Recent reviews by Dr. Mircow

The Deed is a RPG Maker game with a traditional murder mystery setting. The story revolves around Arran Bruce who recently discovers that his abusive father removed him from his Will in favour of his cruel sister to inherit the family belongins. Furious about this, he decides to eliminate his sister in order to restore his own, rightful, inheritance.

The gameplay is all about getting away with the murder of Arran’s sister and trying to blame someone else for it. The player has the choice of who to talk to, what topics to discuss in conversations, which evidence to plant, the method of murder and how to handle the interview when interrogated at the end. Consequently, the paths chosen influence the final outcome (e.g. the ending), and that is all there is to its very minimal gameplay. Generally, a single playthrough takes roughly about 20-30 minutes at normal pace with all rooms fully explored and every possible conversation exhausted. In other words, it is all about solving the one single puzzle: getting away with murder. As a result, the game has a replayability value until the player discovers all the possible methods of committing the crime (while being undetected and without people being suspicious) and various endings. Likewise, this is good news for any achievement hunters who want to achieve 100% completion as it is very easy to accomplish it.

Admittedly, the writing is nothing terrific, and most of it is forgettable anyway, but it is enough to provide context for the puzzle. The very few set-pieces such as the flashblacks are a nice touch since they provide some backstory, aside from simply talking with other people, but that is as deep as the story can get, which is not a lot. Then again, the game’s length is extremely short after all, therefore there is hardly time to expand the story. Ultimately, The Deed is clearly not a purely story-driven game. As mentioned previously, it is all about solving the one puzzle.

The visuals are on par with what anyone should expect from a RPG Maker game. Thankfully, the game does not bluntly rely on stock assets which makes it stand out amongst the majority of half-hearted RPG Maker games out there, but as a whole it is clearly not as stunning as something like To The Moon, as far as RPG Maker games are concerned. It does a somewhat effective use of the dark tone and browny colour pallet to create at least a creepy atmosphere, even if there is nothing remotely creepy or even scary about it. Furthermore, there is no voice acting (as per usual with most RPG Maker games) and the sound effects used are minimal and rather uninspiring. The soundtrack is unmemorable, much like the writing, but does an adequate job in setting up the mood.

In conclusion, The Deed has a simple but interestingly fun little concept despite everything about it being fundamentally way too basic. The game has clear shortcomings which could have been easily avoided in the first place. For instance, the length could have been greatly improved through the use of more elaborate ways of committing the crime and the atmosphere could have also been enhanced by using eerier sound effects. Evidently, there has been a missed opportunity on expending the story due to both the writing and length letting it down. However, considering the price tag, all of these shortcomings are tolerable in this case since anyone can easily purchase the game for “free” by selling any marketable items in their Steam inventory, thus eliminating any notion of a buyer’s remorse. In actual fact, the game should have been (properly) free in the first place. For a fun fact, I bought the game for 7p during a sale by selling a Steam emoticon.

If you fancy the concept at least and can lower your expectations, I recommend giving The Deed a shot as it can be fun figuring out a way without being caught, but also mainly because of its price tag. Possibly the shortest, yet forgettable, fun you will ever have in a game.

Buenos días desde la Tierra de los Muertos!

Grim Fandango is an adventure game by Tim Schafer back from when was working for LucasArts in the ‘90s and it is widely considered to be the swansong of the genre. Many years later, Schafer’s own company, Double Fine, finally brings it back “from the dead” (pun intended maybe?) in the form of a Remastered edition after the original was not legally available anywhere for a very long time (you know, they stopped manufacturing retail boxes). So, what is all the fuss about Grim Fandango?

Well, when someone gets asked what is so great about Grim Fandango, they always pinpoint the quality of the writing firstly (or I would hope so). Tim Schafer’s writing excels in this game, as proven by a narrative full of clever and witty dialogues from well fleshed out characters. Now, the plot in Grim Fandanago is unquestionably one of those which should not be spoiled, but a synopsis can be given. Consequently, the plot essentially spans four years, each representing a separate chapter respectively. It starts off with the protagonist, Manny Calavera, a travel agent at the Department of Death getting fed up one day of dealing with not-so-great clients (ie. evil souls) and eventually steals a client, Mercedes Colomar, from his rival, Domino Hurley, who strangely always seems to get the best clients (ie. pure souls). Despite her being a pure soul, Manny mistakenly assigns her on a four-year journey to the afterlife, as all the evil souls are meant to, instead of the luxury express train due to a rigged database. With that, it is not long before Manny figures out that something fishy is happening in this department, and as a result finds out of the wicked scam. So he sets off to look for Mercedes and put a stop to this. In these four years, Manny faces a handful of challenges and meets many odd, but lovely, individuals. Admittedly, the quality of the plot, while still overall commendable though, peaks at the end of Year 2; with the subsequent two years being both less captivating and shorter in length, clocking up to a total of 10-11 hours of gameplay.

