Broken Sword 4: The Angel of Death (2006)

While this is probably not as good as part I+II it is much much better than part III. Puzzles have the right difficulty IMHO (in part III they were much to easy), less annoying "action" parts and one can actually use the mouse to go anywhere. Negative is that you can't skip dialogues (luckily they are not that long, mostly), but in general I liked that game.

The controls and "cinematic" camera angles are less terrible than they were in "The Sleeping Dragon," and the crate puzzles are mostly gone. However, they also removed the hotspot highlights, so now we're relegated to pixel hunting. Yay. And the locations are still too large, which only serves as padding to make the game longer than it has a right to be. Story and characters are mostly okay, except for some ridiculous plot twists (the one they ripped straight out of "Hudson Hawk" isn't even the worst of them). And the ending was really weak. Definitely wait for a discount.

This was the game that killed off the series until Kickstarter revived it and for good reason: Revolution forget everything that made for a great Broken Sword game. Instead of an atmospheric Parisian setting, you get a dirty rainy New York lacking any kind of atmosphere. Locations feel barren and sterile and really don't encourage exploration. But, worst of all, this game was heavily focused on console controls. When a 10 year older game has much better controls, you should know you're doing something wrong. But no ... they went for a mix of mouse and keyboard which not only feels extremely clumsy, it often leads to confusion. Some interactions have a special mouse cursor showing you there's an action to perform but stuff like climbing a ladder don't - you have to walk into the ladder using key presses! Or how about the dodgy "pulling of boxes" which they can't seem to shake off even after tons of criticism in Broken Sword 3! On top of that, it feels rushed, half-baked and half finished. You can't even skip dialogue! Revolution learned a hard lesson here: don't cater to a console audience if your game doesn't appeal to its crowd in the first place!

I mean...it's not entirely awful. There are less box puzzles than BS3. There are a couple of funny jokes. That's about where I leave my positives. The main problems with BS4, as I see them, are: 1. Nico's voice. So apparently they changed voice actor in every game but wow...no. Not even remotely like the Nico of the first 3. Just generic French, and not great. 2. Illogical puzzles. I've always valued the brilliant puzzles in BS (apart from the boxes.) But in 4 there are a lot of solutions that give you absolutely no hope of figuring out, because they just aren't logical enough. Additionally, a lot of fiddly mini game type puzzles and a lot of objects that are easy to miss make for a frustrating game. 3. The story structure. The story itself is a little bland but ok. But the structure is terrible. There's a load of muddling around with very little detail, no build up of tension and the ending...is just terrible. Nowhere near as cinematic or interesting as the first three. 4. The controls. Admittedly, this is probably mainly a frustration made from playing this in 2018. But many, many times I'd slightly miss a ladder, or get caught on the scenery, or struggle to get through a camera angle. Overall...it just seems to be missing the passion of the first three games. I'm surprised it reviewed favourably on release. Worth a play only for diehard fans making there way back through the whole series. Worth keeping a walkthrough on hand.

As a long-time fan of the Broken Sword series, I had hopes that The Angel of Death would live up to the legacy of its predecessors. Unfortunately, it falls short in several key areas, making it one of the weaker entries in the franchise. Right from the start, the game suffers from a visually uninspired and low-detailed environment. Many locations feel empty and lifeless, lacking the charm and atmosphere that earlier games captured so well. The level design doesn’t help either — most settings are forgettable and uninspired, offering little incentive to explore or engage. Animation quality is another letdown. Movements are stiff and awkward, which breaks immersion and makes even simple interactions feel clunky. This is especially noticeable during cutscenes or close-up moments that are supposed to carry emotional weight. The puzzle design and item use also show signs of inconsistency. At times, using the right item on an object results in the character saying it won’t work, yet clicking directly on the object triggers the correct usage automatically. This kind of logic gap can be frustrating and makes you question the rules of the game world. Worst of all, the ending feels rushed and abrupt. After hours of unraveling conspiracies and solving puzzles, the story wraps up so suddenly that it barely leaves any impact. It’s as if the game runs out of steam just when it should be reaching a dramatic peak. That said, there are a couple of positives worth mentioning. The credit song is genuinely enjoyable, adding a bittersweet note to the conclusion. And the voice acting, particularly for the main characters, is solid and helps bring some life to the otherwise flat world.