Finished Art of Murder on DS and stay by my first impression: It suuucks.
It's like Professor Layton in very bad.
The time limit is never really a problem, but a nuisance nevertheless. (Although I suspect, it's missing in the lower difficulty.) The minigames/puzzles are mostly not that much fun and repeat themselves too often. At least you can skip them, if failed often enough. (Well, it costs you points, but you'll ever have more than enough of them. For one puzzle, I didn't want to do, I had to wait for the time to run out 3 times - 9 minutes in total. lol)
I played on DSXL, and even there I found some hotspots quite small. Can't imagine playing it on a regular one.
It also seems, the game came out, when the DSi was meant to be the hottest shit. For some games they force you to use the camera, where it doesn't make sense at all. For example you have to move your hand before it, to turn a handle. That worked... not so well.
Can't say something about the story - it didn't catch me at all. As bla as the games before. Something something serial killer.
Nah man, not going to touch that series anymore at all. Farewell, Nicole Bonnet. We weren't meant to be from the start.
Buuut just purchased the Dracula: Origin game from GOG's Halloween Sale. (There is a code hidden in their mail, raising the discount to 80%)
While the game has its flaws, I'm enjoying the puzzles so far nevertheless. (Although I just quit because I got stuck. lol)
And after that, I plan to scratch Broken Sword 5 off my list.
Little update on Dracula: Spend nearly an hour around a puzzle, that wouldn't work for me. First thought, I'd just be too dumb. Then checking with walkthrough. Everything was right, but not working. Google said, no bug, just click here, the mc then writes it down. Oh cool, let's do this! But... still not working..?!
It was a bug after all. Reloaded a previous save and did the puzzle again, without touching the other riddle in the house - and suddenly everything worked as intended.
I hate such softlocking bugs. And somehow I always manage to find them, if a PnC has them. -.-'
Ugh, yes, I didn't enjoy that part of the game either, but finally, I have finished the game. My thoughts are that it is a worthy sequel to the first game and feels like more of a continuation. The puzzles were mostly of the same quality, but there is still is some cringey parts like in the first that may be hard to overlook for some. Overall if you liked the first game then you will probably like this one as well, but they should be played in sequence.
Now it's back to Röki and Urban Witch Story, but after those two the only other must play 2020 game on my radar is Imposter Factory. I have an Epic coupon expiring tonight so I might finally pick up Outer Wilds. Everyone is saying the game is so good, but I'm still not sure if I will like it.
Edit: Sequel to Stasis, Stasis: Bone Totem announced!
One of the absolute coolest things. Frank Cifaldi interviewed Ron GIlbert for the MI 30th anniversary. He was going through cut content, and there were cutscenes for MI2 between Largo and Lechuck that were removed from the final game, probably due to size constraints (they were replaced by the sections we know with Lechuck & Largo talking that use no unique assets). What I really loved about them was that in each one, you see more of Lechuck's newly zombified body. In the final game you just see it all at once in the first cutscene, but obviously the initial intention was to tease it out a bit (though it was on the box in the end lol).
Interview:
For anyone who doesn't have the time to watch (I really recommend it if you're an MI fan though), here are the timestamps for the cutscenes in particular so you can just watch them:
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
One of the absolute coolest things. Frank Cifaldi interviewed Ron GIlbert for the MI 30th anniversary. He was going through cut content, and there were cutscenes for MI2 between Largo and Lechuck that were removed from the final game, probably due to size constraints (they were replaced by the sections we know with Lechuck & Largo talking that use no unique assets). What I really loved about them was that in each one, you see more of Lechuck's newly zombified body. In the final game you just see it all at once in the first cutscene, but obviously the initial intention was to tease it out a bit (though it was on the box in the end lol).
Interview:
For anyone who doesn't have the time to watch (I really recommend it if you're an MI fan though), here are the timestamps for the cutscenes in particular so you can just watch them:
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
Join Monkey Island creator Ron Gilbert and Video Game History Foundation founder Frank Cifaldi for a unique look into the making of an adventure game classic...
As we approach the end of the year I started looking for PnCs to play, and by PnC I mean traditional pointing and clicking, not something in between, because I tried Roki and Lair of the Clockwork and boy do I hate how they control.