The entire Aztec themes with the calaca-like characters and the Day of the Dead inspirations, in addition to the film-noir vibe and Art Deco designs, are only some of the few things that make Grim Fandango’s world so exceptionally unique and memorable. Then there is the excellent voice acting and soundtrack to back it up. Having various Latino actors featured in the cast clearly helps cement the authenticity of the aforementioned themes. Moreover, the performances are so spot on, there is hardly a time when you are taken out of the immersion. Now, the soundtrack is splendid and, much like the voice acting, fits with the game’s themes too. It mixes genres such as South American folk music, swing, bebop and jazz all together. Peter McConnell did a brilliant job back then and does it, once again, by re-recording all those tracks for the Remastered edition. This soundtrack is one worth owning alone.

The original gameplay involved using tank controls exclusively, but now that is not the case anymore with the implementation of straightforward point-and-click mechanics in the Remastered edition. Much like any adventure game from that time period, the player must collect objects that can be used with other collectibles, people or environments in order to solve the puzzles and progress the story. The inventory system involves pulling each item in and out of Manny’s coat jacket for use or inspection. This makes an interesting spin on the inventory system, although the problem with this, compared to the classic hover tab, is that it is a bit more time consuming looking for the right item since you cannot go straight to the desired item right away. Manny has to pull in and out each item in turn. Puzzle-wise, Grim Fandango has an adequate level of difficulty in general when you put the effort to be observant. Nevertheless, and it is sad to say, there are moments when their logic jumps the shark, leaving the player clicking on everything and backtracking a lot in hopes of finding the right solution. Thankfully, the last two chapters are a bit smaller in number of places to visit, thus making the backtracking less prominant. Retrospectively, a couple of puzzle designs have aged badly and they sure would put off newcomers. Even veterans of the genre would rightfully complain and be annoyed. I did as well, at least in three instances.

Visually, being the first 3D adventure game by LucasArts, Grim Fandango looks all blocky and with muddy backgrounds by today’s standards. Artistically, there is nothing wrong with that, and perhaps the somewhat cartoon-ish appearance might give it an excuse to bypass this flaw. The Remastered edition tries to fix this by improving the character models and the engine shaders, but only does the job partially. Undoubtedly, the best part of the remastered port is being able to run the game on modern machines without fiddling with emulators.

If there are certain aspects to be nitpicky about though, these would indeed be related to the state of the port. As mentioned previously, whilst the character models were vastly improved through the use of enhanced textures, better cast of lighting and anti-aliasing for jagged edges, the backgrounds were left shockingly untouched. Even though they are not completely ugly, it would have been ideal to give them the same treatment as the character models since a lot of Grim Fandango’s unique charm comes from the world design. Then there is also the stability of the port as many people have reported being buggy. In my case, I have never encountered any game-breaking bugs which would prevent my progress, or any bug for that matter. However, one observation that I would like to point out is that there were, in my playthrough, severe drops in framerate during pre-rendered cutscenes causing them to be laggy on a arguably modern machine. Looking around, I think there is a conflict with the Steam overlay as I also noticed dialogues began to temporarily stutter after I would return from the Steam overlay.

In conclusion, Grim Fandango is a title absolutely worth to be called a classic and definitely amongst the best adventure games. As of now, almost two decades since its original release, it still remains one of the most original concepts in a video game to date. Even if certain puzzles might have aged badly since then, everything else from the narrative, distinctive characters, well-written conversations, stellar voice performances to the splendid soundtrack create this unforgettable ride. Now the Remastered Edition, on the other hand, is admittedly a tad lazy as not everything is in actual fact fully “remastered”; not that Double Fine ever claimed that. The counterargument for this would be that it is more of a case of preserving a lost classic by retaining its original aesthetics and feel as much as possible and making only small visual and technical enhancements where was necessary without ruining the original vision of the game. Ultimately it is up to you to contemplate this practice all you want, but at the end of the day this is still the same Grim Fandango as many people remember from ’98 -- a game I highly recommened to any adventure fan, at very least for the originality of the concept.

The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav is the first point ‘n’ click adventure game set in the Dark Eye universe. The plot follows the protagonist, Geron, who tries to rescue his town from a catastrophe and has to face many obstacles on his quest. He eventually meets this forrest fairy, Nuri, who he has to protect as she is one of the reasons why grim things start to happen in the lands of Aventuria. Initially it may look like a light-hearted story, but the tone deviates from that soon enough.

Now, the art is simply brilliant, no doubt about that. The hand-drawn/painted backdrops are definitely worthy of a praise as they set an unique vibe and aesthetic to the game. In actual fact, The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav has, at least, some of the best detailed 2D visuals in a point ‘n’ click game to date. It would have been even better having most of its environments more interactive to enhance the experience. The soundtrack is also lovely as each track fits perfectly with each scene and sets the mood accordingly.

But honestly, that is as much as the game can be lauded for as everything else is either average or beyond mediocre. The story, characters and puzzles have glaring issues which put a toll on my patience and made me uninstall the game just when I was a bit over halfway through. I simply could not stand it any longer.

Firstly, the story is a mixed bag for a fairytale setting. It has a few interesting moments, but these are overshadowed by the amount of monotonous events. Admittedly, the concept seems interesting enough to hold your attention longer than it should, but its writing can be shoddy every now and then. This aspect plagued the game with many pacing issues resulting in this agonisingly slow momentum in the narrative. Things pick up so slowly that you could easily fall asleep on your chair. Personally, the plot did not captivate me at all, and instead it progressively made me try to rush towards the ending as soon as possible. As mentioned previsouly, I quit before I got to the ending, so I have no idea if things get better. 7 hours in felt already too late for things to get appealing in my opinion though.

