By the time you reach the credits, you know the game by heart. Yes, you die often in this game. Following a long period where adventuregames let you wonder around for weeks, or becoming unbeatable because you took a wrong turn, this dying mechanism was refreshing and allways accompanied by a nice cinematic of you getting stabbed, being crushed or falling to your death. You mess it up, you die, you try again. In this regard the game takes you by the hand and while you do get stuck from time to time, not having a clue about what to do next is hardly ever the reason. It's a puzzle game in the tradition of Myst, coated in a story, full cast of voice actors and a semi 3d world. This is not the greatest story ever told, nor is it epic. The game basically bullies you around and forces you to meet people and solve puzzles; it's really all about the messed up situation the protagonist walks into and his ad-hoc decisions to escape that. I allways thought the world looked pretty gorgeous. You look around 1080 at set places in the world and walk from spot to spot (walking is a prerendered vid, which makes it look a lot better than the 1080 view). It's not fully 3d but gives the impression it is and in my opinion that looked a lot better than the full 3d worlds of it's time and years to come. The character models looked also pretty stunning, using Cryos omni sync technology, which allowed for "actuall' lipsync. At the time it looked fantastic, unlike almost every other character animation, which looked painfully stiff and slow. I played this game a lot and still enjoy it. The game is plagued with an event (the boarfight) that can "crash" on you, forcing you to redo that part of the chapter; and a puzzle that only gives you the info needed to solve it ones, for a very short time, at location other than the puzzle; and than there is the crabgame which comes down to dumb luck and takes quite a while to (not) complete. Other than I think the game is solid and by no means as nonlogical as some reviews make it out to be. Yes, you have to enjoy timelimits on events. I really don't like that in a game, but it allways makes sense in this game (a thug with a big knife is hot on your tail; yes, there is a timelimit) The game is not consistantly good, I think it picks up really well but absurdety really kicks in in the last third of the game. This game is one of my favourites, but that's the nostalgia factor. I give this game four stars, but compared in hindsight to the great adventures of the 90s, I think 3 stars would be more appropiate. At the time I found it a refreshing sorta game, but the story lacks when compared to a Gabriel Knight; and the puzzles are simple when compared to a Myst, let alone a Riven. As a story telling puzzlegame however I think it did really well and consider this an important title for collectors and an enjoyable game for any adventure fan that doesn´t mind a bit of trial and error.