And I couldn't find much that came out this year? The only ones I'm eyeing are Luna The Shadow Dust and maybe Willy Morgan, although the characters in WM just look so unappealing to me, lol. Any more I should be considering?
Carto was released about a week ago. I got it over the weekend and have been playing it on and off to take my mind off the election. It is not a traditional P&C, but "chill adventure game wrapped around a unique, world-shifting puzzle mechanic." I enjoyed it a lot and thought some of you might too. The typically harsh Edge review also gave it an 8.
By the way, anyone tried Ord yet? I might pick it up on Steam or Switch if it's good.
As we approach the end of the year I started looking for PnCs to play, and by PnC I mean traditional pointing and clicking, not something in between, because I tried Roki and Lair of the Clockwork and boy do I hate how they control.
And I couldn't find much that came out this year? The only ones I'm eyeing are Luna The Shadow Dust and maybe Willy Morgan, although the characters in WM just look so unappealing to me, lol. Any more I should be considering?
I feel you. As much as I enjoyed Röki and its gameplay, the gamepad controls are unnecessary.
I'm not digging the look of Willy Morgan, too. ^^
Well, if it has to be from this year, I'd mention Virtua Verse. Heard good things about it. Also eyeing Blind Prophet for a while now. The english subs are meant to be rough at times, that's why I'm still holding off, hoping they patch them a bit.
As we approach the end of the year I started looking for PnCs to play, and by PnC I mean traditional pointing and clicking, not something in between, because I tried Roki and Lair of the Clockwork and boy do I hate how they control.
And I couldn't find much that came out this year? The only ones I'm eyeing are Luna The Shadow Dust and maybe Willy Morgan, although the characters in WM just look so unappealing to me, lol. Any more I should be considering?
I feel you. As much as I enjoyed Röki and its gameplay, the gamepad controls are unnecessary.
I'm not digging the look of Willy Morgan, too. ^^
Well, if it has to be from this year, I'd mention Virtua Verse. Heard good things about it. Also eyeing Blind Prophet for a while now. The english subs are meant to be rough at times, that's why I'm still holding off, hoping they patch them a bit.
Blind Prophet sure has style, but not exactly the type of PnC I'm looking for (I need a slow walking character to command in my PnCs :P). And oh, I had VV on my wishlist at some point but totally forgot about it! Thanks!
For a long time, I thought, Dracula: Origin would be a prequel/spin-off thingy to the first person Dracula series. I don't even remember, where I got the idea from, but just by chance I discovered, that I was completely wrong. Welp.
Anyway, Dracula: Origin is meant to be based on Bram Stoker's book. We play Van Helsing, whose friend tried to kill Dracula and failed. Now in order to save this friend's lover Mina, we start to go after Dracula ourselves.
It's a classic 2D style PnC, with photorealistic backgrounds. They can look a bit "dead" with rarely something moving and in some rare cases the characters stand out quite a lot, like being in front of a bad green screen. But they are detailed and look nice overall.
The characters themselves are more on the average side, with basic animations. At least it doesn't fade to black too often and sometimes shows a more complex action. What irritated me most is the lack of shadows on the ground, they stand on.
But I have to emphazise how beautiful the menus are. A fitting design full of details. When the game loads, it also shows a nice artwork-like picture. This made me wish, it would need a tiny little longer to load sometimes. ^^
Even if activated, subtitels are missing during cutscenes.
Controls are a bit different. Everything goes with left click, right is only to open and close the inventory, and everything is context sensitive. You either have an eye to inspect something or a hand, meaning you can pick something up or use an item here. You can't use an item on a hotspot, that displays an eye.
But the displayed symbols can change on the fly, if you hit a point, where you suddenly need something. This can be a bit irritating. Sometimes hotspots can be rather small and blend well into the background. Both these factors made me use the spacebar to show all hotspots more often than usual. And another little sin: Hotspots don't have a name.
Van Helsing himself doesn't really give a helpful comment. Just the usual "I can't do that". But at least he does tell you, when he's still missing something to solve a puzzle. He also refuses to leave a place, if you still need to do something there. While one could say, it's too much handholding, in this case I appriciated it, given the overall structure of the game.
Using the inventory is a bit clunky. You can't look at an object further. If you click on one, it gets highlighted, meaning you have it in your hand, and it appears in the corner of the screen and can be used with hotspots this way. If you lose an item, its slot in your bag stays empty, and you have to manually readjust them, if you don't want to have the stuff all over the place.
