Pros: wonderful presentation, minimalist soundtrack, creepy atmosphere, and well written Cons: um... maybe a little fetch questy, and dialogue choices have no bearing on its singular conclusion The Excavation of Hob's Barrow had me hooked from beginning to end, so much so I completed it the day I bought it. Its wonderfully presented, from its gloomy muted colour palette and miminalist soundscape, to the excellently charming voice acting, and pixel art FMV that take you back to the days of Sierra's classics. Hob's Barrow slowly builds a sense of forboding as you begin to question not just who to trust, but what is reality itself. The puzzles themselves never stray into the obscure or illogical, plenty of context clues are provided so that the player is lead to rational solutions. If I had to find anything to nitpick, it would be the false sense of agency. Dialogue often has options, which can alter your progression slightly, but the choices you make ultimately have no bearing on the conclusion. This game only has one ending. There is also a sequence about mid-game where you feel like your tasked with solving a fetch quest, by solving a fetch quest, after solving a fetch quest. Hob's Barrow is a wonderfully written, engrosing and well presented game. It definitely belongs in the upper echelon of Wadjet Eye's library, along with Technobabylon and Gemini Rue.
Pros: great presentation, soundtrack and Cyberpunk vibe Cons: puzzles can lack context clues, making them feel cheap and illogical I started this game in 2021, put 4 hours into and then just... stopped. Fast forward to 2025, and after completing a different (and brilliant game) I thought I'd revist this one... why did I stop? I remember really liking the setting and presentation. It didn't take long to remember why. Puzzles can often lack context clues that lead the player to deduce logical solutions. Which results in the player pixel hunting, back tracking, and basically trying every item and item combination, on every hotspot, until you brute force a solution. The writing can be kind of cringe, corny and obvious. It reminded me of how it felt reading Snow Crash. That said it looks gorgeous, the music is fantastic, and the general cyberpunk vibe is spot on. So bearing in mind I write this at about the two thirds mark, maybe its a story that builds to an amazing conclusions. But I don't know if I'll get there, because right now, its not feeling like a lot of fun.
