Why is the screen black?

I got a red cobra digital camera a few years back as a gift and when I first got it I put in the batteries required and it powered up just fine, just the picture it was taking was black, the icons around the camera were all fine it just wasn't capturing any picture at all, I've tried messing around with settings and that won't help so it's just been rotting away in its case for a few years and I tried taking a picture but it just comes up black. but I really want to fix it, what do I do?