[Funktion]

Dead Mountaineer's Hotel and A Stroke of Fate: Operation Valkyrie, two games announced several years ago that seemingly dropped from the face of the earth (well, Dead Mountaineer's Hotel had a small European release, but the publisher went bankrupt, so it's very hard to find) have just been released on Steam.

Frankly, I had given up hope of ever playing them.
These releases came out of the blue.

I was looking forward to play both, so this was a nice surprise indeed.

For those not familiar with the games, here's their official websites:

http://hotel.akella.com/

http://astrokeoffate.akella.com/

[donatelli]

Dead Mountaineer's Hotel, and another adventure game Stroke of Fate: Operation Valkyrie are both on Steam as of today. Dead Mountaineer's Hotel interests me when I first read about it here, but then I totally forgot about it. Did it even see an English release? The other game seems interesting too, but the theme (WWII) isn't quite my thing, but I bought both to support more [obscure] Adventure games on Steam!

Anyone have experience with these games?

[olomaster]

Yes, I just noticed that myself and wanted to tell everybody, but You were faster

[Stuart]

I'm confused, Steam lists their release dates as 2009... are they new releases or not because I've never heard of them but both look interesting. (Edit: Just saw the explanation about their delayed releases)

When I saw the Operation Valkyrie game I immediately thought it was the desperately boring Undercover: Operation Wintersun (one of the few adventure games I haven't been able to bring myself to finish) but its a different game also set in WW2.

Any reviews/thoughts/anything about these two games?

[olomaster]

Originally Posted by Stuart

I'm confused, Steam lists their release dates as 2009... are they new releases or not because I've never heard of them but both look interesting.

A Stroke of fate was originally released in Russia on february 2009. But it was released in english just yesterday.
Well I've been waiting for this game for 3 years so I'll definetely buy it. I think it's much better than Operation wintersun- which was admittedly a terrible game.

[donatelli]

I posted a thread too, haha. So it sounds like the games were interesting to other folks? that's good. I blind-purchased them, bout Dead Mountaineers seems right up my alley at this point.

[diego]

Based on non-english reviews, i'd say A Stroke of Fate is more polished. Here's french review of Dead Mountaineer's Hotel, and here's AG preview of A Stroke of Fate

Funny enough, A Stroke of Fate already has a sequel.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by diego

Based on non-english reviews, i'd say A Stroke of Fate is more polished. Here's french review of Dead Mountaineer's Hotel, and here's AG preview of A Stroke of Fate

Funny enough, A Stroke of Fate already has a sequel.

Wow, the reviews are really negative at that French site. The reviewer gives it 9/20 and the user reviews give it: 6/20, 5/20, 5/20, 2/20, 5/20, 10/20, 1/20, 5/20... not one review over 10/20 or 50%.

[Arial Type]

Originally Posted by diego

Based on non-english reviews, i'd say A Stroke of Fate is more polished. Here's french review of Dead Mountaineer's Hotel, and here's AG preview of A Stroke of Fate

Funny enough, A Stroke of Fate already has a sequel.

And I can verify it. Dead Mountaineer's Hotel was really bad. Very linear (despite being promoted as non-linear), very short and just poorly made.
A Stroke of Fate was a nice classical adventure game about WW2. The sequel wasn't really a sequel - more like a second part.

[donatelli]

Well, I'm trying to play Dead Mountaineer's...either I'm missing something or the game is hugely bugged - there's no mouse cursor - which means I can't move around, or access the menu.

Guess I should have passed on this one...

I'm looking forward to Stroke of Fate though.

[Funktion]

Originally Posted by Stuart

Wow, the reviews are really negative at that French site. The reviewer gives it 9/20 and the user reviews give it: 6/20, 5/20, 5/20, 2/20, 5/20, 10/20, 1/20, 5/20... not one review over 10/20 or 50%.

The usual, when it comes to Eastern Europe games. The huge majority scores terribly in reviews, mostly due to lack of polish.

But while they usually lack in polish, they usually end up being extremely inventive (or totally crazy ), and fun to play, that's why I'm a big fan of the games from that region.

