Still, players who are worried about the lack of gameplay complexity can rest assured that there are plenty of optional possibilities for interactivity available. Indeed, one of the very things Les Mis is most notable for is the expanded, open-world type of feel it provides by having a great many scenes to explore and a large cast of characters — many of whom are, for all intents and purposes, not essential to the game, existing only to make the cities and towns in the game feel more alive. You can even click on a random townsperson in the crowd and learn what he or she might be thinking at that particular point in time. Furthermore, you can travel to any location at will with the help of a map, allowing plenty of freedom of movement. (You are a spirit, after all.)

The biggest benefit to having such freedom is the ability to see some of the political, social, and economic contexts influencing the events of the story, particularly since digressions on these very topics are so prevalent in Hugo's original novel. Unlike the novel, however, this interactive adaptation allows the player to explore as much or as little backstory as they wish, making for fewer interruptions in terms of the main plot's pacing, and ultimately making the story more accessible to modern audiences. What I personally found rewarding was that after the story ended, I was still free to roam around the world and read the remaining characters' thoughts, which is certainly something you don't usually get to do in adventure games.

The downside to this freedom of exploration is that it can be very easy to get lost and not always know which location you should be visiting next. To combat this problem, there's an adaptive, multi-tiered hint system in place where characters talk amongst themselves to give clues about where you should explore if the game senses you're spending too much time on a particular puzzle. For more direct hints, you also have the option to go back and visit Victor Hugo in heaven, who'll tell you what to do next in a somewhat more explicit manner. Having these hints ensured that I rarely had to close the game window in search of outside help, though I did run into one puzzle near the end in which a hint on where to find Valjean's hidden stash of money confused me with its wording, leading me to spend a long time searching for it in a completely different area than I should have been. What's more unfortunate is that this particular fetch quest came right at a key time in the story, and being stuck in the game lessened the emotional impact by slowing down the pacing of that scene. Thankfully, these situations are infrequent enough that the majority of the game didn't feel as jarring.

Presentation-wise, the game feels like what it is: a one-man show. If your visual expectations of games are of a slicker, more commercial bent, you may find the rough minimalistic artwork not to your taste, particularly since glitches in animations and transparency colors occasionally sneak in. Yet there is much to be liked about the artwork, as it certainly looks different from most other games. In many ways, it gives the feel of being inside a simple picture book, with iconic, boldly-outlined character representations and a muted watercolor style to the backgrounds. Music is used to great effect as well, with an atmospheric soundtrack consisting mainly of classical choral and orchestral pieces. Hence, while there aren't any film-inspired cinematics to convey particularly poignant scenes, the emotion does come across very well using a combination of character animations and appropriate musical cues.

There isn't any voice acting in Les Mis — a wise decision, as there's an incredible amount of text in this game — meaning that the storybook feel of the game is further embellished by demanding a great deal of reading. Fortunately, the reading is made as smooth and painless as possible with the use of large fonts and reasonably short blocks of text on screen at a time. The writing itself, unfortunately, tends to suffer from lack of polish, whether it be typos or spelling inconsistencies (sometimes it's "Jean Valjean", other times it's "John Valjean") or complete stylistic shifts. Some of the text is written in a nineteenth century style — indeed, much is lifted from the novel itself — whereas some of it reads like it came from the present day, with twenty-first century references and colloquialisms. I would have preferred it if Tolworthy picked one style and stuck with it; as it stands, I often felt like the fourth wall was being broken in an otherwise highly engaging story.

Still, despite these criticisms, Les Misérables: The Game of the Book is a faithful adaptation of its source material in spirit, as well as an enjoyable interactive experience in its own right. At approximately ten hours to play through — or more depending on how much exploring you do during or afterwards — it's an excellent way to spend a few evenings if you enjoy a story that's more cerebral and philosophical than your usual game, whether you've read the book before or not. The game is available for digital distribution for $14.99 at the Enter the Story website, though this price also includes the next two games in the series. These subsequent titles are planned to expand Les Mis' pre-existing game world while following the stories of other classic novels, eventually combining to form the aforementioned "world's largest adventure game" exploring life's greatest questions and ideas. Though Tolworthy still has quite a ways to go before he fully realises this goal, he is certainly off to an interesting and innovative start.