While you have the typical use of items, the gameplay relies heavily on riddles and puzzles of different kind. Finding codes, solve mechanisms, find a secret entrance. Often you also have to gather information from articles and things people told you. For that, every dialogue and document, as well as Helsing's own notes, can be viewed in your inventory.
Those riddles/puzzles are quite varied in structure and difficulty. Most of the time, I enjoyed them. Just a few were too simple or basically trial'n'error, or the opposite: a bit reaching and vague, what made them a bit too hard. The others were entertaining and clever. I also liked to work with all the notes. (Btw, it would be good to have pen and paper ready.)
Sometimes it can be a bit clunky, though. When you have to make that one extra click to let Helsing understand and write down for himself, what you figured out already.
And at one point I met an ugly softlock around a safe, within the first chapter.
Concentrate on that safe puzzle, before you do more in the mansion. Most of all stay away from the secret door (which must be the worst hidden secret door I've ever seen.). Otherwise it might be, that the safe doesn't open, even if everything is done correctly.
Be also sure, that Helsing writes down the info you find in his journal. Although the findings are obvious to you, he needs to realize it, too.
The story is super simple and nothing to write home about. It's not even told that good and comes across quite lame. Sometimes even a bit unintentional funny. It's also not spooky, just a bit gruesome, maybe.
There are three things, that stood out to me, in different ways.
At one point, you'll pick up a dead, dissected, beaver and use it in a quite uncommon way, that made me go: srsly now?! Well, you put a funnel in its mouth and basically use it as a pipe...
And then you pick up a round pretzel and a staight pretzel. But, how can it still be a pretzel, when it's not formed like a pretzel?!
But a real "Bruuuuh!" moment is, when you find a dead woman, who then turns out to be related to someone you know. Before leaving, Helsing tells them the lie, the woman met a prince and left the country with him, and because stupid reasons you can't reveale that prince's identity. This seems so wrong to me on various levels.
The game's length is around 7 hours.
If you are into this kind of puzzles and riddles, it might entertain you good enough. It sure worked for me. The gameplay in between is a bit lacking though and suffering from some flaws. So how good of a game it is for you, might depend on your personal preference in this regard.
As we approach the end of the year I started looking for PnCs to play, and by PnC I mean traditional pointing and clicking, not something in between, because I tried Roki and Lair of the Clockwork and boy do I hate how they control.
And I couldn't find much that came out this year? The only ones I'm eyeing are Luna The Shadow Dust and maybe Willy Morgan, although the characters in WM just look so unappealing to me, lol. Any more I should be considering?
Oh I like the look of this, added to the wishlist, thanks!
Tried the Chicken Police demo and I'm really into it, great voice acting and I love how detailed everything is. Text and dialogue heavy, which is exactly what I need right now after going through most of Serious Sam 4, lol.
At first I was feeling it, especially coming from Deception. Ghosts being torn apart! Murders & Mysteries! Secret group that ties it all together! It was entertaining and interesting. Great pixel art too.
But then when the explanations started coming in the end, they were all pretty weak and I thought the final antagonist was really uninteresting and didn't like the ending. Also the puzzles seemed fine until about the last 1/3rd where I kept getting stuck and personally got frustrated. The game has a very rigid order to trigger dialogue options appearing and there's no way of telling when something Joey just looks at in some other room suddenly creates a new dialogue entry with someone or a new journal topic. You'd think he'd have to talk to Rosa and inform her about it.
Also I don't like Rosa as a lead character. She was just kind of cold and unlikeable. One of the least likeable leads in an adventure game in a while. Even Joey was just a jerk a lot.
I remember liking the first 3 Blackwell games a good amount, but despite the higher production values I liked the final two a lot less. The writing/stories just didn't seem as good and I found the puzzles more tedious and was flipping between guides back and forth.
I would say I hope Gilbert gets better, but I played Unavowed when it came out and loved it without reservations, so yeah I think he did a lot better job writing/story/puzzle/character-wise with Unavowed coming from Epiphany.
Anyhow I didn't hate it or dislike it. I disliked Deception a little, but I liked Epiphany...but just a little.
