The game begins as
silent protagonist Torque is being escorted by
CO Ernesto Alvarez (voiced by Mark Dias) onto
death row in Abbott State Penitentiary on Carnate Island, off the coast of
Maryland, an island with a long and troubled history. Torque has been
sentenced to death for murdering his ex-wife and their two children, although he claims to have
blacked out during the incident, and can remember nothing. Shortly after entering his cell, an
earthquake rocks the prison, and moments later, all of the inmates on death row except Torque are killed by Malefactors, a grotesque race of supernatural creatures manifested from various forms of deaths that took place on Carnate Island and are bent on purging any life they run into. One of the creatures opens Torque's cell, and he sets out to escape. After seeing several guards killed by the creatures, Torque uses
security monitors to find the entire prison is under attack. He then gets a phone call from his dead wife, Carmen (Rafeedah Keys), telling him the island is more than a prison, that it brings out
evil in everyone, and advising him to escape as soon as he can. Descending to the basement, he soon encounters the
spirits of three of Abbot's most famous occupants. Dr. Killjoy (voiced by John Armstrong) was a
psychiatrist/
surgeon who ran an
insane asylum on the island in the 1920s. Obsessed with discovering what is wrong with Torque, Killjoy appears as an image projected from
16 mm film projectors. Hermes T. Haight (
John Patrick Lowrie) was the
executioner in Abbot for twenty-seven years, before he committed
suicide in the
gas chamber. He appears as a green
vapor formed into the shape of a human. Hermes is determined to drive Torque into unleashing the evil inside him. Horace P. Gauge (John Armstrong) was an inmate who was executed in the
electric chair for murdering his wife during a
conjugal visit. Full of guilt for his actions, he claims Carnate drove him to it, and wants to help Torque realize his decency. He appears in the form of
electricity. They teach Torque how to unleash the anger inside himself and transform into a powerful monster, although the transformation is only in Torque's mind. Torque then encounters a fellow inmate, Dallas (Mark Berry), who he knows from his previous prison, Eastern Correctional Institution. They head through the eastern cellblock, where Torque has a vision of Carmen, who explains why she left him; when he was incarcerated for the second time, she knew she needed to make a change to her life. Torque and Dallas make it to the
loading bay, and Torque heads to the control room, opening the doors, and allowing Dallas to escape. However, a fire starts, preventing Torque from following. He then hears a call from Consuela Alvarez (Meg Savlov), Ernesto's wife, asking Ernesto to call her. She tells him that she and the girls are fine, but there is a fire in the nearby
forest getting closer to their house. Torque heads to the western cellblock, where he has another vision of Carmen, telling him she is pregnant but is filing for
divorce. Torque heads to the radio room, finding the radio is working, but something from the asylum is preventing communication with the mainland. Torque heads to the asylum, and encounters Killjoy, who is determined to "cure" him using his "Rebirth Machine". Torque fights through a series of tests set by Killjoy before destroying all his projectors. Killjoy then tells Torque to return to the prison, where he will give him his
diagnosis. Torque heads back to Abbot by way of the beach, where he encounters Clem (
Ross Douglas), an elderly inmate who was in the middle of an escape when the earthquake struck. Clem has a small one-person boat ready to sail, but needs Torque's help fighting creatures emerging from a wrecked
slave ship before he can leave. Torque sets fire to the wreck, enabling Clem to escape. He enters Abbot's
sewer system where he encounters Horace, who tells him Abbot wants his
soul. He then heads to the electric chair, destroying it and releasing Horace's spirit. Returning to death row, he finds Killjoy's diagnosis, and then returns to the radio room. Successfully sending a signal, he learns a
Coast Guard vessel is on the way. However, Carnate's
lighthouse is not working, and must be reactivated before the vessel can approach the island. Torque heads to the lighthouse, passing through the old military barracks, Fort Maleson. In the fort, he encounters Hermes, who forces him to fight. Torque defeats him by using pressurized gas to push Hermes into a
furnace. He continues to the lighthouse, outside of which he meets Ernesto, who is trying to find his family. They restore power, and reactivate the lighthouse, arranging to meet the ship at the dock. They then head to the nearby village to look for Ernesto's family. The gate to town is locked, but in return for freeing his soul, Horace opens it. They then encounter a broken bridge, but, impressed with Torque's efforts to kill him, Hermes helps them cross. As they near the village, however, they are separated by a fire, and Ernesto goes on alone, telling Torque to get to the docks. As he arrives, he encounters Killjoy, who tells him to cure himself he must face what awaits him, and only by using the Rebirth Machine can he defeat it. Torque heads to the docks where he encounters a massive creature with a miniature version of himself protruding from its stomach. Torque fights and defeats the creature while remembering the truth about his wife and children's deaths, leading to one of three endings, depending on the player's actions through the game: • Good ending: Torque remembers that his wife and children were killed while he was spared by two criminals under orders of a third individual called "The Colonel", who also incriminated Torque in order to make him suffer. Torque heads to the docks and is picked up by the Coast Guard. On the boat, the captain recognizes him, and reveals that his case has been reopened after the prosecutor was
indicted, and Torque will likely have a
retrial. The game ends with the boat sailing away from Carnate. • Neutral ending: Torque remembers that he accidentally killed his wife during an argument, and, out of revenge, his eldest son
drowned his younger brother before killing himself. When the Coast Guard arrives, Torque knocks the captain out and commandeers the boat, sailing away from Carnate. • Bad ending: Torque remembers that he was the one who killed his family after all. When the Coast Guard arrives, Torque transforms into his monster state and kills the captain, before running back into the woods of Carnate. ==Development==