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| Hotel manager Alfonso is exactly how he looks, a 'difficult' individual. Incidentally, conversations are performed with the little icons at the bottom of the screen | Before long George has the inventory capacity of a large backpack stuffed into his trouser pockets |
The game boasts the best graphics of the series (Not that it'll be bringing FPS fans to their knees or anything) and throws in platform jumping/climbing and computer hacking related puzzles to enhance game play. The game, of course, consists mainly of the standard features of point-and-click adventure – classic 'use key with door' gaming, lateral thinking, comedy, an unrealistically massive character inventory, and the kind of frustrating puzzle you get stuck on for hours before attempting to use everything with everything else in a random desperate attempt to progress to the next infuriating puzzle.
Any true gaming connoisseur will be *no* stranger to the BS point-and-click series; which leaves me rather embarrassed to say that *I* am. Through the decades of Monkey Island, Loom, the Discworld Games, and so on; I neglected the French gem which is so often talked of fondly. Since the last decent point-and-click I played was Grim Fandango several years ago, my thirst for adventure and long overdue need to investigate this series meant I leapt all over the chance to review the latest instalment.
You play the game as recurring hero George Stobbart, an American x-treasure hunter who has recently set up a small law firm. Despite George's obvious desire to take a rest from the wall-punching frustration of point-and-click adventure games, he is soon drawn into the hunt for a powerful religious treasure by a mysterious young woman. Before long George finds himself in the middle of a complex race against time involving all manner of shady characters.
There are three key elements to a classic adventure game; story, humour, and atmosphere. There can be no doubt that the game has great humour and immersive gameplay. The quality of the storyline, however, fluctuates wildly - being frequently brilliant but occasionally atrocious. While the general quality of the story is top-notch, every now and then either a massive loop-hole seems to creep in or a complete section of plot seems missing or unexplained. The worst example of this may well be the very ending of the game, which without giving anything away, is disappointingly short; far shorter in-fact than any of the other uninterruptible story sequences throughout the game.
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| This would be one of the puzzles involving dial turning, in case you didn't guess | And this is nothing at all like hacking into a remote server; but hey, it makes a challenging mini-game |
The game's puzzles come in several formats; the primarily of which being the orthodox 'use X with Y' style point-and-click adventure gaming. In this respect BS4 has the same mix of good clever solutions and seemingly-random impossible to understand solutions that the genre is renown for. The game also features many puzzles which can be viewed up close and require the turning of certain dials or the connecting and cutting of certain wires, usually this type of puzzle requires some kind of prior research to be done by George, for example the examination of a Latin manuscript, and then some logical thought to be applied to the problem with this new knowledge.
Additionally, George carries a handy PDA around with him which, as well as letting you to make phone calls and access George's notes, allows you to attempt to hack in to certain internet servers or local security systems. In order to successfully hack something a challenging logical mini-game must be played. Basically something which acts like a beam of light must be deflected around a grid using a limited number of things which act like mirrors – avoiding certain things and making contact with others along the way. Apparently this is supposed to represent hacking by using routers to avoid monitored servers and so on, but it's probably best to sympathetically ignore the potential unrealism of this. Although the idea is simple enough, some of the puzzles are extremely challenging and perhaps some would find it frustrating to have to complete them before being able to progress to the next section of adventure in the game.
The game's graphics speak for themselves and personally I think the voice-acting is absolutely brilliant; although I've heard people say otherwise. However, the supposedly 'helpful' fixed-camera angles can at times be frustrating and the game's path finding seems to need considerable work – with George often walking into walls and failing to negotiate obstacles correctly when you click to move him around. I also think the game lacks a lot of, for want of a better term, unnecessary depth. It's all very well that you can examine the crucial locked door, or talk to the arrogant secretary. But what about that marble table, what about that picture on the wall? There seems to be far too many objects in the game which the player should be able to examine and at least get some kind of sarcastic or humorous comment, all it'd take would be a bit of extra programming and a little more work for the voice actors – I mean, come on!
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| Prison cells, unconscious guards, loss of your entire inventory.... Yea this is where it's at! | See what I'd like is to examine the meaningless fireplace and have George tell me some hilarious anecdote involving his history with arson; unfortunately it's not to be, and that's one of the places the game falls short |
Alright so what we have here is a less than perfect adventure game, but for all intents and purposes it satisfied my craving for point-and-click games of this type. If anything the often involving and fantastic story-line will encourage me to play the other highly acclaimed games in this series. I think the best way to sum this up is; top marks for creativity, but the occasional flaws, bugs and, to repeat my oxymoron, lack of unnecessary depth, make it look like the game could have done with another 6 months of fine-tuning.
Top Game Moment:
TOP GAME MOMENT
When, for a second, you forget you’re playing a game and get a tingle of excitement creeping around an appartment, an office or a factory, looking for clues.
