As a certified horror-game wuss, I'm admittedly not terribly familiar with the games that Signalis draws inspiration from (the closest thing I've ever played genre-wise would probably be Alan Wake), so I'll leave it to others to decide how derivative it is and whether it's able to stand alongside or even rise above its influences. All I can say is that from my narrow perspective, Signalis is cool as hell. Its bold aesthetic and cryptic presentation had me hooked from minute one, and even though the frequent need to backtrack in order to free up my extremely limited inventory space for new key items could sometimes be frustrating, I really enjoyed my time with the game.