Adventure Gamers - Forums

Hello my dear fellow adventurers, and I wish you a very happy New Year!

Beyond the Edge of Owlsgard will be the first game I will play in 2023, and I will share my thoughts, impressions or just random tidbits here in this thread, as I run along the game. Please feel free to join me, if not to play the game, then to chit chat or just post some random staff, so I know you’re here.

Now, because I’m too lazy to write an introduction of my own, let me just copy/paste the text from the official steam page of the game:

Strange things are happening in the animal kingdom of Velehill. Unknown shadows of large appearance are seen roaming through the forests and making the ground shake with every step of their steel feet. Houses and trees are destroyed and one animal after the other seems to disappear mysteriously.

Finn, a young roebuck, soon finds out about the disappearance of his family as well. Without hesitation, he goes on a journey to find them, not knowing he and his new friend Gwen the owl will soon uncover a dark secret that should have been kept hidden for all eternity…

Senior adventurers will immediately spot resemblance to the game Inherit the Earth, where anthropomorphized animals are also the protagonists. Now, right at the beginning the game offers two modes:

I will go with Classic mode, thank you very much!

After the long and nicely done introduction video, you’re put into the shoe of roebuck (I just learned it’s a word for a male roe deer), who comes back to his village only to learn that his family is missing and there’re some strange footprints scattered along the forest. That’s where the

begins.

Happy New Year, everybody!

Great to see you do a Let’s Play again, Diego. The game looks very good and I’d like to join you, not entirely sure yet, because I’m joining the CPT and I also want to finish The House of Da Vinci 3.

EDIT: Oh what the heck. I’ve bought the game. 

You lead the way, Diego. I’m right behind you. 

LOOOL! Happy to see you joining along, Karlok! I hope this thread won’t harm the official playthrough, here you can play at your own leisure and post random thoughts.

So far, I really like the voice-acting, and while I’m not always crazy about the retro-pixel graphic style, this one looks quite good!

chrissie - 01 January 2023 12:21 PM

Unfortunately I’ve just bought two games & can’t stretch to buying anymore this month. The game looks interesting though & I’ll certainly follow your Let’s Play diego. 

That’s cool! The game is interesting, indeed!

I played a little bit more today and I’m really surprised at “over the average” production values for an obvious indie game - I already mentioned cool voice overs and graphics, but there’re also small animation here and there that make backgrounds come to life. The plot also gets more interesting, as the whole village believe it’s the wolves that are responsible for kidnapping.

This is an overhead map, similar to that in Monkey Island games. New locations are added in the map as you progress.

You can see the example I was telling, with the animation of background characters, like the giraffe? in this scene. The dog on the right is smartly named - Doggomir.

Yes, you can die in this game. The game is a mixture of early Lucas Arts ScummVM interface, and Sierra-like timed-puzzles and deaths.

The map screen also has a great Kyrandia vibe. And Sierra-like death screens are a nice surprise! Something you don’t expect from a game with a walking/talking hipster deer… Please, go on

I also got killed unexpectedly by what looked like a wolf. I managed to get past that death scene, fat lot of good it did me.

Once you open the door to the forbidden forest of the wolves it can’t be closed again. That’s weird when everybody keeps telling you everything possible has been done to keep this area closed off. I have my suspicions about those wolves, they might be just scapegoats.

I like the game, it’s fun and intriguing. Lovely graphics and lots of animations. The dialogues are a bit too long for my taste. 

I am on Classic Mode and get no death warnings. Which is fine by me. I haven’t come across any timed puzzles yet, I hope they’re not too hard. Yes, the little jingle when you’ve solved something is a nice reward.

Doom - 02 January 2023 02:52 PM

The map screen also has a great Kyrandia vibe. And Sierra-like death screens are a nice surprise! Something you don’t expect from a game with a walking/talking hipster deer… Please, go on

Spot on with Kyrandia - not only the map, but the atmosphere in general, too.

Karlok - 02 January 2023 04:17 PM

I also got killed unexpectedly by what looked like a wolf. I managed to get past that death scene, fat lot of good it did me.

Me too. And I solved it purely by accident (I took wolf costume instead of frog, and… what was that last one, tomato?), and clicked on it in desperation at that screen. The moment I did, I knew it’s the solution.

Karlok - 02 January 2023 04:17 PM

Once you open the door to the forbidden forest of the wolves it can’t be closed again. That’s weird when everybody keeps telling you everything possible has been done to keep this area closed off. I have my suspicions about those wolves, they might be just scapegoats.

Yes, something’s fishy about those wolves. Regarding the door, it’s a missed opportunity to close the door and grab a new inventory item hanged on a door or a key… a staple of LucasArts puzzles.

Karlok - 03 January 2023 05:46 AM

I am on Classic Mode and get no death warnings.

I’m also on classic mode - there’s a floppy drive animation showing up for a few seconds when you’re in the danger of dying like in the Wolf territory.

TheLongestJourney - 02 January 2023 05:57 PM

The LucasArts nine verb interface though is nice for nostalgic reasons

Yes, but I kinda like it for gameplay reasons, as well - it’s a welcome change to the smart cursor which is in majority of these kind of games.

diego - 03 January 2023 06:09 AM

Yes, something’s fishy about those wolves. Regarding the door, it’s a missed opportunity to close the door and grab a new inventory item hanged on a door or a key… a staple of LucasArts puzzles.

For me it will always be a staple of Riven. The devs made it so easy for the player to miss an entire area by not closing an inconspicious door. And they did it twice.

I’m also on classic mode - there’s a floppy drive animation showing up for a few seconds when you’re in the danger of dying like in the Wolf territory.

Aha, I hadn’t noticed that.

I’ve finished The House of Da Vinci 3 and apparently the CPT is on hold, so I’m going to concentrate on Owlsguard.

Damn, this game is not easy! A lot of locations already in the 1st Chapter, and even though you have little (around 5-6) inventory items, there’s plenty of ground to cover (reminds me a bit of how the story evolves in first Monkey Island), and ScummVM interface makes for a tougher challenge. But I like it so far, there’s a good dosage of humor inserted here and there, and main character is nailing it with the voice acting.

The only gripe I have so far is that the notebook seems to update itself rarely in terms of hints or goals, as it still stays on the general “Find my family” entry from the very beginning.

Loved the puzzle here! Reminds me a bit of goat puzzle in Broken Sword, where you need to think a little bit outside of the box.

And yes, I’ve met that metal thing. This is not what a wolf looks like.