Additionally, the main protagonists are generally unlikable. They are boring, wimpy and lack personal charms. Not only that, but the fairy companion, Nuri, that you have to protect and escort up to a point in the story is borderline unbearable. I do not know if the writers' intention was to make her actually sound autistic, but I believe they succeeded to some degree by accident. At least that is the vibe that I got from her during every conversation. It does not help that the English voice acting is also dull as a lot of characters talk too whispery and without much energy in voice projection.

Lastly, the puzzles are fairly easy in the beginning and should not pose a problem to veterans of the genre, but they eventually become unintuitive and leave the player wondering what to do next in more than a couple of occasions. Therefore, do not be surprised getting stuck a couple of times later on. One interesting mechanic, though, is the ability to break or fix objects through a magic power which adds an extra layer of challenge in solving certain puzzles. Whilst this is nothing radically innovative, the mechanic is commendable as otherwise the gameplay is the same as in any standard point ‘n’ click adventure game from the past few decades. Sadly, it is only used a few times and not always in the most creative ways.

In conclusion, The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav had a lot of potential to be at least an engaging point ‘n’ click adventure game set in an already established lore (famously known in Germany), but its agonisingly slow pacing and painfully dull (English) voice acting are the two most prominent sins in this game which suck the majority of the enjoyment -- and closely followed by some of the characters and puzzles. Besides the break/fix mechanic, the game’s gameplay simply does not attempt to challenge the standard already set by the genre since the '90s. Although there is nothing utterly wrong with that, this means that both the story and puzzles, which are both average at best, have to carry the game – and The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav does not succeed in either of them. Much like the developer’s other franchise, Deponia, I was initially captivated by its unique visuals which led me to purchase this game in the first place. Now I wish I knew how mediocre the content is underneath that vibrant coat of paint. At this stage, I do not care how the story ends anymore as I simply could not enjoy the ride and do not want to revisit it. I might watch it on YouTube instead, some day. I cannot recommend this game unless you have an enormous amount of patience and tolerance. If so, I admire you.

Emily Is Away does not warrant an in-depth review as there is not much to talk about it.

It is an interactive story that takes you back to the Windows XP era where you chat online with this girl, Emily, from high school. The "gameplay" is minimal since there are only dialogue choices to play around with and there is no deep story behind it all, although some people might feel, subjectively, emotional by the end depending on what ending they get. An alternative name such as "Friendzone Simulator" would have still been appropriate.

Hardly a game, per se, but it is very short (30 minutes?) and most importantly free. It does not make you feel like you wasted a lot of your time nor being ripped off by an absurd price-tag. So there is not much to complain about, which is also why I give it a recommandation even though a neutral one is more fitting.

My brain keeps deceiving me as I always tend to read GabeN: The Final DESTINATION. Not DECISION.

GabeN: The Final Decision is simply a game made in RPG Maker as a joke over the weekend. The story is a lot of childish meta gibberish filled with outdated dank memes written with a mentality of a 5-year old who has discovered the Internet just the other day; and yet I believe it makes narratively more sense than a David Cage interactive movie chocking on heroin. But that is like commending this game for something which would be mindboggling. So the story, or the lack of a coherent one (do not worry, even the game warns you), essentially revolves around Gabe Newell, Valve, Illuminati and Gabe’s final decision; yes, how original. Whilst there are a few moments that may make you grin accidently, more so at how bad everything is rather than at any redeemable quality, it miserably fails at any form of comedy. There was potential, but it was all wasted.

The gameplay is mostly always on rails. Whenever the game attempts to throw a puzzle in, it is generally the most dull and badly implemented fetch quest that you could imagine as the random enemy encounter is also absurdly way too high. But that is okey as the battles, which require no tactics and are devoid of any depth whatsoever, always end up just one-shot killing your generic asset enemies. On the other band, bosses can be stupidly overpowered. There is no pace, consistency, balance nor progression in the entire gameplay as also seen by a majority of items and skills which make no sense statistically, leaving you clueless what to do or use half of the time. The developer furthermore put no effort into the game world as everything is bland, copy-pasted and full of large “empty” rooms. From a design standpoint, everything is utterly lazy.

Then there is the disproportionate use of stock assets from RPG Maker and, presumably, royalty-free websites. But I do also believe half of these assets were "stolen" one way or another. This leads to a lack in personality and feel for the game to at least stand out amongst the rest of the carbon-copy trash games made in RPG Maker on Steam Greenlight. However, the soundtrack can be catchy despite looping poorly at times. Makes you wonder from where the developer “stole” it in the first place.

You would expect such a rushed game to be riddled with bugs, but surprisingly there are no game-breaking ones. Conversely, there are many things which needed to be ironed out such as when either you or your companion dies, at least do not display the deceased party member as if he is still alive. Also, spelling mistakes are present here and there, and it is a headache figuring out whether they were intentional or not.

In conclusion, GabeN: The Final Decision is just another by-the-numbers trash RPG Maker game that gives Steam Greenlight a bad reputation, but it is the exact kind of trash that you should only play it once for the novelty experience when you are absolutely drunk or bored and received it as a free gift from someone. Additionally, it is also the kind of trash where you should shoot yourself for even paying a single penny for it. It would have been received a lot less harshly by the community if the developer would not have had the guts to even ask for an overpriced admission fee for this load of junk. It should have been completely free. Period.

