This game is essentially a JRPG with a card based battle system. This sounded great for me, because I really like both genres. From the JRPG part, I expect interesting story & exploration. From the card based battle system, I expect interesting mechanics. After around one hour in, I was quite pleased with SteamWorld Quest, because it seemed to tick all of those boxes. However, now after finishing the game after 15 hours, I am very disappointed, because the game severely lacks depth and variety in every aspect: while there is a story, it fails to be compelling. While there is some exploration, the layout of all maps is the same where there is only variety in where the exit is placed - sometimes, there is a hidden exit which leads to some item. The progression is strictly linear, there is only a battle arena side quest later in the game offering optional rewards. On the other hand, the battle mechanics are dull. While there are a lot of cards, there are only very few combos or synergies between the different characters. Using them does not really matter or is required to beat the game. In addition, the game discourages the player from switching between the characters because stand-by characters gain a lower amount of experience making them a weaker choice. In the end, I only used the same characters with very similar abilities. On a positive side, I liked the art style and the soundtrack.
The game has a fresh take on the point & click adventure genre. You no longer move a character around and guide him through a story by making him interact with the world. You become the silent observer of a story. You are presented with explorable scenes which capture certain moments and try to make sense of what is happening right now and what are the developments which led up to it. You observe. You watch people and their actions. You collect clues to your inventory. Finally, you bring all the puzzle pieces together to form a story: The Case Of The Golden Idol. While playing the game, I found the story telling the most interesting part. Some scenes are very relevant to the story, but you only later understand fully what their importance is. And even if I found the conclusion of the story somewhat lackluster, it felt very good not only to bring together each of the scenes but also the connection between them. I found the average level of difficulty very pleasing. The only real downside of this game is that it feels quite short. Well, it is not exactly short for this kind of game - it took me around 10 hours to solve the game (including DLCs) - but it kind of feels short with respect to the price tag.
I played this game with quite high expectations due to the praise it got from critiques, and I was not disappointed. The artstyle is - for what you can expect for such a production - beautiful, the atmosphere sucks you right into the world and the gameplay is fast paced and very much on point. I found the difficulty reasonable. Yes, you will die to some of the bosses and also sometimes just during exploration, but one thing the creators did very well is to put in shortcuts which can be opened during exploration and remain permanently open if you die at some point. This way, almost any death feels forgiving and honestly, the longest way from dying to any boss took me less than twenty seconds. And while I game a lot, I am not particularly skilled and none of the bosses took me more than a couple of tries to beat. Overall, I was only disappointed by two things. First, the collectibles in this game feel somewhat useless. Even though you can find several weapons in the game, I stuck to the initial weapon as it was the most balanced and none of the other weapons felt stronger. It takes a very long time to collect enough crystals to extend your health and mana, and one can only get two additional points each. The mana is useless as it can be replenished easily, and the health is good, but two additional points for a lot of searching do not feel rewarding. The hidden upgrades to your skills are quite weak. Second, the game was over pretty quickly. It took me 9 hours to complete the game and another 3 to get to 100% (where I admittedly used a guide to find the last two crystals). The post game has a lot of missed potential. It is short and does not add any new areas, it only let's you explore the old areas to unlock the true ending and everything you might have missed. The true ending does not add a lot to the story. Overall, I still had a lot of fun exploring the world and would have loved more of it!
This game could be great. It has a very intriguing start where the player is left stranded in a French village in the middle of nowhere with very little information to go on. This makes for very interesting story telling because of course Gabriel knows why he's here, but the game leaves it up to the player to slowly unravel the story. You are introduced to a solid set of mostly well-written characters all acting suspicious in one way or another and you quickly end up in a whodunnit situation where you suspect each and everyone of murder, child-abduction and even worse. Even though the story falls a bit off near the end, it is still the strong part of GK3 and I would love to see it again in a modern setting - because the game itself - as it is - is only barely enjoyable. People find two major issues with the game: its 3D engine, which was experimental at the time. Navigation through the game is somewhat tedious and missing crucial objects in a scene is very easy. It does not help that the engine did not age well, but in its essence it already was unfit for an adventure game at the time. The second issue people often have are the puzzles in this game with the infamous cat-hair-mustache puzzle often being quoted as one of the worst puzzles in all of adventure game history and being blamed for the downfall of the entire genre. My main issue with the game is different: most of the time, I had no clue about what to do next. I spent my time running around places which I had already visited many times because I desperately searched for the one clue I missed or what changed since the last time I was here - sometimes the smallest thing was missing to advance the timeline and the game made no efforts to point me into the right direction. I would really love to see a remake of this game, with a modern engine (like the remake for part GK1), but mainly with subtle guidance through the story. Well, and it would damn help if the game did not crash every fifteen minutes...
