Adventure Gamers - Forums

I finished Perfect Tides tonight. What a wonderful game. Heartfelt, poetic, full of nostalgia. It had a cinematic quality to it not often found in games. Thank you to whoever recommended it, this is one I’ll remember for a long time.

Finished RAMA which I started playing 3 weeks ago. In fact it was shorter and easier than I expected - and probably Sierra too, because the last part was artificially extended by a lengthy timed sequence. And it wouldn’t be all that bad if the timer functioned properly. Instead it followed it’s own logic, I barely had time to explore and solve everything, even when I knew what to do! I didn’t need a walkthrough, but I had to replay the last couple of levels a number of times, and when I finally got to the last puzzle, the timer told me I had… an hour and a half left to mess with it. What kind of design is that?

But all in all, Rama is a solid adventure, certainly inspired by Myst, but with a better presentation. First of all, the story is told not via countless notes and books, but through conversations, video messages, encounters with alien creatures, and that’s definitely how I prefer it. I had nightmares about those volumes of unreadable texts from Cyan’s games used for storytelling. I enjoyed most of the actors, and the way they were integrated into the gameworld was near-perfect, especially for 1996. They never felt out of the CGI environment and interacted with it like they naturally would.

Secondly, the gameplay is more varied and rich in activities. Areas are smaller than those in Myst/Riven, but they feel a lot less empty. The small avatar we carry in our pocket based on William Shakespeare’s Puck works as a fully functional substitute for a “look” cursor and sometimes gives hints. We will get another Shakespearean tiny character later in the game, also with a unique ability. There’s inventory of the late-Sierra type (takes almost half of the screen while you can rotate each object in a 3D mode) which, as expected, became so huge by the end that finding a necessary crystal in it felt like a challenge itself. But I still prefer this to no-inventory games, it just feels right.

There are also plenty of challenges, from logic to inventory puzzles to pure pixel hunting. A vast majority of puzzles are dedicated to learning alien cultures, alphabets, math systems, customs which is always fun. There are labyrinth-like corridors connecting some of the areas, but they are easy to navigate. The areas themselves - not so much, as with most other frame-by-frame adventures. I constantly felt lost, spinning around and jumping from one corner of the map to another, trying to figure out the right path.

The story felt a bit confusing since I haven’t read Rama books, but there were many clues left to figure it out, and with Arthur Clark constantly giving directions and lecturing on some important topics it was a pleasure to discover. But I have to admit, the world itself (a huge spaceship turned into a sort of planet inhabited by 3 races) doesn’t draw you in as much as Myst or Riven, it just misses something extra that made those games feel like living, breathing universes, even without much interactivity.

I’d have given the game 4.5 stars if not for the last chapter, now it feels like 4 stars to me. Still great for a Myst-inspired game from Sierra, but I enjoyed Shivers 2 better. And now that I mastered “one of the hardest adventure games” and new numeral systems, I probably should finally play and finish Riven which I failed to do 2 times before…

It’s probably obvious from my post on the eponymous thread, but I just finished Syberia: The World Before.

I thought it was a great game. Although, by giving it 4 out of 5 stars, I didn’t think is was as great as the AG reviewer thought. One puzzle in particular kept it from being 4.5 stars. The mechanics take some getting used to. But they very shortly become second nature.

It’s a game that is definitely worth replaying. Although I will wait for a hoped-for CPT.

Just finished Whispers of a Machine.

Got the following ending: Shot Stina. Destroyed the program. Kept the baby. Ended up in a cemetery talking to dead-forever-Evan.

I have mixed feelings about this game.

What I liked:

- The puzzles were very well done, particularly the integration of your special powers with other elements. I thought that the powers felt like part of my character, not just more inventory items, and they really made my character seem powerful.

- Logic puzzles were smart enough to stump me for a little while, but not smart enough to make me feel dumb.

- The choices seemed meaningful, especially toward the end.

- The art and atmosphere were splendid.

- The voice acting was good.

What I didn’t like:

- Auto-save-only feature makes it unlikely that I’ll replay the game to see alternate endings.

- The voice acting is good, but the script needed some refining. Too often characters say things like ‘I will’ or ‘I am’ or ‘She would’, when any normal person would use a contraction such as ‘I’ll’ or ‘I’m’. This lead to several stilted moments that were drained of some resonance due to robotic line delivery.

- I roll my eyes when most games try to make obvious religious allegories of their stories. ‘Ohhhh, this robot-human hybrid is going to be just like a modern Jesus!’ That story has been told once, and that’s enough.

- Considering the scope of the story, the game is too short. It’s pretty cool that the whole mystery is kept to a local level—a down-home murder story with possible global implications—but I think it would have been more meaningful if it had been fleshed out a little more.

- The special powers were well integrated into the gameplay, but I think they could have been used even more and even better had the game been longer.

- The game wants you to believe that your character is both hardboiled and sensitive. The dichotomy between the hardboiled side and the sensitive side, as well as the rough appearance of the character, were too great. There was a cognitive dissonance between the hard-ass and the soft-ass that I just couldn’t believe in. It did improve toward the end of the game, but in general it was a big pill to swallow.

And that’s about it. Overall, I really enjoyed it. A solid 7+ out of 10.

I have finished all games from Cloak & Dagger, a developer I strongly recommend as one of the best nowadays in my humble opinion. Their games are always well written with logical and fair puzzles. The list of games is:

-The Terrible Old Man: very short adaptation of a short story by H.P. Lovecraft. It really captures Lovecraft’s spirit from the original story.

-A Date in the Park: another very short game, half an hour or so, set in a portuguese park with an ending you will never forget…

-Mudlarks: their first long game, set in London using real pictures as background. A powerful story I couldn’t stop playing. If you forgive the awkward movement of the characters, you will enjoy a very good adventure game.

-Football Game: short game (an hour or so), yet very enjoyable. It seems an simple story of a young football player, but owls are not what they seem…

-Legend of Hand: some kind of RPG-combat-adventure game which I didn’t think I would like at first, but I was very wrong. One of the best games I have played lately, with good sense of humour and very different from what we are used to. A quite long game.

-Sumatra: Fate of Yandi. With a touching and enviromental story, another must-play.

And now I am just waiting for their next game, Incantamentum, a mystery adventure game inspired by folk horror and English folklore. Coming soon!