I knew from the start that the game was made as a (poor) parody, so I guess the joke is on me for even giving it the slightest bit of attention by writing all this. But hey, got some free time to kill this evening and free trading cards from a free gift.

Life Is Tumblr™. Telltale will remember this.

Life Is Strange is an interactive adventure game/movie done in episodic format which focuses on storytelling with choices and consequences in the same vein as recent Telltale games.

Firstly, the storytelling is the heart of this game, or interactive movie. You follow Max, a socially awkward geek who recently got accepted into Blackwell Academy as a photography student and starts having tough time integrating in. The story in this episode tackles social issues from typical (Americanised) student drama to being secluded by “za kewl kidz club”. Of course, with Max being an arty-fartsy student, the game naturally had to feature a school full of pricks, snobs, hipsters and shy nerds who get beaten up by bullies - and everyone is very stereotypical. They are the sort of people I would like to punch in the teeth and kick right in the nuts, where applicable. Through all this, Max eventually ends up facing a life threatening situation where, out of the blue, she discovers that she can rewind time and as a result manages to save an old friend in the process. Personally, I was not pleased with how the writers dumped this magical power in there from nowhere, but I suppose more context is provided in the following episodes. After this incident, with her old friend reunited, the story starts focusing on their renewed friendship and the events that are about to happen next at Blackwell Academy and in town.

What did actually impress me in this episode is how natural the dialogues are as the conversations heard reassemble closely to what teenagers would talk like in real life nowadays – that superficial, Internet-like prattle. Thankfully, for our sanity and mine, the game does not go overboard with this “dialect” before becoming infuriately irritating, but does an acceptable job in emulating the current social media generation. This positively helps with the immersion for an interactive movie as it will feel at home for some people, although if you are someone who is already fed up of it all, whether you hear it enough from your friends or any younger siblings, then Life Is Strange will make you rightfully despise it even further. Regardless, the writing feels unquestionably written from a female mindset as seen by many events in the game. Moreover, the voice acting is commendable and the soundtrack is very calm and sweet, despite being subjectively poppy.

If you have played any recent Telltale games since The Walking Dead, then Life Is Strange plays exactly the same way. The core of its gameplay relies heavily on the dialogue choices you pick, followed closely by some exploration elements, albeit a bit restricted, where you search every little nook and cranny for further layers of backstories and then lastly by light puzzles which I personally would hardly even call them puzzles. The one new mechanic which differentiates itself from a Telltale game is the ability to rewind time, thus allowing the player to redo previous choices or mistakes. On paper, this would sound terrible, but in actual fact it kind of works; and here is why. In Life Is Strange there are, generally, two main choices you have got to make at certain points in time. Unlike them being the usual black and white, both choices are relatively “bad”. There is no obvious “good” choice. As a result, the game pressurises you in picking what you would consider the lesser evil. In this context, the rewind mechanic makes sense as there is not a strict way of cheating your way through. Besides, personally, it reminded me of The Last Express’ time mechanic which was revolutionary for its time. Highly underrated classic I must add.

So with a rewind mechanic implemented, it begs the question: do your choices actually have consequences? Well, I do not know yet, at least in terms of their magnitude, as it would be more ideal to judge them once all five episodes are played. But, based on my experience rewinding in this episode, the choices do not deviate too much from the critical path which remains fixed. What does seem to adjust is the behaviour of certain characters or the mood of the scene. As an example, without spoiling, the first playthrough of a particular scene ended up very jovial, or how they referred to in game as “so punk”. The second time around, it ended up rather sad and depressing, but it was a very evident contrast. A third variation might have been possible, but I decided to stick with my last choice there.

Graphically, the art style used in Life Is Strange is somewhat cartoonish, but undeniably colourful, and the good use of lighting and sunrays manages to capture that feeling of the autumn season present in this episode. Whilst the use of some post-processing filter effects and the emphasis on bloom/depth of field might end up a tad tiresome for the eyes after a while, it is an interesting artistic choice to say the least which I do respect even if it is not my cup of tea.

Technically, the game runs smoothly with absolutely no hiccups whatsoever. Nonetheless, if there is one palpable complain to be made that would be pointing out the fairly abysmal lip-sync. Despite the fact that it is not a total deal-breaker, it is hard not to spot nor ignore it. It is as if the developers did not even put that extra effort in remediating this issue. Depending on your standards for interactive movies, this may or may not break some of the immersion.

In conclusion, Episode 1: Chrysalis did enough to just pique my interest in this series, mainly to see where its story and the choices made lead to. Based on this one episode, I can clearly see that it is not a game for everyone, both from its premise and gameplay standpoints; I am not a fan of its Tumblr-like mindset either, but I suppose it is something new and different. The episode is also not something that I felt overwhelmed by its sheer quality, nor made me a dedicated fan of interactive movies done in episodic format. It is an interesting experience, however, with colourful visuals, conceivable dialogues, solid voice acting, a peaceful soundtrack and a nifty rewind mechanic reminiscent of The Last Express. Weirdly enough, there is a traditional point ‘n’ click feeling in its gameplay despite the lack of actual puzzles that I managed to at least get some form of satisfaction from. Perhaps that is due to the exploration elements which honestly could have been a bit more fleshed out. Episode 1: Chrysalis is an alright introduction, even though it is mundane in the middle in terms of events, but enough for a recommandation to grab it and use it as a gauge on whether you want to invest any more time on its other episodes.