Have been in love with the genre since the first Commandos game, and this one, like the Shadow Tactics main game, is a great title. Do not expect anything new compared to the main game though, this expansion is just more of the same - which I felt was great, as the gameplay already works really well. I finished the game in a little more than 8 hours, and loved every minute of it. If I had to nitpick, I feel that the story could have been better: it does not add any depth to the characters - even not Aiko and this expansion is about her - nor does it contribute something to the story of the main game.
This game is not as bad as most people here seem to make it. Is it worse than the first part? Absolutely. Does it have some flaws, like ultra low quality cut scenes, some fade-to-black scenes where content seems to be cut out? Yes, a few. Does it have annoying arcade events? Only very few, not enough to make or break the game. If you are new to the genre just looking for a point&click adventure to enjoy, this game is not it. Play the first part, as it is quite a good game even when compared to the genre classics. If you are really keen on the genre like me and think you need to revisit some titles you have missed in the past, I would recommend this one. I would say it is at on par with secret files 3 (the worst of the main secret files games), whereas the first part is much better than all of the secret files games combined.
This is probably the weakest Daedalic adventure I played -- and I played a lot because even though they are not always great (some are), they usually never fail to entertain. This one does. It has great visuals and decent audio, but it lacks in every other department: While there are certainly good sections in the game, it does not work as a whole. Even though the story framework is good, the story telling and the pacing of the game are awful. The villain is only revealed in the very last section of the game. His story, and why he threatens the magic world is only explained during a picture sequence right before the credits roll. There is no character development for any of the characters and the protagonist is very weak to begin with. The dialogues are long but not rewarding. Many of the puzzles do not make sense which comes down to a lot of try and error -- hints are too sparse and the help function of the game is not helpful at all. The developers should have spend more time on the story board and character development and not on the optional card game and dew drop pixel hunt for bonus material which do not add anything to the main game.
TWW does so many things right that it could have been a gem in my collection of classic 2D point&click adventures: It features beautiful 2D art, some of the most interesting characters alongside funny dialogues and a mature story with a touching ending. As Sadwick is ventures out into the world accompanied by his only friend Spot, a little caterpillar, the player will not only learn more about the nightmares, but will also be confronted with very general themes about the transient nature of life, and continuity and change in the real world. So, where does it fall short? First of all, despite of having a few great puzzles, which involves Spot's unique capability to shape-shift into several useful forms, the average level of puzzles is mediocre at best: some of the puzzles are highly illogical, others fall short because of too little or even misleading hints of what to do next, so you should be prepared to be stuck and rely on try&error at several points during the course of your adventure -- even while the numbers of areas is quite limited in each of the four chapters. Another downside is the actual build-up of the plot. While the idea behind the plot is great, it is pretty much set in the first chapter and resolved in the last one -- there is almost nothing relevant happening in chapters 2 and 3. Adding to these conceptual problems, there are some flaws on the production side: The english voice-acting is downright horrible up to Sadwick's voice beeing unbearable -- the original (german) voice-acting is on a professional level though. The video cutscenes have been produced by a cheap 3rd party company and do not reach the quality of the rest of the game. Some minor technical issues such as no proper wide-screen support exist, but no game-breaking ones. Overall, TWW is still a good adventure and good entertainment for adventure enthusiasts or fans of other Daedalic adventures. If I had to recommend a modern adventure game, the Deponia series is a much better choice.
