[Bon]

Originally Posted by cbman

From what I have seen of it The Whispered World is a totally generic example of the genre, averagely executed.

You're horribly wrong about TWW. It's most definitely not a Monkey Island clone. It's pretty original when it comes to video games, tho it reminds me a bit of The Longest Journey only with more humor.

Btw, Monkey Island clones are awsome!

[ozzie]

Does the German version of this game have English subtitles?

No, it doesn't.

And while I have to agree here that the game offers nothing special in terms of gameplay, there's still enough that makes it extraordinary, like the presentation, the graphics, music, the characters, the dialogues, the atmosphere, the mood.

If those things matter most to you, then this is your game. The gameplay is neither very original nor well executed. It has its moments of course, like the sequence where you control Spot or the one where you have to negotiate with the porter to let you to the train. Other puzzles are solid, some need creative thinking to solve, some are badly implemented and some just annoying retreads (the slider puzzle...ugh).

[Bon]

I liked the one with clock a lot. Simple, yet brilliant.

[sopabuena]

I think that the use of Spot as an item, specially when changing it's shape within the same puzzle, is an original gameplay innovation. At least I haven't seen it done in this way in many other games. The art of the game is amazing, but I didn't really like the animated sequences, they didn't have the same feel of the game and I don't like that "photoshop brush" look. I'm not a fan of the self deprecating humor either, and the game is loaded with it, and I really hated when Sadwick whined (perhaps it was the voiceacting). Other than that I truly enjoyed the game and I would recommend it to any adventure fan, and I wasn't expecting a groundbreaking story from a fantasy game (a genre I particually don't care for, it was correct in this case). It's a great a game and I had a lot fun playing it, but perhaps nostalgia has something to do with this.

[ozzie]

Well, lots of people pointed out that Torin's Passage did something similar to Spot before. I never played the game, so I just believe it.
The clock puzzle...true, it was rather good, too. But personally, I thought it was a bit too hard to appear so early in the game. Well, TWW is for hardcore gamers anyway, so you should go with this expectation into the game. But that doesn't make all puzzles good, of course.

[DustyShinigami]

Originally Posted by ozzie

No, it doesn't.

And while I have to agree here that the game offers nothing special in terms of gameplay, there's still enough that makes it extraordinary, like the presentation, the graphics, music, the characters, the dialogues, the atmosphere, the mood.

If those things matter most to you, then this is your game. The gameplay is neither very original nor well executed. It has its moments of course, like the sequence where you control Spot or the one where you have to negotiate with the porter to let you to the train. Other puzzles are solid, some need creative thinking to solve, some are badly implemented and some just annoying retreads (the slider puzzle...ugh).

Okay, thanks.

[mataku]

Spoiler:

I think they could have made the ending a little more "foreseen" if the narrator was all over the game and not just in the cutscenes, and he would tell everything in the form of a story. for example, if Sadwick try something he's go "Sadwick tried to use X with Y, but it failed", and so on... quite frankly i miss narrators in adventure games, where have they gone to?

[Bon]

That would be dull. It would lead to repetition.

[ozzie]

Well, narrators came from the text adventures and the graphic adventures of Sierra also included them, since they basically inherited many conventions of interactive fiction.
LucasArts on the contrary used the protagonists to describe to you what you see and what's happening.
Weirdly, narrators did disappear from Sierra adventures after Grabiel Knight 1. I think with King's Quest 7 characters started commenting on everything. I have no idea why this decision was made.

But anyway, if you let the characters comment on every action then you can form a closer bond between the player and the avatar. On the other hand, it seems then like the avatar talks constantly to himself, which may result in weird situations if other characters are around, especially in serious games.

[Bon]

Well, they're talking to themselves in their head. Mouth opening is imaginary.

[mataku]

seems like the lucasarts way of doing things really won in all aspects. most (if not all) adventure games nowadays have:
no narrators, characters talking to themselves.
hotspots instead of full interactive environment
conversation trees (most Sierra games didn't have those, the closest was "subject lists" seen in GK1 and LSL7, i think)

[J.H]

Originally Posted by ozzie

Well, narrators came from the text adventures and the graphic adventures of Sierra also included them, since they basically inherited many conventions of interactive fiction.
LucasArts on the contrary used the protagonists to describe to you what you see and what's happening.
Weirdly, narrators did disappear from Sierra adventures after Grabiel Knight 1. I think with King's Quest 7 characters started commenting on everything. I have no idea why this decision was made.