A Golden Wake is an old-school point-and-click adventure game developed by a small group of individuals and published by the renowned Wadjet Eye Games; famous for similar types of games developed in the AGS engine such as the Blackwell franchise.

Firstly, A Golden Wake is set in a rather unique setting which is hardly ever used in video games; and that is in the state of Florida, all the way back in the 1920s. The choice of setting is due to the story revolving around at the height of the period’s Land Boom. In fact, the story is based on real-life events with a few deliberate artistic emancipations here and there. Right from the start, this aspect of the game already makes it quite appealing as its setting is very refreshing.

You take the role of Alfred Banks (also simply called Alfie), a young real-estate agent trying to follow in his father’s footsteps and make his name big in this market. Initially working in New York, he eventually relocates in Miami the moment he hears the news about this real-estate boom taking place there and so begins taking part in the new Coral Gables project. Throughout the story split into chapters, you see Alfie’s life turning into a rollercoaster as he discovers both the ups and down of the market (subsequently his job) and how badly corruption can affect even your closest friends and family members. Although the game is very short in length, some of the narrative manages to make the player feel some sort of sympathy for Alfie by the end of it all in a very condensed time.

As far as old-school adventure games are concerned, A Golden Wake is graphically adequate and as expected from a game developed using the AGS engine, even though some of the drawn backgrounds can lack finer details. But they can be very colourful and the game does a good job in capturing the time period quite nicely. The soundtrack, much like the game’s aesthetics, is another aspect which the game does superbly well in emulating that authentic jazzy feeling of the ‘20s.

And that is as much praise the game can receive up to this point as the rest of it is sadly riddled with many flaws ranging from lacklustre design choices to uninteresting writing. While the premise of the story is in actual fact interesting, the narrative eventually becomes, for a lack of a better word, dull -- even justifiably sloppy. This is partly due to the lack of engaging dialogues and fleshed out support characters as Alfie is the only character you would ever care about or feel attached to throughout the game’s story. But even then, through all the troubles he has to face, some of the actions written for him by the developers can seem occasionally implausible or inconsistent. In fact, Alfie is without a shadow of a doubt the best character and in turn the best part of the plot, although that is not saying much in a relatively depthless storyline. From start to finish, you will be able to see how certain events change his life forever, even if you sort of end up "watching" these said events rather than directly causing them in the process. And that latter part is another problem tied to the writing quality in general. It just is not on par with other adventure games and simply puts forward nothing new in a way to at least make itself stand out to some degree.

But perhaps the most obvious flaw in the game is the design of the “puzzles”. Their solutions are very obvious, arbitrary and even somewhat insulting to seasoned fans of the genre. It can be argued that these so called “puzzles” should not even be called puzzles. Then what is the point of playing a point-and-click adventure game when neither the game’s plot nor narrative is its strongest aspect to at least compensate for this puzzle design? Not only that, but a few fairly inventive puzzle mechanics such as when you attempt to make a sales pitch to a crowd are either used only once throughout the entire game or were implemented in a uninspiring way.

And that leads to the next flaw: linearity. Indeed, it is true that the point-and-click genre is infamous for being linear thanks to being a more of story-driven medium, but that does not mean that some form of variety, or choices, should not be included. While the game does manage to offer some moments where you seem to be able to approach things in different orders, even as an illusion, these are very few in between. Going to A, B, C and then D is sufficient in completing a chapter in the game’s story. It basically works just like that. The problem here is clearly that it feels too blatantly linear than it should be.

Then the voice acting can also be hit-and-miss in places, although full credit has to be given to Alfie’s voice actor who singlehandedly put on a stellar performance; he simply overshadowed everyone else.

In conclusion, A Golden Wake is a very casual adventure game. It ends up offering an interesting premise with a great soundtrack and nice looking old-school aesthetics, but with lots of potential wasted due to mindboggling easy “puzzles” (or simply lack of actual puzzles), a strict linearity and a story which starts slowly, gets bland halfway through and ends too soon. Not much backbone in there really. At the end of the day, it is a by-the-numbers adventure game with nothing ambitious about it. At its current price, it misses a recommendation. Even on a Steam sale I would be cautious recommending this unless you like supporting the indie scene. It is easily the weakest game published by Wadjet Eye which produced far superior and more striving adventure games than this game could ever offer. If there is one word to summarise the game as a whole that would be “mundane”, almost to a point where I would fall asleep on my chair.

Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons is a third-person linear co-op game and inspired by games such as Ico and Shadow of the Colossus due to their similarities in gameplay and aesthetics.

The premise of the game is following two brothers, Naie (eldest) and Naiee (youngest), through their journey across different lands searching for a magical tree which has the cure that can save their dying father. Being a very narratively driven game, revealing any details about the story would ruin much of the game’s charm since that is its main driving force.