Anyone else play the Stasis Bone Totem demo that was just released yesterday? I liked it a lot. The atmosphere is fantastic and it's got DoTT style character switching/shared inventory. It's a lot of fun. There was some weirdness with the controls that I hope they iron out but Im really looking forward to this now. Especially after Beautiful Desolation.
Call of The Sea's release date is announced for December 8th. I've been looking forward to this one since the Inside Xbox showcase. Love the visuals and the gameplay looks like some classic adventure game fun. Clunky exposition at the start of this gameplay demo aside, I was rather impressed.
This and Twin Mirror to close off the year? I really can't get over how many good adventures there were in 2020. I guess it only took everything else going to hell lol.
Call of The Sea's release date is announced for December 8th. I've been looking forward to this one since the Inside Xbox showcase. Love the visuals and the gameplay looks like some classic adventure game fun. Clunky exposition at the start of this gameplay demo aside, I was rather impressed.
This and Twin Mirror to close off the year? I really can't get over how many good adventures there were in 2020. I guess it only took everything else going to hell lol.
Wrapped up Broken Sword 5.
To start with a TL,DR: It is a lot like the first two games. I personally was never that big into them, so I'd like to add 'for better and for worse'. But everyone who do loves them, should be very happy with the 5th. And it is for sure easily better than the last one was.
You have George and Nico together in Paris, stumbling into a murder, turning into a chase of an ancient artefact. Business as usual, so to say.
The game doesn't really try to give newcomers a helping hand, and instead is very focused on fanservice and nods to characters from the first games. While you can enjoy the game witout knowing them, you'll still feel left out a lot. So at least read up on the story a bit.
Whenever you meet someone, they'll get an entry in a character gallery, what helps to jog your own memory and give new players at least a light idea of the persons. I missed some nice character artworks in those bios, seemed a bit barebones to me.
Talking about barebones: The main menu might be the laziest shit I've seen in a while. Super simple without any finesse at all. Additionaly with very lacking descriptions at times: Pick Fullscreen 1, Fullscreen 2 or Fullscreen 3. Wat?
You can choose between classic and modern subtitels as well as inventory. (I prefered classic, btw. Especially the subs. The modern ones have a big white block around them, I found too distracting.) Graphically they went back to classic style as well: 2D comic look with gorgeous handdrawn backgrounds.
I can't stress enough how much I enjoyed those backgrounds! They are so full of details back and forth, always going that one extra step. And with beautiful lighting. I couldn't get enough of them at times.
The characters itself are cellshade 3D, but work pretty well with the backgrounds and rarely stand out. They could throw a better shadow, though.
Animations are fine, only in close ups they are somewhat lacking. What I don't like is, that you have to constantly wait for characters to finish their animation. If you want to talk to someone, for example. Or use an item. Often you have to wait a sec or two in silence. If you skip dialogue, they speed up the character's animation, they would have done during the sentence.
The gameplay is exactly like in the old days, even the same cursor. You ask NPCs about stuff, sometimes showing them items from your inventory. Pick up stuff here, use it there, and solve a little puzzle every now and then. The first half seems pretty basic, the second gets a little more demanding. Although I'd say, it is more because the game makes it a bit too complicated. There is also the old problem for me, that George rarely gives a helpful comment on things.
More than once you'll have to repeat the same action, until you figure out the whole solution, or it is even necessary to get a result in the first place. This combined with quite slow, unskippable animations tended to grind my gears a bit. Characters can't run as well, btw.
Sometimes you have a choice to pick from during dialogue, but you either have to just redo it, when you picked wrong - or it didn't make a real difference anyway.
At certain points you get to control Nico, but that's quite rare, and she doesn't feel any different to George at all. There is also no real co-op with them.
You have a hint system, what's a good thing, but no way of showing all hotspots in a scene.
Humor and characters are fine, but I didn't like them too much. Dialogues felt a bit bloated as well - I started skipping a lot. As mentioned above, I was never the biggest fan to begin with and I had similar feelings with the old games as well. But again, I suppose fans should be quite happy.
The story itself is serviceable, but seemed a bit too convenient at times.
It took me around 9 hours to finish the whole game. It has beautiful artwork and it's nice to see, that they really were able to go back to their old formula. Yet it also inherited some rough edges, I was never really a fan of. I played through it, it was nice, and well, that's basically it.
Wrapped up Broken Sword 5.