[TopCat]

It's really great that games like SoF and DMH get released on Steam. No offence to The Adventure Shop but there's no better place for exposure of a PC game than Steam. If the dev is smart and works out a way to get some sort of a discount/promotion with Valve people will buy it. Steam users LOVE good, low - priced games. I think that Steam could be the key to the revival of AG...

Just my 2 cents!

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by TopCat

It's really great that games like SoF and DMH get released on Steam. No offence to The Adventure Shop but there's no better place for exposure of a PC game than Steam. If the dev is smart and works out a way to get some sort of a discount/promotion with Valve people will buy it. Steam users LOVE good, low - priced games. I think that Steam could be the key to the revival of AG...

Just my 2 cents!

I 100% agree and games like Gray Matter and Book of Unwritten Tales, the sort of AGs that grab attention immediately by their cool cover, concept, and graphics, need to be on there to promote not only the games themselves (which would sell a lot on Steam especially when on sale) but also the AG genre as a whole. At least 90% of serious PC gamers must be using Steam now. Whispered World was on the Top Sellers list during a recent-ish daily deal for it.

[MoonBird]

Best news for..um... say... in 2 or 3 years!? I love hotels and mysteries. DMH is awesome, although the voice-acting is mediocre, but that doesn't matter. It's certainly much, much better than nothing!

[Phaid]

Originally Posted by TopCat

It's really great that games like SoF and DMH get released on Steam. No offence to The Adventure Shop but there's no better place for exposure of a PC game than Steam. If the dev is smart and works out a way to get some sort of a discount/promotion with Valve people will buy it. Steam users LOVE good, low - priced games. I think that Steam could be the key to the revival of AG...

Just my 2 cents!

I'm perfectly fine with games being released on Steam, but I'd much rather buy games from gamersgate or Adventure Shop so I can get third party storefront client-free versions. I hate it when I have to run a client like Steam in the background - it's just intrusive and reeks of obligatory spyware to me, which is why I'm not happy that so many games these days downright force Steam down customers' throats, even when you get the boxed versions. It's just me though, I know some people don't mind it.

What are the chances of Stroke of Fate becoming available via other digital distribution channels? The Adventure Shop would be nice, as well as a review!

[TopCat]

Originally Posted by Phaid

I'm perfectly fine with games being released on Steam, but I'd much rather buy games from gamersgate or Adventure Shop so I can get third party storefront client-free versions. I hate it when I have to run a client like Steam in the background - it's just intrusive and reeks of obligatory spyware to me, which is why I'm not happy that so many games these days downright force Steam down customers' throats, even when you get the boxed versions. It's just me though, I know some people don't mind it.

What are the chances of Stroke of Fate becoming available via other digital distribution channels? The Adventure Shop would be nice, as well as a review!

Boxed games that force you to use Steam use Valve's Steamworks i.e those games usually have achievements, online stats, cross - platform play, steam cloud, etc. No developer would want to make 2 versions of their game just because some people wouldn't want to use Steam.

I would much rather buy AG on Steam where I could actually recommend the games to other players easily than The Adventure Shop. I wasn't a Steam supporter before, but now 90% of my games are on Steam. I am not against AG being available EVERYWHERE possible, but the truth is that Steam offers great exposure due to its HUGE user base whereas The Adventure Shop is only known among us, AG players.

[plumgas]

Originally Posted by donatelli

Well, I'm trying to play Dead Mountaineer's...either I'm missing something or the game is hugely bugged - there's no mouse cursor - which means I can't move around, or access the menu.

Guess I should have passed on this one...

I'm looking forward to Stroke of Fate though.

the missing cursor problem is fixed by installing divx codes, this was found on a french forum. I thinki it was vista & win 7 related as soon as I installed xp I had the cursor. Just install divx 6, once I installed it on win 7 64 it worked

[donatelli]

Originally Posted by plumgas

the missing cursor problem is fixed by installing divx codes, this was found on a french forum. I thinki it was vista & win 7 related as soon as I installed xp I had the cursor. Just install divx 6, once I installed it on win 7 64 it worked

Yes I was just about to update, I found that (thankfully) and it has worked! Now I am just wishing I could run the game in Windowed mode. There's a config option for it, and in the Manual it shows an option in the actual menu to activate Window mode but it's not working.

Thanks though!