The game plays exactly like a co-op puzzle-platformer where you control the two brothers through their journey. Throughout the game, using a controller is strongly recommended as playing it on keyboard, whilst still doable, can result in some awkward coordination between the two controllable protagonists when they start bumping into each other or objects like two drunks. The actual gameplay itself is satisfying due to the nice blend of “puzzles” requiring both brothers’ participation throughout most of the game. The difficulty of these “puzzles” may eventually feel disappointing after a while as they do not provide any concrete challenge to the player(s) (hence the inverted commas), although that might have been deliberate for the integrity of the game’s pace. Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons is, indeed, one of those games where the difficulty requires being at a minimum for the narrative to be at full throttle. Remember, no one wants to get constantly stuck solving complex puzzles in a narratively-driven game as it subsequently ruins the game’s pace.

However, where it lacks in challenging puzzles or even perhaps rewarding gameplay, it compensates for its narrative which in actual fact is the heart of this game. The journey, albeit disappointedly short, transports you in a world where you believe you are in a place like Middle-Earth; travelling through various mesmerising landscapes on your quest for the cure while the suiting soundtrack plays in the background. All of its narrative is achieved rather through visuals and gestures as there is not any comprehendible dialogue in the entire game. That in itself is commendable as not many games can pull it off as successfully as Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons does. Frankly, each gesture or visual representation is easily and surprisingly understandable. Besides all that, the game also offers in its storytelling a handful of moments of happiness, laughter, seriousness and sadness without feeling schizophrenic with its mood shifts. The game‘s narrative can have some amazing set-pieces, but also a couple of clumsy ones.

And that is as much as Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons can offer to players. On top of its colourful charm, or even some of its darker undertones, there are two main complains I personally had with this game in my first playthrough which ultimately felt detrimental to an extent towards my overall enjoyment. On a technical level, I encountered three game-breaking bugs which would not allow me to continue to the next area. Whilst two of them were solved by looking up online forums, the latter required restarting two prior chapters since simply restarting the current one was not sufficient to solve the problem. As of now, I still have no idea how those bugs triggered when it seems that the majority of people never even encountered them in the first place. Still, having to restart two complete chapters is bothersome. Then lastly, the ending. I will honestly be one of those in the minority who was not totally satisfied with the story’s conclusion nor did it have an impact on me. Even as I wish to critically evaluate it in this review, I cannot do that without simply spoiling it. But I will say this: I understood what they tried to achieve with the coming of age approach, but reflecting back through the entire journey, the writing at this point was sloppy and felt more of a cop out in the end to me. It also made me realise how Naie was not fleshed out as a character as much as his younger brother, Naiee, making a certain event not as effective as the developers would have hoped for, to me at least. Perhaps that is because the story might have been moving a bit too fast for things to fully develop.

Conclusively, Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons is one those video games where you delve in exclusively for the storytelling experience. Nothing more, nothing less. Without even sounding remotely pretentious, It is hardly the “masterpiece” everyone clams it to be, although it will definitely, and respectfully, leave a lasting impression for many people regardless, especially for youngsters. But not for everyone. Mechanically, it has a solid co-op experience with extremely easy puzzles to solve and backed up by artistically appealing sceneries, a fitting soundtrack and a simple, yet immersive, narrative despite a few clumsy set-pieces and a somewhat unsatisfying ending. At full price, however, I would definitely not recommend this due to its short length (2-3 hours at most) and limited replayability as there is not much reason to revisit it anytime soon now that you know how the story wraps up. Conversely, considering it always goes as low as £1 during virtually any Steam sales, there is absolutely no excuse not to try this, and that is why I am recommending it in the end. Despite some of its flaws, I truly had fun playing it and thought it managed to do what it was aiming for mostly pretty well, even if I will probably not reflect too much upon it in the near future.

The twist is that they somehow fixed the series, but was it just in time?

Firstly, Runaway: A Twist of Fate is the third and latest entry in the Runaway series, the point-and-click adventure series by Pendulo Studios where you follow Brian Basco - a shy physics nerd turned into a confident adult capable to stand up for himself - and his attractive girlfriend, Gina Timmins, in their Hollywood-like adventures which take some evident inspirations from a couple of known classics, like Broken Sword in particular.

Split into a couple of acts, this time around the story starts off from nowhere with absolutely no connections to Runaway 2’s ending: Brian is dead and he left a cryptic message to Gina who was supposedly still trapped in some sort of water tank in the previous game. For the first time in this series you take control of Gina, which oddly enough feels like breath of fresh air for this series despite this mechanic being nothing new to the genre. Not only that, but the biggest complain I personally had with this series was how useless Gina was as a character in the past by bringing nothing to the story other than an incentive for Brian to save her -- damsel in distress at her finest. It also did not help her being off-screen for at least three quarters of a game each. But the developers have finally listened and addressed this issue with a newly rewritten Gina who can be clever, reliable, and funny whilst still retaining her woman qualities.