To start with a TL,DR: It is a lot like the first two games. I personally was never that big into them, so I'd like to add 'for better and for worse'. But everyone who do loves them, should be very happy with the 5th. And it is for sure easily better than the last one was.
I really disagree with this. I love BS1 and BS2, but imo BS5 is just an average game. The quality of the writing, the vibe, characters (especially the antagonist) and puzzles are nowhere close to the first two games, and there are just far less NPC's in general leaving locations feeling empty. With that said it's still way better than 3 or 4.
I really disagree with this. I love BS1 and BS2, but imo BS5 is just an average game. The quality of the writing, the vibe, characters (especially the antagonist) and puzzles are nowhere close to the first two games, and there are just far less NPC's in general leaving locations feeling empty. With that said it's still way better than 3 or 4.
Welp. Guess that shows how much I am out of touch with the franchise. ^^ Maybe I gave them too much credit for going back to the roots.
The game did review well, though, didn't it? That's at least the impression I got from a quick glance.
Btw: Did anyone else feel kinda uncomfortable when posing as the late husband before the widow?
Welp. Guess that shows how much I am out of touch with the franchise. ^^ Maybe I gave them too much credit for going back to the roots.
The game did review well, though, didn't it? That's at least the impression I got from a quick glance.
Btw: Did anyone else feel kinda uncomfortable when posing as the late husband before the widow?
When we left Guybrush Threepwood, he'd just escaped the mysterious winds of Flotsam Island aboard the well-meaning sailing ship The Screaming Narwhal. However, his hand is still cursed, and LeChuck--now in human form--seems, from a distance, to be courting fair Elaine's favor. To top it all...
www.metacritic.com
Agree about the stuff with the widow. It was like the family portrait thing in Curse of Monkey Island except I wasn't feeling particularly happy about solving it.
Wrapped up Broken Sword 5.
To start with a TL,DR: It is a lot like the first two games. I personally was never that big into them, so I'd like to add 'for better and for worse'. But everyone who do loves them, should be very happy with the 5th. And it is for sure easily better than the last one was.
You have George and Nico together in Paris, stumbling into a murder, turning into a chase of an ancient artefact. Business as usual, so to say.
The game doesn't really try to give newcomers a helping hand, and instead is very focused on fanservice and nods to characters from the first games. While you can enjoy the game witout knowing them, you'll still feel left out a lot. So at least read up on the story a bit.
Whenever you meet someone, they'll get an entry in a character gallery, what helps to jog your own memory and give new players at least a light idea of the persons. I missed some nice character artworks in those bios, seemed a bit barebones to me.
Talking about barebones: The main menu might be the laziest shit I've seen in a while. Super simple without any finesse at all. Additionaly with very lacking descriptions at times: Pick Fullscreen 1, Fullscreen 2 or Fullscreen 3. Wat?
You can choose between classic and modern subtitels as well as inventory. (I prefered classic, btw. Especially the subs. The modern ones have a big white block around them, I found too distracting.) Graphically they went back to classic style as well: 2D comic look with gorgeous handdrawn backgrounds.
I can't stress enough how much I enjoyed those backgrounds! They are so full of details back and forth, always going that one extra step. And with beautiful lighting. I couldn't get enough of them at times.
The characters itself are cellshade 3D, but work pretty well with the backgrounds and rarely stand out. They could throw a better shadow, though.
Animations are fine, only in close ups they are somewhat lacking. What I don't like is, that you have to constantly wait for characters to finish their animation. If you want to talk to someone, for example. Or use an item. Often you have to wait a sec or two in silence. If you skip dialogue, they speed up the character's animation, they would have done during the sentence.
The gameplay is exactly like in the old days, even the same cursor. You ask NPCs about stuff, sometimes showing them items from your inventory. Pick up stuff here, use it there, and solve a little puzzle every now and then. The first half seems pretty basic, the second gets a little more demanding. Although I'd say, it is more because the game makes it a bit too complicated. There is also the old problem for me, that George rarely gives a helpful comment on things.
More than once you'll have to repeat the same action, until you figure out the whole solution, or it is even necessary to get a result in the first place. This combined with quite slow, unskippable animations tended to grind my gears a bit. Characters can't run as well, btw.
Sometimes you have a choice to pick from during dialogue, but you either have to just redo it, when you picked wrong - or it didn't make a real difference anyway.
