Deadfall Adventures Review

I’m lucky in terms of games I’ve wished to exist. Rocksteady gave me the Batman games I’ve always wanted, Telltale made a new Monkey Island, there are new Thief and Deus Ex games coming out, and that F2P Command & Conquer game got shut down. What still eludes me however is that big epic Indiana Jones experience. With LucasArts disappearing up some executive’s backside and Disney not realising they bought something other than just Star Wars I’m not holding out much hope, but luckily developer The Farm 51 (a Polish studio who have helped on Painkiller, The Witcher and made, uh, Necrovision) wanted the same thing as me. They couldn’t get the Indiana Jones licence so they made their own adventurer – please welcome James Quatermain and his Deadfall Adventures.

Deadfall Adventures is a first-person shooter/puzzle game that’s so Indiana Jones it hurts. It’s set in 1938, and the story revolves around a globe-trotting chase for an ancient artifact of unearthly power between a gruff behatted adventurer, his spunky female sidekick, and Nazis. Oh and just for the hell of it, Commies too. To be fair The Farm 51 also borrows from recent videogames who were also “influenced” by Indiana Jones. James Quaterman has more than a whiff of Uncharted’s Nathan Drake about him, including having a famous ancestor who did most of the work first, and spunky female sidekick Jennifer Goodwin is blatantly Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. Fine, there’s also plenty of mummies to shoot too, so let’s bring in The Mummy series as a reference. And, bizarrely, Alan Wake’s “flashlight-focusing to weaken supernatural enemies before shooting them” mechanic appears as well, because f*** it.

Jennifer Goodwin, Lara Croft impersonator extraordinaire. Pictured in front of a tomb she’s about to raid

I may mock Deadfall Adventures for pinching every part of its storyline, a few set pieces and a few gameplay mechanics (there’s a mine-cart chase for god’s sake) but in truth there isn’t a single other game like it out there. A first-person Indiana Jones game with both shooter and puzzle sections? Uncharted meets Portal? Tomb Raider in first-person with less bottom-shimmying? Seriously, I’m not kidding – you’ll face Nazis with Call of Duty-style controls, mow down mummies in an ancient tomb, then you’ll turn a corner and be faced with an ancient puzzle with only a few hints in a notepad (left by legendary adventurer Allan Quatermain) to help you solve it. No jumping, no climbing, just shooting and puzzling with Nazis, Commies and Zombies. What more could you ask for?



Well, better shooting for a start. The FPS mechanics are never terrible but they certainly aren’t very satisfying. Guns can shoot completely wide of the mark, soldiers can spawn at random locations, and even weak enemies can take several solid hits before dying. Shoot a soldier behind cover once and nine times out of ten he’ll be knocked to the ground and take several seconds to get back up, by which point you’ve considered him dead and moved on. If I shoot a normal human soldier I want him to die, not pretend to be dead for a bit. AI is also pretty weak, with soldiers regularly alternating between taking cover/avoiding fire and just running about/ignoring grenades/taking cover in wide open spaces. Things get more fun when you can start deliberately springing ancient booby-traps to kill Nazis or mummies, but nevertheless you won’t be playing Deadfall Adventures for the shooting bits.

Fortunately the rest of the game, mostly the puzzles and the exploration, are much more fun. As the game itself states in a tutorial message early on, Deadfall Adventures rewards exploration and discovery. There are treasures hidden around the levels, often with traps or puzzles to get past, and only a magic compass to guide the way and the promise of upgrades (under the categories of Warrior, Life and Light) stirring you on. Then there’s the puzzle rooms themselves, occasionally gigantic contraptions which can be quite sneaky – although you can always get a strong hint by looking at Quatermain’s notebook. It kind of makes me wish The Farm 51 hadn’t bothered with the FPS bits and just stuck to temple exploring, but then you can’t have Nazis without wanting to shoot them. And while the main villain isn’t hateful he certainly is very punchable, so that’s something.

Pictured: a puzzle being solved. God I’m great

Levels take place across three parts of the world – Egypt, the Arctic and Guatemala – and each one is utterly gorgeous. Levels are well designed (if largely linear) and truly impressive to look at, and the developers have clearly done their homework in making each area look authentic. There are bits that’ll make your jaw drop, like one particular standout creepy moment where a lush sunny jungle suddenly turns dark and sand-swept as monsters emerge from the sand. Temples, pyramids, caverns, lost cities, tombs that need raiding, they all look superb and push the Unreal Engine 3 to breaking point – which is probably why textures take so flippin’ long to load.

Sadly the same can’t be said of character animation and lip-syncing, which is Original Xbox/PS2 standard. In fact I know exactly what game the animation reminds me of: Monolith’s No One Lives Forever, with its cartoony, exaggerated, almost puppet-like movement. Great then, silly now. That combined with the fact that the voices are merely okayish means no one will be warming to James Lee Quatermain like they did with Nathan Drake. The acting is not terrible, but not great either. And while I’m on the subject of problems, there are a fair few silly glitches like grenades I’ve thrown getting caught in leaves, shots occasionally going through stone walls, bosses getting stuck, or just general AI or texture issues. Also some dodgy checkpointing now and again.

Then there are intentional things that are just silly. Design problems include invisible walls in pointless places, tutorial instructions that don’t take into account any control changes you’ve made, and Quatermain dying when he just touches a small pool of water. Boss fights are just plain not fun and often come with no instructions or hints (the final boss for example I only defeated by accident), but luckily they don’t happen often. There are some story problems sneaking in too. A blatantly obvious betrayal happens way too early, apart from the main villain the Nazis just disappear suddenly and get replaced by mercenaries, and one particularly spectacular last-minute escape from a collapsing mine would be an amazing setpiece... except that the developer forgot Quatermain had two companions with him who would have undoubtedly been crushed if it wasn’t for their ability to teleport to safety. If only Quatermain had thought of that. Oh, and there’s some translation issues and the game refuses to show swastikas on the Nazis. Boo.

Did I mention I’m scared of heiiiiiiiiiigghhhhhhhhhhhtsssssss

Amazingly enough there’s also multiplayer, although I admit I haven’t played too much of it since the game isn’t out yet. The options seem plentiful on the menu but are rather basic to be honest. The co-op wave-based Survival mode sees you and friends using torch, guns and traps to defeat waves of monsters, although it’s very tough since I found I fell much more quickly than in single-player – I didn’t even notice a mummy was behind me before I died nearly immediately. Versus modes include variations on Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture The Flag (here an artifact of course), Last Man Standing, and a Treasure Hunt mode where killing people makes them drop treasure which you can cash in for points or “blessings”. Variations can remove environmental threats, but frankly if you choose those you might as well play Quake since these traps are the one thing that makes Deadfall Adventures’ multiplayer stand out. I think The Farm 51 are a bit hopeful to be honest – if I had trouble finding people to play Batman: Arkham Origins online with I haven’t got a prayer with this.

Deadfall Adventures certainly has some problems but if you’re an Indiana Jones fan you really should be getting it. The shooting isn’t anything to write home about, animation is rather basic, voice acting is okayish, and there are glitches and little problems aplenty, but the puzzles, exploration, traps and amazing environments make the whole thing worthwhile. It took me around 8 hours to finish and while I explored a lot I certainly didn’t find all the treasures, so it’s got pretty good replay value (although I admit having to solve the puzzles a second time might take the sheen off). Put simply if you’re after an Indiana Jones adventure you can either play through Fate of Atlantis on Steam again or you can get this, and while it did frustrate on occasion I enjoyed my time with it. One question for the developer though… why the heck is it called “Deadfall Adventures”?