But anyway, if you let the characters comment on every action then you can form a closer bond between the player and the avatar. On the other hand, it seems then like the avatar talks constantly to himself, which may result in weird situations if other characters are around, especially in serious games.

I think the best way to do it in serious games would be to use the style in Broken Sword, how George is speaking in past tense in the background. Or how they did it in Indigo Prophecy, speaking in real time but in their thoughts.

[J.H]

Finally! I have my copy and I must say I'm loving it so far. It's the first adventure game I've played for a while that has me wanting to come back for more every time I'm at the PC.

[Igor]

I just finished the game (been playing it on and off for more than a month) and.. wow! What a beautiful ride.
Brilliant imaginative world and characters, great dialogs.. and even the story (that I found a bit cliche at first) got completely new dimension and depth with its ending.

[sierramindy]

That ending was something else, like I still see it in my head even though it has been over a month since I finished the game! The way Sadwick looked at the very end sort of haunts me. At the time it even made me try for a second ending, but...if you have been there you know how that worked out.

[MalcolmMac]

Originally Posted by Igor

I just finished the game (been playing it on and off for more than a month) and.. wow! What a beautiful ride.
Brilliant imaginative world and characters, great dialogs.. and even the story (that I found a bit cliche at first) got completely new dimension and depth with its ending.

I agree with everything you said, I even liked the voice acting.

You didn't mention the puzzles though, and when I factor those in, Whispered World is really, really bad. Most of the the puzzles were pretty easy, but the difficult ones were often illogical. I rarely resort to a walkthrough, but I did for some of the tougher puzzles in Whispered World. Very often I couldn't understand the logic of the puzzle even after I knew the solution.

Despite really enjoying the story (I'm about half way through I think), I'm not sure if I'll slog through to the end.

[Jelena]

I just started chapter three and have a question from chapter two:

Spoiler:

What about the horn in the first hut of the village? I couldn't make Sadwick use it before the chapter ended. Did I miss anything?

And just wanted to say that I'm so very much enjoying this game. I don't get to play for long hours, so I move quite slowly forward. It took me three days to solve Muluchai's (how was that spelled now again? ) puzzle. But I thoroughly enjoyed it. The puzzles overall suit me very well, illogical or not. So far I've only had to resort to a w/t once.

Speaking of illogical puzzles:

Spoiler:

I can't believe I actually put Spot in that pearl-mould. I was trying everything on everything when I realized that actually worked. At first I thought I had killed him.

[Bon]

Spoiler:

Yeah, that's pretty bad. There's no indication (as far as I remember) that being violent to Spot will make him change his form.

Overall, the puzzles, tho well imagined, are kind of ruined, which is a shame since mostly all they need is a bit more feedback.

[thinker]

I loved that I found an adventure that didn't immediately took me to a walkthrough but this was impossible! I was checking it every night for 3 days and nothing and then what?

Spoiler:

USE FAT-FORM OF PET ON A STONE CONTAINER? [that any sane person would never think an INSECT would have the capacity to break it merely by standing on it] WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAA??????????????

That must have been the most irrational thing I've seen for a long time. It wasn't only that it was irrational, it's that the rest of the game wasn't that irrational

Anyway, beautiful game.

[Sughly]

Originally Posted by thinker

I loved that I found an adventure that didn't immediately took me to a walkthrough but this was impossible! I was checking it every night for 3 days and nothing and then what?

Spoiler:

USE FAT-FORM OF PET ON A STONE CONTAINER? [that any sane person would never think an INSECT would have the capacity to break it merely by standing on it] WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAA??????????????

That must have been the most irrational thing I've seen for a long time. It wasn't only that it was irrational, it's that the rest of the game wasn't that irrational

Anyway, beautiful game.

Yeah that solution had me stumped for quite some time. Ended up getting that one from the famed try-all-inventory-on-everything-you-see technique .