this game....
Such games are very uncommon and rare.
Besides, it runs terrific under Windows Vista.It has all the cards up its sleeve to enter the top 3 action/fantasy games of all time.
The dialogues, the music, the sound effects, the plot twists, the stunning graphics, the original storyline, etc.
- everything fits perfectly the overall magic embroidery of this game.
It can be played late at night and you don't have to jump off your seat to increase or decrease the sound volume - the effects and music are very intricate and the words of the characters are clearly pronounced (though the dialogues do require a very good knowledge of English - I cannot understand about 25% of the in-game speech!).I often felt sorry that I had bought this or that game but this one really made me think: "It's damn good and it will never wear off its weird value."10 out of 10.
A place God never intended..
A great bizarre ride.I have only left my computer for work since I got this game.
I am having headaches, nausea, and I think I had a seizure???
This game has to truly be the best video game I have ever played.
The bizarre, strange, wonderful creatures that EA has created is pure genius.
I am extremely impressed with the gameplay as well as the graphics.
The soundtrack is just unreal.
This will undoubtedly turn into an excellent motion picture..
This game is awsome and totally wicked.
Alice goes crazy after her parents are burned and killed in a terrible fire.
She is taken to an insane asylum, where she appears to have tried to slit her wrists (notice the bandages around her wrists).
She is terribly losts and sleeps with her old stuffed rabbit.
Strangely enough she is taken to wonderland, following the strangely demented white rabbit.
With his bug out eyes and scary teeth it makes you wonder if he is good or bad.The Chechire cat helps greatly but with his evil wicked grin you may not know if he is telling the truth or not.Alice is in a strange and demented wonderland.
Greatly changed since her first visit she needs to change something.
She starts on a journey to safe the slaves of Wonderland from the Queen of Hearts.Will she make it.
Only you know..
"even if you hate the book/s"..........................
How can anyone hate anything similar to or from Lewis Carroll?
Anything Alice related rocks.
I have the game and the characters and so much more Alice stuff and have been waiting for this movie since I heard of it as an idea for making two years ago.
FINALLY!!
I hope it doesn't disappoint.
If it's anything like the game mixed with the actual books then I think it will prove extremely unique and entertaining.
I still can't imagine anyone hating the books.
They would have to be a very VERY boring person; seeing how the books are full of weirdness, adventure and more..
Disturbing....
Great, disturbing but for all the right reasons.
Good plot and nearly all the wonderland cast are re-created in wonder(land) 3d.
Plays very well too.
A bit short but that can be fixed by playing on nightmare.
There's some dodgy voices though thats the only bad point..
Looks good, terrible game play..
I'm a big fan of all things Alice so I looked forward to this game...
great graphics, the backplot was a good read - then I installed it.
Decent intro followed by about one minute of game play before my character got stuck down a steam pit.An hour later of trying to time the jump to get out I gave up and have never played it again - it requires far too much precision and is not player friendly.
I have completed various games like Tomb Raider and Quake so I don't give up easily.Also my computer is quite high spec, but I had to drop the game to its lowest possible settings to get it to run - it relies too heavily on graphics card power.
Make sure you check the minimum requirements before buying this one.Shame, but not a nice game to play..
Dark, Depraved, and Pretty Decent.
This review is meant to be for both this first game, and its recent sequel, "Alice: Madness Returns." American McGee's "Alice" series and I have an interesting relationship: when it first came out, I hated it.
Now, I SORT OF like it...my tastes changed with my age, and, as they did, so did my liking of these games.
By the time the sequel came out, I was looking forward to it.
There are a few specific things I like about this game: first of all, the Cheshire Cat, to put it very frankly, is AWESOME.
The husky purr of his voice...the skeletal appearance...the manic grin...the constant speaking in riddles...to quote the Joker, "I don't know if it's art, but I like it!" Then there's the music: this series has, arguably, some of the most hauntingly beautiful (and sometimes just plain haunting) tunes I have ever heard.
I think my favorites have to be "Riding on Wings of Steam" and the Boss Theme for the Mad Hatter, both from the first game, and "Hyde Park" from the second.
Music box chimes, ticking clockwork, and the "toy-like" quality of several pieces of music heighten the horror of these games.
The character twists are interesting, if sometimes odd (how did the Hatter become obsessed with Time, again?), and their appearances are often so depraved the player/audience is often left saying, "What the heck happened to YOU?" (In a good way, if that makes any sense.) Some characters – like the Duchess, the Jabberwock, the Gryphon, and Alice herself – are sort of a "warped Tenniel," on par with the designs in "Dreamchild;" close to the famous illustrations, but still obviously...off.
Most, however, are so far off from the designs it's hard to believe what has become of some of our cherished childhood characters.
For the twisted psychopath lurking in every Carrollian and/or video game lover's heart, this is good.
The Wonderland landscape is pretty much the same: the gory grounds of Queensland, the rigid order in the chaos of the Pale Realm, the steampunk dungeons of the Mad Hatter's Domain, the misty marshes of the Vale of Tears (especially in the first game, regarding this one), and, from the second game, the "Roald-Dahl-in-depression" feel to the Dollhouse, are all strange, darkly beautiful, and horrific, all at once.
All this being said, for all the things I like about these games, there's just as many things I dislike: first of all, the gameplay.
As a take on "Alice," these are really, really good.
But as video games, I hate to play them: I find the camera and the control system frustrating, and the endless battles with Snarks, Boojums, Phantasmagoria, and Card Guards from the first game, along with the contrasting lack of bosses in the second, confuse and irritate me.
This leads into a second problem: these games focus so much on being GAMES that the story gets lost along the way.
This is especially true in this first installment: wandering through this surreally scary Wonderland is okay, but to get any idea of what's REALLY going on, you have to read Wilson's Casebook WHILE you're playing the game.
I mean, what's the point?
Couldn't we just put those same things into the game itself?
The second game fixes this, sort of...but there are still unanswered questions and uncertainties at the end of the run through.
Perhaps ironically – and I may get a good deal of hateful words for this – my third, and main, problem, is Alice herself.
I really don't like her.
Oh, she has her reasons to be cynical, callous, and cruel...she has her reasons to destroy and horribly mangle everything she faces...but I don't like her.
In this first game, it's not too much of a problem: she's extremely violent, but that's to be expected, and her reactions are more believable: she's annoyed with certain characters, hateful towards others, and even has friendliness for a few.
In the second game however, she seems cold-hearted toward everyone and everything.
I guess you could say that it's because she is going through some hard times, and can't trust anyone in the real world, so Wonderland would reflect that...but she cries when Cheshire Cat dies in the first game, but seems to hate him almost as much as the Queen in the second.
All that being said, this game is a little over half-&-half in my mind: it's an intriguing take on Carroll's universe, and these games contain the world's greatest Cheshire Cat...but inconsistencies in the story, and, for me at least, frustrating gameplay, drag it down from being the best.
Still, video game fanatics, and lovers of "Alice", should check this out: you won't believe your eyes.