At certain points you get to control Nico, but that's quite rare, and she doesn't feel any different to George at all. There is also no real co-op with them.
You have a hint system, what's a good thing, but no way of showing all hotspots in a scene.
Humor and characters are fine, but I didn't like them too much. Dialogues felt a bit bloated as well - I started skipping a lot. As mentioned above, I was never the biggest fan to begin with and I had similar feelings with the old games as well. But again, I suppose fans should be quite happy.
The story itself is serviceable, but seemed a bit too convenient at times.
It took me around 9 hours to finish the whole game. It has beautiful artwork and it's nice to see, that they really were able to go back to their old formula. Yet it also inherited some rough edges, I was never really a fan of. I played through it, it was nice, and well, that's basically it.
Despite being a Broken Sword fan and it's the adventure franchise I shared most playing with family, I didn't complete 5. I even backed the Kickstarter. I don't know if it was the writing or I wasn't ready to play more of it at the time. First and second games have great dialogue and characters. This does compel me to play more and see how my opinion shakes out.
I do want to check out Beyond A Steel Sky. It got good reviews like from Simon Parkin who I trust.
Despite being a Broken Sword fan and it's the adventure franchise I shared most playing with family, I didn't complete 5. I even backed the Kickstarter. I don't know if it was the writing or I wasn't ready to play more of it at the time. First and second games have great dialogue and characters. This does compel me to play more and see how my opinion shakes out.
I do want to check out Beyond A Steel Sky. It got good reviews like from Simon Parkin who I trust.
One of the main writers of Lure, BaSS, BS1 and BS2 (Dave Cummins) sadly passed away years before BS5. The dialogue is unfortunately clearly not as good without him. :(
One of the main writers of Lure, BaSS, BS1 and BS2 (Dave Cummins) sadly passed away years before BS5. The dialogue is unfortunately clearly not as good without him. :(
It's not on sale but pick up Moon RPG Remix while you're there. Despite the name it's a console adventure (direct control vs. pointer) that would probably appeal to the regulars in this thread. Especially anyone who played Japanese RPGs in the 80s and 90s.
In my opinion, the first game is a classic. But I felt the sequel was pretty boring actually. It doesnt have memorable story, characters or locations, and my feeling was always that it was well liked because of its superficial similarities with the first game. But guess i am alone in thinking this?
By the way, I also thought the third and fourth game was better than the credit they got, and that the fifth was just average.
In my opinion, the first game is a classic. But I felt the sequel was pretty boring actually. It doesnt have memorable story, characters or locations, and my feeling was always that it was well liked because of its superficial similarities with the first game. But guess i am alone in thinking this?
By the way, I also thought the third and fourth game was better than the credit they got, and that the fifth was just average.
imo, while it lasts BS2 is great. Playing as Nico is fun (wish we had more of that), the bit with Emily is only behind "Paris in the fall" as most memorable moment in the series - what a gut punch that was the first time. The bit at the end is great with the mirror is great - Much more effective ending then BS1. I love the music creeping out whenever Tezcatlipoca is mentioned. I liked how they leaned even further into the supernatural.
The weaknesses of BS2 to me are just how short it is and how few locations there are compared to BS1. I dunno if their budget got cut or what. I remember reading in a preview something about branching paths which obviously never happened in the final game.
The third game I agree with you about, but I honestly think the fourth is trash. I have no desire to ever replay that again.
I thought Broken Sword 5 was alright save for 1 or 2 odd puzzles (in terms of plot integration not difficulty).
I disagree with the idea that Dave Cummins writing is the difference maker. A lot of the Dave Cummins edgy humor from the first games ages the poorest of anything.
I just think that with a series like Broken Sword eventually it all feels like "been there done that." The first game felt like a slowly unraveling mystery with genuine suspense. By 5 entries you're just following the template and changing a few details, it's not special anymore.
If I have to pick one, I'd choose the second as my favourite. It has some improvements over the first, and I also like that you play Nico.
Back in the day I enjoyed the third for what it was – what is clearly not a real PnC, though. It has its fair share of flaws, but overall I liked the gameplay. (Would be interesting to replay it these days and see how it holds up. ^^)
The 4th can rot in hell. Controls are awful. They had some good ideas for puzzles, but overall I didn't like them much either. And the conversations were so bad, I really didn't want to talk to NPCs. And as far as I remember, the game released (and still is?) in a very sorry state and the support from the devs was/is a joke.
