Reader reviews for Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon page 3

I actually just recently replayed this title to freshen up my memory before the release of BS5.

Many people talk about BS3 lost track of it’s roots with this title. However, I must say that this game is still definelty top notch in Adventure Games standards and perspective. If you compare this game to other games in the genre, it still holds up extremely well.

I have said this before about Broken Sword 1, but even in this episode, the story is top notch. It can easily rival famous conspiracy/adventure/thriller authors like Dan Brown, Clive Cussler, and Steve Berry.

However there are some issues with this game that stops it from being a master piece. First of all the game engine that is fully in 3D. I am actually not that disturbed by the graphics and the game engine being in 3D, it is more about the controls. If this game would have been controlled by mouse with an easy point and click interface, instead of being controlled by a keyboard or a joystick, things would have been much better. The control scheme just makes navigating extremely difficult and it feels very unnatural.

Second of all there are some story elements that get a little bit too supernatural (one really over the top ending scene amongst others) that does not really fit into the Broken Sword universe, but it i definitely not a big deal breaker.

Third, there are a little bit too many “pushing objects/boxes” puzzles. A few of them would have been OK, but not this many.

Overall great game with solid story, interesting characters, beautiful music, fun puzzles, that we have come to expect from the Broken Sword series.

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Time Played: 10-20 hours
Difficulty: Just Right

Some people may hate the switch from 2D to 3D, but you have to think realistically. At this point, adventure games were on life support. Do you really think they would try to sell a 2D cartoony point and click game to an audience with no patience for that type of thing. I’m just grateful this game got made. Controlling with my keyboard was not as easy as controlling with my mouse, but the puzzles and the story made me forget all about it. I don’t know why people complain about the graphics. They’re beautiful! If anything, it looks just as much like a cartoon as the first two, but this time, they took their cues from Pixar instead of Disney.

The block puzzles did seem like a cop out to replace inventory puzzles, but I didn’t hate them, and sometimes they were kind of fun.

The ending is slightly less abrupt than the one in BSII, but I guess I’ll have to play the next game in order for the story to continue. It was less than fitting, but more than unsatisfying.

The story is amazing. It feels like a movie, only way better than most movies.

If you loved the first two and aren’t against controlling a game with something other than a mouse, you’ll love this game.

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Time Played: 10-20 hours

This Broken Sword series seems to just keep getting better. I much prefer hand-painted 2D background art, so i was feeling a bit nervous about the series switching to full 3D environments with this game. but lately I have played a few 3D adventures and found that they’ve been OK. And this is probably the finest of them so far. It certainly didn’t detract from the Broken Sword experience.

At times it felt a bit like Tomb Raider with the crate puzzles and jumping ledges and shimmying against walls. This represents somewhat of a departure from traditional adventure gaming and personally i would’ve preferred a few less crate puzzles, but it didn’t really hinder my enjoyment any. Sneaking past guards got a little tiresome tho.

The humorous character dialogue was in top form. Even better than the previous two games! Because George and Nico were together more often this time, it provided more opportunities for them to trade witty banter

The story was strong and epic. like it’s predecessors, you could argue that it borrows too closely from indiana jones. in fact this time around i found some of the ideas and scenarios even more similar. usually i detest this kind of “copying”, but for some reason it doesn’t bother me with the broken sword games. perhaps it’s just that it’s been implemented so well or that it’s different enough in it’s own right or maybe just that such elements have become such a staple of the adventure genre that it doesn’t matter so much even if it is a little clichéd.

one thing the broken sword makers do really well, is find just the right balance of puzzle difficulty. you still feel challenged but you never get stuck or bogged down.

next it’s on to Broken Sword 4…

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Time Played: 10-20 hours