This game was the first to ever seriously scare me. I was seven years old watching my dad play The 11th Hour when a cutscene of a women's face shifting into some horrible bug-eyed monstrosity freaked me out so badly I ran upstairs and wouldn't touch the computer for weeks. Naturally, this game would never have that kind of effect on a kid raised on today's games, but it still holds a darkly comedic appeal, whether or not most of the comedy is intentional. This game's predecessor, The 7th Guest, was no doubt a spooky game, but also a rather PG one, with cartoonish characters and a mostly pristine mansion that looks like the dollhouse of a psychopath. The 11th Hour steers the series deep into the macabre. The host mansion is now a dark, rotting mess loaded with bloody surprises and gruesome traps. The designers really put a lot of effort into giving you the impression that something horrible happened in every room you step into (and could happen to you). As in the previous game, the primary focus rests on puzzle-solving, and unlike other adventure games you may have played, the puzzles are not necessarily integrated into the environment, like trying to start a broken generator or anything. Rather, you're retracing the steps left by the mansion's insane owner Stauf, who left deliberate puzzles throughout the house, some of which can be brutally difficult and lengthy to solve. This gives the game a rather anarchic structure: There's no logic to the puzzles thrown at you, so each one tends to be radically different from the last. The story of the 11th Hour is also a strong departure from The 7th Guest, and this is were most fans of the short-lived series jump ship on this game. The developers went for more of a contemporary mystery story this time, and the result is an FMV-heavy narrative with the aesthetics of an early-90's TV crime drama. As you solve puzzles in the mansion, you unlock video clips that offer you a glimpse at what's happening in the outside world and lead you to solve the primary mystery. The cutscenes are just as poorly acted as in The 7th Guest, but since this game doesn't have its predecessor's cartoonish charm, it's harder to forgive the performances. Still, anybody who survived the cutscenes of the 3DO days should appreciate the accidental hilarity the actors offer. The 11th Hour is a controversial title no doubt, with fans of The 7th Guest urging players away from this sequel. But on it's own, the game has a wonderfully unique macabre atmosphere while retaining the spontaneous puzzles of the original. Perhaps it is difficult to like both games (I personally thought 7th Guest looks too much like a Saturday Morning cartoon), but if you want a spooky, cerebral adventure into darkness and decay, the 11th Hour is worth the trip.
