Dreamfall Chapters: The Final Cut

I bought this game because of the good reviews. Choices are supposed to matter so I thought replays might be more interesting. This is a point and click type of game which can be frustrating although they do a good job of helping you find the places you can click on. To progress you need to solve puzzles and make choices. The puzzles started out a lot of fun. As the game progressed the order of clicking becomes important and at least to me it wasn't obvious what the right order was. A lot of try this or try that was needed to get past these puzzles. If you find yourself getting frustrated you can reference a walkthru and take a hint or two. The story was difficult to follow. It is told from different perspectives and you have to figure out how it all fits together. The designers also noticed this and added a lot of narration to fill some of the gaps. The last part of the game was likely rushed. It is mostly cut scenes (one after another) with very little game in between. The acting was decent and the graphics were good, but if I wanted to watch a movie I would be in front of Hulu and not playing a game. I can't say how impactful the decisions you make are since I lost interest after the first play through. I expect your choices may impact some minor things but the main plot would remain unchanged. It wasn't worth my time to find out.

The story feels detached from its predecessor. Old characters and storylines are forgotten or diregarded to make place for new ones. If just like me you waited all those years to learn what happened to Olivia and Damien, you're in for a big letdown, as they're basically swept under the rug as if the writers were telling us "Forget about them, here's a hot-dog girl. Like her?" There's a lot of contempt for the main character, mostly directed at how she was written and potrayed in the previous game which is unpleasant to say the least. Not worth waiting all these years.

So the world and its lore is cool and all, but the gameplay is very slowly paced. The puzzles are uninteresting or archaic (which I guess some point-and-click-adventurers might find great, I dunno), and the animations are slow, clunky, and outdated. I find it hard to be invested at all in this game, unless you are already such a fan of the series that you *must* know what happens in your own version of the story. I am simply gonna watch a playthrough instead of playing this, because I cannot be bothered with the game anymore.

I was excited for this game..more than excited, really. I was beside myself with excitement at the knowledge that I would finally be able to see what happened with Zoe, and April, and Crow, and everyone else after the dramatic events of Dreamfall. Sadly, however, it was not to be; my computer and this game just did not get along. I experienced slow load times, frequent crashes, and other technical issues that often times wouldn't even let me past the load screen. In the end it seemed all I got was a lot of big talk that amounted to nothing.

My review is too long here so just go on this link... I posted a review on steam because the gog release got some release problems and I had to ask a steam key from the developer: http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198148248888/recommended/237850 the review is in italian but I will make a short english review here: Both TLJ and Dreamfall TLJ are masterpiece and if you still need to play them go buy them. Dreamfall Chapters is both good and bad... Book 1-2-4 are really good, Book 3-5 are not really good. The story is the end of TLJ more than the end of Dreamfall TLJ (because we still know nothing about WATIcorp, the twins, the monster etc...)....(while it is an end of TLJ because we know who really is Lady Alvane). The good: I love the music, storytimes, the power/gameplay of storytimes, the art style, the journey of Zoe in Arcadia. The bad: I don't like the graphics glitch, the short book 3, the change of sexual orientation of Kian (I'm not against gay. There is another gay relationship in this game and I love it... but Kian was not gay in Dreamfall TLJ... he was in love with April and I think until book 2 Kian was not meant to be gay at all... anyway I saw it forced), after book 1 I don't like Kian character (he is boring) book 2-3-4-5 Kian only got a good start in book 1, I don't like the movie like feeling in book 5 there is really little gameplay. 3/5 is my final vote... you need to play it to fall in love with both The Longest Journey and Dreamfall TLJ... and you will find something really good... but don't play it with a masterpiece in mind because this game is not a masterpiece at all.