Adventure Gamers - Forums

Hi everyone ! I could finally find a bit of free time to try a new indie adventure game lately. It doesn’t seem to be very famous here, but the italian author has done a big effort to translate it into english.

Download : http://www.freankexpo.net/500/donald-dowell-eng

The name is Donald Dowell and the Ghost of Barker Manor, by ApeMarina. When I started the game, I quickly realized that it was promising. The retro graphics took me back to the good old pixel era, with a very nice feeling. I liked the world of the game and the detailed graphics, with nice backgrounds.

But the best, according to me, is the quality of the texts. I don’t know for an english born player if it sounds as great as it sounds for me, but the dialogues are really funny. I found here what I liked in old LucasArts classic games : comical replicas, choice of answers, weird situations, and stupid characters.

The story is simple but the way it’s turned makes it immersive :
the 80 years old Donald is bored in his retirement. Days are passing slowly and he doesn’t seem to stand his wife anymore. That’s why he takes the decision to go look for a job. He visits his little town in search for a new situation, but nobody seems ready to hire the old foggey. That’s when he discovers an anouncement to become a Ghostbuster. He suddenly realises that’s what he always wanted to do, and the game really starts here : Donald has to convince the guy to hire him !

Recruiter : you’re not qualified for this job ! You don’t know anything in monsters.
Donald : oh ? Really ? You don’t know my wife ! Look, I have 2 photos of her, when she was young and now. See ?

If you’re not convinced to give it a try, I have to add that this game is… free !

I did not go very far in the story (lack of time), but I hope some of you will give their opinion here and help share this interesting game.

Recently, I have been playing freeware game Donald Dowell and the gost of barker manor
http://apemarina.altervista.org/donald-dowell.html

I believe it did get some coverage by adventuregamers in the freeware section, but I only started to play it after a mention on RPS.
Anyway, I am quite impressed by the quality of this game! It looks great, is huge and can be funny. Also references to the golden adventuregames of the 90ies are not forgotton.
My only complaint is that lots of puzzles require random solutions, very frustrating and forcing you to use a walkthrough. I wonder what an editor/producer could have improved…
Does anyone else have some thoughts abot this game?

jaap - 05 October 2014 02:09 PM

I believe it did get some coverage by adventuregamers in the freeware section

Yep, in the November/December 2013 Following Freeware article.

Does anyone else have some thoughts abot this game?

You obviously missed this thread. No worries, I’ll merge.

Other people who talked about the game:

Greg, in the Freeware Game Recommendations thread
Intense Degree, in his own AGS gaming journal