So as Gina, it is your job to find out what actually happened to Brian as you deduce that he is not actually dead. From there on, the story starts building up piece by piece into a satisfying adventure worthy of its title with enough thrills and detective work to suck you in; you really want to know what happens next. I do not know what kind of sorcery the folks at Pendulo Studios dealt with, but whatever it was, the narrative in particular is a massive improvement over the previous games. It has a certain cinematic vibe to it which works surprisingly well with what Runaway: A Twist of Fate is going for, but perhaps the best part is how you are given a certain degree of perspective from different characters on how the plot develops (or developed in the past events) over the course of the game. Without any major spoilers though, the ending does feel somewhat unsatisfying considering the events that occur in the game, even despite being a throwback to Runaway 1’s ending. At the end of the day, considering how Runaway 1’s plot took a while to hook you and how Runaway 2’s was a trainwreck after the first two or so acts, Runaway: A Twist of Fate shows that this series is capable of consistently adequate writing. In actual fact, this is perhaps the most serious Runaway game from a plot standpoint due to its evident shift in tone, but at the price of also being the most mundane from the series as it cut down on the supernatural nonsense and the number of cheesy scenarios. Therefore, fans of the original might miss some of that wacky trademark whilst those who despised Runaway 2’s “Indigo Prophecy”-like approach in storytelling might go through sensations of revelations. Cutting it to the chase, the plot is simply a retcon of the entire story of the series.

Where Runaway: A Twist of Fate truly shines is perhaps when it mocks itself. There are plenty of hilarious, tongue-in-cheek, moments and references where it acknowledges how cheesy the previous Runaway games were and even questions the clichés of the point ‘n’ click genre. Realistically, becoming self-aware of itself should have ruined any of the immersion that the game has to offer, but it actually works in its favour to drive some of the humour from this comedy-oriented flick. Still, when it works, it can generate a chunck of laughter.

Visually, the cartoonish hand drawn backgrounds in here still maintain the unique aesthetics of the series, although they do feel subjectively less memorable (than in Runaway 1) and not as vibrant (as in Runaway 2) this time around. Locations and scenes, which in fact are far less than in the previous two games, are more constrained and definitely a lot smaller in size than before. Furthermore, they are also not as exotic as before since most of setting is mainly based in urban locations. One major criticism in regards to the drawings is that some of the rooms or objects were drawn at really odd angles in respect to the camera, so to speak, making them feel out of place sometimes. The character animations are also much better now.

The puzzles follow the tradition in the Runway series of doing plenty of pixel-hunting and every so often nodding at their illogicality when characters have to “improvise” their way. For our sanity, the developers finally listened to the criticisms received from the previous games and implemented a clever hint system which gives clues (not full solutions) to the player at any given time, along with the ability to highlight all the hotspots in the scene. This allows for a smoother experience than the previous entries without hindering much of the story’s pace. As result, this becomes the easiest and shortest Runaway to complete, clocking around 6-8 hours at most. The only noticeable annoyance with some of the puzzles is when acquiring items before any real motive, thus making certain actions not sequentially logical. This, sadly, ruins a bit of the immersion that is being built. Other than that, Runaway: A Twist of Fate has probably the best puzzles compared to the other two with less temptations of looking up a walkthrough.

As with the shift in tone, the soundtrack returns to the vibes accustomed from the original game which is a satisfying feeling for anyone who unashamedly enjoyed it, especially for its cheesily sang theme tune with synth-guitars. Talking about the audio, gone are the days when you were hearing someone talk as if they were doing so through a tin can, so it is, again, relatively better in most parts than in the previous games. But the most notable observation is the change in voice actors. For instance, Brian does sound different this time around. So you may like this change or not, but I did not find any problems with the new voice actors as far as I am concerned.

In conclusion, Runaway: A Twist of Fate is easily the best and most polished entry in this series, but sadly not the ultimate Runaway experience in my eyes. The way I personally see it is that it spends too much time doing a retcon of the entire series rather than bringing something new to the table. Many of the new features and improvements implemented in here were already present in other similar games of its genre many years prior this. It might as well have been called Runaway 3: The Apology Letter To Fans instead. The only thing that Runaway: A Twist of Fate did was to catch up with modern standards. By fixing many of the series glaring issues (which is commendable), it lost a bit of its charm that made it stand out to other adventure games from its genre, whether you liked it or not. Just when it finished cutting all its badly grown weeds, it ended. Still, I am recommending this game to anyone who fancies a point ‘n’ click adventure game with a good narrative and doable puzzles as it is easily the most accessible of the three games. Luckily, it does not require to have played the previous two to understand the story and recurring characters as everything is explained in it, but in lesser detail. For a better understanding, do play the previous two even if you have to endure their respective flaws.

I believe Pendulo Studios learnt a lot from this experience and I strongly believe, based on how this game played out, that Runaway 4 would have been that ultimate Runaway experience I am craving for. Retain the design polish of this game, but bring back some of those wacky charms of the original.

Mafia II: The Movie.

The sequel to Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven, Mafia II is a third-person action-adventure game in the veins of GTA with a mafia theme instead and more story-focused set pieces. You take the role of Vito Scaletta, an up-and-coming gangster trying to climb through the ranks of the Mafia crime families.

This is without saying that Mafia II’s strongest aspect is its narrative. Whilst the story does not bring anything vastly new to the table, in terms of Italian gangster flicks, the way it unfolds from start to finish feels like a well written screenplay of a movie. It may not win any Oscars, but it is worthy of a nomination at the Golden Globes. Or maybe it is worth no awards, but a thing is certain, it is (subjectively) damn good. The characters are mature, sometimes even funny, but most importantly believable thanks to the strong dialogues and a sturdy voice acting performance from virtually every actor, making it a fairly immersive experience. It simply nails how a mafia should look, sound and act like.

