Reader reviews for Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars - The Director’s Cut

The differences and good and bad :

+ A few scenes and puzzles added with Nico, which adds nicely to the game
and develop a side of the story that was just vaguely spoken about in the
original.

+ Characters still move slowly, but when quitting a screen you don’t have to
wait for them to reach the border anymore, it’s almost instantaneous.

- A lot of red herrings have been removed, meaning a lot of useless objects
you could (try to ) interact with, meaning a lot of text, ambiance and also
jokes, are gone.

- All puzzles based on timing have been changed not to rely on timing
anymore. There were not a lot of them and they weren’t that hard, no
dexterity required. Which simplifies a lot these puzzles, to the point where
they’re not puzzles anymore or there is no point in making a puzzle there.
(The goat, the towel,...)

- There were very few places where you could die, now you can’t. Adding to
the things you don’t have to figure out anymore. Although it wouldn’t take a
lot of retry to get those right and it added tension and involvement.

- The simple inventory system, mouse up to reveal the inventory, click on
object, then on another one or somewhere on the screen, has been replaced.
Now you have to click on the inventory icon to open a window, then drag an
drop the inventory item. What does drag and drop adds here? And the most
annoying is that the inventory window covers a part of the screen, so often
it covers your target too, and you have to drag the item out of the window
so that it closes, and then back to the target. Change for change, Added
nuisance.

- In the original you could have as many saves as you wanted. Now it’s too
limited, you’ll end up erasing the old ones. Why go backwards?

- Appart from the new Nico’s parts, some puzzles have been slightly altered
towards easiness, a few very much simplified to a ridiculous point, and a
very few have been “enhanced” but without really bringing more challenge or
interest. Simple pattern-matching or painstakingly copying what’s in the log
book doesn’t enhance anything. (Chess, Tomb,...)

All in all, I think they should have added the + up here and let everything
else as it was. the rest seems like amputation, change for change or poor
compensations for these amputations.
It’s still a good game but only because the original was great. This one
thinks people are dumber, so much dumber that you get a hint system on top
of all the simplification.

I’ll never repeat it enough :

Play the original first.