Adventure on the Orient Express, a review of The Last Express
 

Adventure on the Orient Express, a review of The Last Express by Ragnar Ouchterlony

Introduction

In 1883 the luxury train Express d'Orient or Orient Express as it became later on started to go between Paris and Vienna and later between Paris and Istanbul. This train is perhaps one of the most legendary trains travelling across the world. It's purpose was to give a luxurious and comfortable way to travel for rich people. Maybe the biggest reason for its legend is that Agatha Christie once wrote a story about it called 'Murder on the Orient Express'. Many times the nobility rode with the train by simply attaching their own wagons to it. It is on this train The Last Express takes place.

The year is 1914 and the date is July 24. Europe is well on it's way to the first World War and nationalists are everywhere. You, playing as Robert Cath, a young American doctor sought after in a murder investigation, receive a note from your long time friend Tyler Whitney urging you to join him on the Orient Express. Within minutes from stepping on the train you notice that everything isn't what it should be and you are drawn into an intriguing story of love, murder and much more, ending three days later in Istanbul.

Game play

The Last Express is different from most games in that is taking place in real time, that is even if you don't do anything, the train will go forward and things will happen around you. This also means that all characters have their own agenda, they go to lunch, talk to each other rather independently of you. Due to these features of the game, you will probably not always hear the same conversations, meet the same persons etc. every time you play, so you will have a slightly different game each time you play.

Some might be disappointed in that there aren't very many difficult puzzles in the game, instead most puzzles are based on that you listen to other people talking or getting information in person from other people. Many puzzles are also just that you find the right thing or go to the right place at the same time. There are also some more unconventional puzzles such as locating something through sound.

When you first play this game it is easy to feel that you take too long time doing things and generally miss out important conversations. This is however not very important due to the excellent saving system of the game. You can always back to any previous point in the game, so it is very easy to back some time and redo and try something different from the last time you tried. You won't need to be bothered by remembering to save all the time which is very good.

Now to something that might put off many hardcore adventure gamers. There are several fights in the game that you can't avoid. The fighting isn't very hard though, and with the save system I described above it is very easy to just try again if you lose, so they shouldn't pose too much trouble.

The graphics is an interesting and very well made mixture of real photographs and filmed sequences combined with hand drawn sequences and most of the time you see everything through Robert Cath's eyes, i.e. in first person view. The animations are not continuous, but rather more with a feeling of one picture at a time. This is done without taking away the flow of the game. The train environment feels authentic with the Orient Express and the surroundings feel like it is really is 1914.

Not many games has this much and well made music in them. For example, you can listen to almost 20 minutes of César Francks Violin Sonata, well played by Josef Suk. The background music is also well made and conforms very well to the mood of The Last Express.

Conclusions

The Last Express has a very strong story and it is a pleasure to follow it to the end (actually, you can end the game in many ways, but there are just one ending that can be counted as completing the game) with nice graphics to rest your eyes on and inspiring music to lend your ears to. The real time approach also means that you can experience the game in a multitude of ways, so you can have a slightly different view of it each time you play. You can however feel frustrated if you can't find out what to do and need to replay a sequence again and again.

The fact that this game doesn't do everything in the traditional way of adventure games shouldn't hold you off from playing it. The story and the way it is presented is a fresh variation that will make you think, both on the story, the history in the period around the first World War and the interesting way the story is put forward.

If you haven't played The Last Express you should try hard in getting a copy and play, because the game is worth it, even if you have to accept some fighting and time related puzzles.

Ratings

Story: 9 / 10
Puzzles: 6 / 10
(Voice) acting: 7 / 10
Graphics: 8 / 10
Sound and Music: 9 / 10
Originality: 9 / 10
Overall: 9 / 10

That's a great review. The Last Express is one of my favorite games, and I do recommend that everyone who plays it should lose on purpose by listening to Franck's Violin Sonata in A in its gorgeous entirety. The second time I played through the game I wondered what would happen if I didn't try to find the gold-filled briefcase and just sat and listened. I was pleasantly surprised. That's the real beauty of the game: "What if...?" What if I listen to this conversation, what if I decide to ignore the meeting, what if I don't spy on the Russian anarchist. There's an answer to every possible "What if?" and that is the reason I have replayed the game over 15 times.

nice one...and good grades

personally i would put far better the voice acting...let's not forget the many languages and the fact that others and not the actors gave the voices :D and all was great...

This game is superb for me, only something flaws and nothing else. It is my third best adventure(game?) after all ;)

It is truly the best adventure game ever for me. Jordan Mechner should make another AG.

Too bad it didn't sell well, actually it sell badly :\

I'm convinced that if they would rerelease it it would sell bucketloads of copies. It truly desrves that!

In the current "cash cow" atmosphere, it might be a sleeper hit if ported to PS2 or GC, but I doubt anything more than that.

Nice review, Ragnar. I read it a few weeks ago and it motivated me to finally get around to playing the game (it's been sitting unplayed in my game library for years). And I'm so glad I've played it now - it was an absolutely beautiful and unique experience. The real time system was a little unnerving at first (I kept feeling like I was missing out on crucial elements of the story) but once I got used to it, it seemed so natural (and perfectly suited to the atmosphere).

Like yourself and sillycanadian, I found Franck's violin sonata a welcome distraction and I've rewound to that point several times just to sit and listen to it.

One of the best, and most immersive, adventure games I've ever played. My only complaint is that it seemed to be over so soon (but that might have been because I couldn't stop playing once I'd started). Still, there's so much replayability, that I'll be keeping this one close at hand for a long time to come.

I feel like I owe you one - it'd probably be sitting on my shelf gathering dust if I hadn't read this :crazy:

Heh, I didn't finish that soon, because i kept trying out different ways of getting wrong endings. :)

i've been wanting to play this game for years, they dont sell it anymore;(
sometime i can find it on ebay but i'm not a big ebay shoper

Its my second favorite adventure game, after the Secret of Monkey Island...and I was able to get it from my local library believe or not. I just coppied all the disks (3) and voila I have the game! I did the same with the Neverhood.

http://www.cdaccess.com/html/shared/lastexp.htm

$20, new retail box.

Nice review. Definitely one of the best games ever. But I'm with pleto in thinking that the voice acting should've received far better a score. In fact, I'd give it a 10 straightaway. It's hands down the best voice acting I've ever heard.

All the other scores are right on track, though (no pun intended).