On a presentation level, Mafia II is exceptional. With some really impressive visuals which even after five years still look great, its setting and atmosphere are incredibly beautiful and authentic, respectively. You feel like you are living in the ‘40s-‘50s America; from the way people behave to chilling to its brilliant soundtrack featuring plenty of classic tunes played on the radio back then. Not only that, but the physics in this game are reasonably realistic and sometimes even enjoyable to watch, whether that is debris falling off the walls from your bullets or the way your enemies ragdoll.

Gameplay-wise, it is self-explanatory as it plays out like any recent GTA game in an open-world with only main differences being the time period and the focus on dealing with the mafia gangs. It does have some really nice little touches such as the police chasing you for actually going over the speed limit. Mafia II, at times, really tries to aim for realism. The handling of the cars in the game is mostly acceptable although the controls for some cars could have been tuned a bit more. Surprisingly, the cover system implemented is fluent and functional as almost every wall or object can be used as a cover and there is not a moment where you feel the mechanic is broken in some form or another. However, the introduction of regenerative health might not please everyone as most of the time, from my experience, it feels like a cheap way to storm your way through gun shootouts. But the gunplay is solid as each shot you fire has certain punch to it.

Sadly, Mafia II has some obvious and rather irritating design flaws which are mainly due to the direction the developers decided to approach. In fact, these flaws did have a detrimental effect on my overall enjoyment of the game. You see, the biggest misstep the game takes is featuring a highly restricted, yet impressively detailed, open-world which most of the times can also feel “empty”. Firstly, there are no side-quests to try out as you are limited to completing each chapter’s story mission (which is only one per chapter). They would have been a nice addition since they could have acted as a way to take a break from the main storyline. Next, there is basically not much else to do around town aside from using the only available shops which are the ones where you can buy cosmetic items such as clothes, acquire weapons and ammo from weapon vendors and garages to repair or mod your cars; and most of the times you do not even need them. Sure, you can go and rob the shops and get chased by the police, but that is as much fun as you can have from the game outside missions. Then you have the handful of scripted sequences where the game takes away your controls in the middle of whatever you are doing and have you waiting for each sequence to finish. In regards to this, there are moments in the story where the player is forced to do the most mundane activities which just are not fun - and off the top of my mind - like spending five minutes driving to a shop to buy new clothes in the middle of the mission only because you are told to do so. The lack of ways to complete the missions is also laughable since it is always a case of going from A to B in corridor-like patterns shooting your enemies or following your radar when driving your vehicle. All in all, Mafia II might be the most linear and restricted open-world game that I personally played to date, which honestly boggles my mind on why the developers even decided to feature an open-world if the game snatches most of your freedom. I do not even know if I should call it open-world as the only thing open about it is being able to drive around the whole map or shooting civilians when you are not in a story mission. Is it schizophrenic? In most aspects yes, as it appears to have an identity crisis on whether it wants to be a game or an interactive movie. Might as well watch the entire playthrough on YouTube since it plays out as a movie really well.

Other issues encountered are relatively minor, but I feel they are worth mentioning. For instance, the police AI can be silly at times as there are many occasions when they pathetically lose your track in their chase by simply increasing your vehicle’s acceleration, thus posing almost no challenge at all. The lower difficulties available are also extremely easy due to the regenerative health and the cover mechanics, making the experience less rewarding since all you have to do is taking cover to avoid any damage whatsoever. On the other hand, playing it on the hardest difficulty can be punishing at times since your health regeneration is slower and about three bullets can kill you. In a very story-driven game, you do not want to die frequently because it simply ruins the pace of the game. But more importantly, you do not want to die in a game featuring a shoddy checkpoint system. Mafia II’s checkpoint system can be poor at times as you can easily die, for whatever reason, closely to your next checkpoint (which you do not even know when and where it is) and forcing you to start all the way back from the last one saved which can be a bit farther back. Additionally, it would have been ideal if the enemy AI in general was more tactical in a way where they can rotate around their covers and make some sort of push in the battlefield as most of the times they just stand in the same position behind a cover, ultimately making themselves easy targets for the player who can swiftly move around covers. Lastly, the melee combat is pretty pointless. Once you learn the pattern of wait-dodge-punch, you can beat anyone without ever taking a hit.

Conclusively, Mafia II is a great interactive movie (masquerading as a game), but an average open-world game at best. However, its redeeming aspects are its strong narrative, authentic setting and atmosphere and the cast of interesting characters. Although I spent a lot more time discussing the negative aspects of the game that annoyed me, that is not to say I did not enjoy Mafia II for what it has to offer - just not fully. I only wish it were not so restricted in so many of its gameplay aspects. It is not a first person shooter, and even some of those have more freedom than Mafia II has. So it is a no brainer: if you are looking for a purely story-driven experience, Mafia II delivers it. Otherwise, whichever copy of GTA you own should still provide you with plenty of hours of mindless fun. I do give some credit to Mafia II for not being a complete carbon copy of GTA though. Realistically, I would have given this a neutral score, but instead I recommend it mainly because I got it for free, as many others did, so I do not have any of that buyer’s remorse.