Posted on: July 29, 2023

Prah

Jeux: 1215 Avis: 97

Great story but the game itself is not

Shadow of the Comet has a great story and atmosphere to it, but unfortunately that's where the good things with it stop. You play as Parker, sent to check out Halley's Comet in a small New England town and to investigate claims of what occured there 75 years earlier. Instead you uncover something more dark and sinister in the perfect fashion of H.P. Lovecraft. The gameplay is right out bad, even compared to other point n click games at its time. I don't know if the CD version made it worse, but controls are unresponsive and hard to figure out. The writing is... mostly serious but oddly comedic at times. The voice acting might not be the best, but it was also the early 90s so it can be excused. I don't recommend this game unless you're a hardcore Lovecraft fan or a point n click veteran. Definitely not something for newcomers of the genre.

Trouvez-vous ce commentaire utile ?

Posted on: September 17, 2023

Mogan

Possesseur vérifié

Jeux: 141 Avis: 1

Starts well enough, goes wrong quickly

Shadow of the Comet starts off as a promising Lovecraft adventure game, but around the halfway point really loses its way. The biggest issue is puzzles which the player isn't given enough information to solve. In the early game, the main character can "look" at many of the objects and areas in the game world and will provide a description of what he sees. A lot of these details are important for solving puzzles and allow attentive players to progress using logic and memory. In the second of three in-game days, there are suddenly far fewer opportunities to "look" at the environment, and consequently very little information about what the next steps should be. This is also the point at which the game begins peppering puzzles with lots of fail-states which require a reload. The end result is the player having to brute force most puzzles and being punished for not saving constantly, which isn't satisfying gameplay even when the solution is guessed quickly. Shadow of the Comet is clearly made by developers familiar with Lovecraft, and the Cthulhu Mythos is mostly well used ... except when it comes to the non-player characters. There are numerous NPCs in the game which get little introduction (some introductions can even be missed) and most of those are frontloaded early in the game. Later in the game, conversations will start referring to these characters the play has met only briefly, if at all, and it's really impossible to remember who the game is talking about. Worse, remembering who 's who becomes important the gameplay, resulting again in the feeling that the only way forward is trial and error. Not to mention making it difficult to follow the plot. Overall, Shadow of the Comet is pretty weak. What starts as a classic feeling 90s point-and-click adventure game devolves into a rushed feeling mess in the back half of the game. It's a shame, because the first third or so is quite promising.

Trouvez-vous ce commentaire utile ?

Posted on: January 5, 2025

drk84x

Possesseur vérifié

Jeux: 352 Avis: 65

I tried hard to like this one...

Graphics is nice and there is a proper "atmosphere", interface is not that bad you will get used to it fairly quickly. There is fast movement, a journal and you can change animation speed. Problems are the puzzle design, some weird "escape from monsters" encounters, some deads end and bugs. My verdict if you really like Lovecraft buy it at discount and don't feel guilty to use a walkthrough when you need to. Really one of the puzzle you need the help of an external source for solving it (chatGpt in 2024, in 1993 no idea? A Library?)

Trouvez-vous ce commentaire utile ?

Posted on: February 24, 2016

Winterborn

Possesseur vérifié

Jeux: 207 Avis: 6

Creepy story based adventure/horror

SoC is a third person adventure game, the story, while going in its own direction, seems to be at least partially inspired or based on a combination of two of Lovecraft's short stories, namely The Shadow Over Innsmouth and "The Dunwich Horror." The controls are slightly unusual and odd but not difficult to master. In the CD version it does have full mouse support although a certain amount of using the keyboard is still required (its faster if you need to interact with something due to the short cut keys, and sometimes you do need to move/act quickly, other times mouse it better for accuracy or careful movement around danger) While the disk version was keyboard only I believe. But I soon got used to switching between the mouse and keyboard and using both. Compared so some of the modern day horror games you wouldn't think an old 1994 VGA graphics game could be that atmospheric or scary.. but atmosphere and graphics (for its time) especially the character portraits and backgrounds ..not so much the other animations, and I found it genuinely creepy the first time I played it (although it starts out gently enough)and even when I replayed it with my sister watching in my late teens/early twenties it still managed to make us jump a couple of times. The game is pretty linear but has a good storyline, and I also like the voice acting in the CD version. Soundtrack fits well too. It's very atmospheric for a game of it's age, and does a good job of pulling the player into the story. It's a reasonably challenging game although a little unintuitive in places as some sections will probably have you reaching for a walkthrough. This game has remained one of my favourites and is one I've replayed on occasion, not perfect but still good and despite its flaws well worth checking out if you enjoy both old school adventure games and the cthulhu mythos (or even just horror in general) . Happy this game has finally made it on to GOG :)

Trouvez-vous ce commentaire utile ?

Posted on: June 19, 2016

Charon121

Possesseur vérifié

Jeux: 335 Avis: 24

One of the best Chtulhu titles

This game nails the foreboding atmosphere of the works of Lovecraft. The main character arrives to the sleepy New England town of Illsmouth to photograph the passing of Halley's Comet, and also to discover why the photographer who tried to document the previous passing went mad. It doesn't take him long to scratch the surface and discover not everything is what it seems. This is a plot device used by many cult works, from Shadow over Innsmouth to Twin Peaks, and this game is among the best-executed examples. From the very beginning you can explore the entire town and the surrounding forest, which gives you a clever illusion of freedom, even though the plot itself is fairly linear, refusing to advance until you've done and witnessed everything you must. The sunny and relaxed atmosphere gradually gives way to suspense and dread as you discover the dark secrets of the town. Not too difficult, but there are points at which you might get stuck. At least the game features the sight mechanic that effectively removes the need for pixel hunting. I'm deducting one star for the clumsy controls – they really require getting used to. All the dialogues are voiced, with varying degrees of success. And there are some frustrating sequences in which a wrong move leads to the game over screen – like navigating a cave in pitch black darkness while avoiding a monster that roams there. Or the catacomb maze where all rooms look almost the same. Still, along with Dark Corners of the Earth (at least the first third), this game deserves to be on the pedestal of the best Chtulhu mythos games. Finally, a friendly advice: skip the Prisoner of Ice, a sequel to this game.

Trouvez-vous ce commentaire utile ?

Découvrez les jeux de CD PROJEKT RED

Ne manquez pas

Featured

Proche, mais pas une correspondance exacte

Call of Cthulhu: Shadow of the Comet

Autres notes

Ajouter un avis

Modifier un avis

Supprimer cet avis ?

Signaler cet avis

Informations complémentaires (obligatoire) :

Signaler cet avis