While the 5th is kinda shallow, it's not a bad game, that metacritic score seems a bit harsh to me. It's also "very positiv" on Steam and 4,2 Stars on GOG.
So I finished up Röki and Urban Witch Story. Both were good, but I liked the latter a bit more because of the dialogue and graphical style.
I also played a few hours of Outer Wilds, but so far I don't see why it is so highly praised. I hate the mechanics and all I do is die a lot.
The one remaining 2020 game I was waiting on was Impostor Factory, but it got delayed to 2021 unfortunately. I've been wanting to replay Sam and Max, so I'll pick up the remaster later this week.
Otherwise, I've gone back to my backlog and am playing through the visual novel 428: Shibuya Scramble. It's by the producer of the Zero Escape and Danganronpa series so there are some adventure game elements. You play the game from the perspective of five different characters and it's kind of like solving a puzzle to get all the characters to the end of a chapter without hitting a bad end, even if you're just reading and making choices. I will say that it's so nice to play a visual novel with no fan service or anime art style since it's all using stills of live actions shots using actors. If you liked the style of writing of those other games, I recommend checking it out. I'm enjoying it a lot.
I made a short point and click with my brother for a 2 week game jam. If you guys wanted to check it out, it's free! Takes about 30 mins to 1 hour to play through the whole thing!
A Prologue to Almost My Floor, an upcoming horror-themed point'n'click adventure. Alex is a real fan of creepy stuff and horror movies, but he never expected to experience it himself just by taking the elevator back home! Can he avoid the madness and deal with the evil he's up against?
Almost My Floor - point & click detective in a frightening atmosphere of sinister nightmares. Each step may end up fatal. Solve the mystery of the house #9 residents or go crazy. Labyrinth of endless floors will not let go of their victim without a fight.
so im WFH and had to reboot my computer, and GOG launched automatically, and (wont get into it) i remembered they have Lure of the Temptress on it, so downloaded and loaded it up for a minute just to look, my 4 1/2 year old came over and seemed to get it immediately "open the door" i tell her its locked "ok, grab the torch"
So now im thinking....... any recs for a point and click for a 4 1/2 to watch get played? feel like monkey island is maybe too much?
so im WFH and had to reboot my computer, and GOG launched automatically, and (wont get into it) i remembered they have Lure of the Temptress on it, so downloaded and loaded it up for a minute just to look, my 4 1/2 year old came over and seemed to get it immediately "open the door" i tell her its locked "ok, grab the torch"
So now im thinking....... any recs for a point and click for a 4 1/2 to watch get played? feel like monkey island is maybe too much?
Amanita Games is your friend here. The more "gamey" games like Machinarium are perhaps a bit complicated, but Botanicula and Chuchel (which I've been meaning to play...) and the Samorost games (need to get back to 3...) are very bright, colorful, no words, no questionable content, lots of bouncy animation.
Botanicula and Chuchel in particular I feel like were made with the intent of being kids games, but obviously can appeal to an older audience
so im WFH and had to reboot my computer, and GOG launched automatically, and (wont get into it) i remembered they have Lure of the Temptress on it, so downloaded and loaded it up for a minute just to look, my 4 1/2 year old came over and seemed to get it immediately "open the door" i tell her its locked "ok, grab the torch"
So now im thinking....... any recs for a point and click for a 4 1/2 to watch get played? feel like monkey island is maybe too much?
Includes 35 items: Big Thinkers 1st Grade, Big Thinkers Kindergarten, Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise, Freddi Fish 2: The Case of the Haunted Schoolhouse, Freddi Fish 3: The Case of the Stolen Conch Shell, Freddi Fish 4: The Case of the Hogfish Rustlers of Briny Gulch, Freddi Fish 5 featuring Mess Ha
Lumino City is an award-winning hand-made Puzzle Adventure game. By exploring the city, and using your ingenuity piece together all sorts of puzzling mechanisms to help the people who live in its unique world. Discover gardens in the sky, towers marooned high on an immense waterwheel, and houses...
store.steampowered.com
Seconding almost anything by Amanita Design (Samorost, Botanicula, Chuchel)
