Economic trauma, anger at corruption and immigration fears have dominated Greece's most uncertain election campaign in decades, with no clear image of what government will emerge from Sunday's vote.
Two years after Greece launched a drastic economic overhaul to save itself from bankruptcy, many Greeks are left wondering if their sacrifices were worth it.
And politicians from the parties that spearheaded austerity -- socialist Pasok and conservative New Democracy -- are in the fight of their lives to keep voters from flocking to groups that promise to undo the work done so far.
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According to opinion polls, which analysts say are of questionable value, New Democracy seems assured to finish first but without clinching a clear majority.
This could prove disastrous at a moment when the country needs a strong political hand to complete structural reforms pledged to the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in return for default-saving loans.
"We are entering a period of instability, the whole political landscape has been turned upside down...and the crisis favours extreme options," said political analyst Thomas Gerakis.
Three of the smaller parties who want to throw out the EU-IMF recovery blueprint known as the 'memorandum' - the KKE Communists, the Syriza leftists and the nationalist Independent Greeks -- are all expected to make major gains.
And for the first time in nearly 40 years, a neo-Nazi party -- Golden Dawn -- is poised to enter parliament on the back of immigration and crime fears.
The election is being fought over "a mixture of economy, immigration and national humilation," said analyst George Sefertzis.
"Injured national pride plays a major part in shaping the vote dynamic," he added.
Under electoral law, the party that comes first gains an extra 50 seats in the 300-seat parliament, but even this provision may not be enough to produce a majority government.
If no clear victor emerges on Sunday, the head of state, President Carolos Papoulias, has up to 12 days to identify a party or coalition with enough support to form a government, or new elections will have to be held.
New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras has regularly warned of political instability in a bid to maximise support.
"Growth and jobs...security for citizens...A European course for the future of our children...this is done through stability, not through lack of government," he said Friday in the northern city of Alexandroupolis.
Nevertheless, voters seem tempted to punish the two parties who have between them have ruled the country for the past 38 years.
Compared to the last elections in 2009, Pasok and New Democracy have respectively lost 25 and 10 percent of their support to rival parties, some of them recently sprung from within their own ranks, analyst Gerakis said.
And both have a poor record on corruption, one of Greece's endemic ills.
The last conservative administration collapsed in 2009 in the wake of a scandal involving questionable land swaps between the state and the influential Orthodox monastery of Vatopedi in northern Greece.
The monastery's abbot will be tried for embezzlement but no politicians have been sanctioned over the exchanges, which New Democracy still insists caused no damage to the state.
The socialists meanwhile, have had their own high-profile case to deal with.
A prominent socialist ex-minister was placed in pre-trial custody last month alongside his wife and daughter in a bribery case involving state arms procurement contracts over a decade ago.
Akis Tsochatzopoulos, 72, is accused of having used his position as defence minister from 1996 to 2001 to pocket bribes paid through offshore companies for the purchase of a Russian rocket defence system and German submarines.
Prosecutors say the kickbacks were added to the final cost to the Greek state, which ended up paying millions of euros (dollars) over the real price.
Tsochatzopoulos, who has denied any wrongdoing, has hinted at revelations about other politicians if brought to trial.
"The truth will out," he said in a statement last week.
"After 40 years in politics, I know everything...I cannot be blackmailed," he said.
