Posted on: September 18, 2018
AJBAtreides
Verified ownerGames: 704 Reviews: 5
An Atmosphere I'm Sad to Leave Behind
Lamplight City was a great game; the only flaw narratively is the brevity. I appreciated that the initial cases show the world and the characters. It simply felt to me like the final act was rushed but without a real reason for time pressure in-story. Mechanically, I found it an interesting idea to have inventory-free puzzles. The fact that you sometimes have to pick up items in order for Fordham to work out how to use them, however, just removes the annoying inventory shuffle from the equation, while still requiring you to find specific solutions. Without spoiling, the quest to find a cup in New Bretagne drove me half-mad. The atmosphere is what gripped me the most. The pseudo-Victorian/Cajun vibe was charming, with a clear inspiration from Gabriel Knight and Sherlock Holmes. The main characters all had excellent voice actors, though some of the extras sounded a little forced. The soundtrack was particularly interesting, always seeming quite upbeat for a murder mystery. The negatives of the game are mostly mechanical and have more to do with the genre than the game on it's own. Until someone can work out a solution to the inventory shuffle that isn't stripping out puzzles, all adventure games will have to work with it. Additionally, the single path to truth occasionally had the usual moon-logic leaps of coincidence and luck leading Fordham to his conclusions. Without going into spoilers, the dynamic of the two male and two female leads is excellent. Their interplay is believable, and the relationships feel relatively nuanced. Combined with the gripping world, I was devastated to finish the game so abruptly. I can only hope for a sequel giving us more time to explore the City of Air and Light beyond it's barest port. My only real objection is that we heard so many wonders of this world but encountered so few. The lack of an airship scene in particular... It would have been great hearing Bill's thoughts on flying on an explosive balloon.
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