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You'll die of boredom, not of fright

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 16
Date: July 19, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I have enjoyed playing adventure games, like those by Dreamcather. But the mystery in this game is when does something happen? I wandered the house for over an HOUR and nothing happened!

My first clue should have been that it took an incredibly long time to install (it's a single CD). It sat there and (loaded into memory?) for several minutes that I thought it had hung up--there was no progress bar or indication that it was doing something prior to installing. And if they were re-vamping the game to give it an alternate ending, why didn't they fix such an obvious error as having the 'hotspot' for the doorknob on the wrong side of the front door!? They also talk about updated music, but it's not like it plays, except sporadically, so it's not setting any sort of mood. There was very little voice acting except at the beginning and during a phone call.

I realize this is a point-and-click adventure, not an FPS, but I expected something at least mildly interesting or spooky to happen. Something to forward the story--a clue--anything! But it was a lot of clicking to wander the place, open drawers, examine contents. I think I found one item to collect and another one (a lantern) I couldn't use because I hadn't found any oil.

When you're playing an adventure, all you have is the plot to keep you engaged. This game apparently has none and I don't see myself going back to waste more time on this. What's really scary is that they've actually added additional content--who wants more bad content?

Be Aware of the Game Requirements

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: March 04, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Be aware of the technical requirements for Scratches Director's Cut. The game requires a graphics card that supports Open GL. Not all graphics cards do. In fact, I know of very few that do. Without an appropriate video card, the game is virtually unplayable. I did not find the tech specs here on Amazon, so I only saw them once the box arrived. Nucleosys has posted several workarounds on their site. They may word for you, they didn't for me.

The Open GL requirement only exists, as far as I know, for the Director's Cut version of the game. The original should play well on almost any card. But you won't get the bonus material.

Highly dissapointing

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: June 01, 2008
Author: Amazon User

When I bought Scratches, I had very high hopes of it, for I enjoy adventure games. It was highly recommended due to my love for the Nancy Drew PC games, and with a very similar game engine and gameplay, I was very excited over playing it.

However, unlike the NancyDrew games, Scratches became a major dissapointment.

In Scratches, you play as a horror writer living in an abandoned Victorian House your real-estate agent got through not-so-legal means to find your next inspiration. When you hear scratches at night, instead of being sane a high-tailing it out of there like a normal human being, you decide to stay to uncover the mansion's secret.

(SPOILERS)
However, the simplicity of the story line is thrown away once a cursed African mask comes in, throwing the game onto its back when you hear voices, see figures, and eventually come face to face with the cause of the scratching sounds - an ungodly, cannabalisitc humanoid creature whose place seems more fitting in an H.P. Lovecraft story.
(End SPOILERS)

While the plot is so farfetched it's unbeleiveable, the engine also failed to deliver; half of the objects in the game you cannot touch or read; you can open draws and not take or use anything inside them; you cannot advance in the game unless you do EVERY SINGLE THING you have to do for that 'Day', which makes the game frustrating, and without any hint system, can become quite difficult to enjoy.

Another complaint is that some things you have to do are almost impossible to discover, such as crawling through a human-sized furnance to uncover a shadow in order to advance to the last Day in the game. It is hard to understand how one could figure that out, and why one would want to do it.

The story's timeline of events is jumbled, leaving more questions than answers at the end of the game that not even it's sequel within the Director's Cut can answer. The movement is not fluid, at all (I find that the game is SLOWER when exploring the exterior of the house and much faster inside it), and some puzzles are just too vague, which makes the need for a walkthrough almost mandatory.

Possibly the only advantage to Scratches is that the music by Cellar of Rats is chilling, but even that can't make a horrible game good.

In short, you can do much better than Scratches. If you want a fun game with a simple engine and some added chills, pick up Nancy Drew and the Curse of Blackmoor Manor or Legend of the Crystal Skull and just avoid this game; it's really not worth the time and effort to play.

Scratches: Directors Cut comes with a virus as a bonus

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: July 31, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Well, I wish I could provide a review but both copies I have received had a virus. The first copy I sent back for an exchange. Same thing with the new copy, a virus. They also promised that this one would work. It's not even worth my time to send it back again. In the trash it goes.

Made every game design mistake in the book

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: February 05, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Like other gamers, I really wanted to like this game. I love adventure games, especially the spooky kind, and the challenge and slow pace of them is something I relish. But this game made so many obnoxious design mistakes, I gave up halfway through and used a walkthrough just to see what would happen. Things that in my book are unforgiveable design sins:

1. Red herrings. It's very annoying to have the game point something out to you, especially something that looks like it should open, or move or otherwise function, and then never enable you to DO anything with it. If you're like me, you waste a ton of time revisiting it, trying in vain to make it do something.

2. Ignoring established game logic. Early on in a game, you figure out the logic of the game world - what sorts of things are interactive, which aren't, how you can move, etc. When a designer changes these rules late in the game, it creates confusion. This example is the annoying flip side of the above issue. I'm thinking here of a specific instance in the game wherein I tried to interact with something no less than 8 times with no result. (the player voiceover even said something along the lines of, "I don't EVER want to have anything to do with that!") Being totally stuck later on in the game, I looked for a hint and the hint was to - you guessed it - interact with the thing that up till then, had done nothing.

3. Ignoring common sense. All I can say here is "who the hell willingly climbs into a crematorium-sized furnace?" Or if a person is investigating a mystery and finds a trove of informational papers but is only allowed to read one of them, would s/he think it's possible to come back and read more later? (see game world logic)

4. Ignoring established player motivation: Having had the player character insist multiple times that he refused to leave the house until the mystery was solved, a puzzle solution shouldn't then be contingent upon him leaving.

5. And lastly...persnickety/redundant puzzle solutions. If you already have a rag in your inventory, you shouldn't have to find an equivalent but DIFFERENT rag to complete a puzzle.

The designers often seemed not to take the time to consider what they to might actually do in the situation and instead invented contrived circumstantial puzzles that were just irritating to figure out. All told, this game was an exercise in frustration and I was severely disappointed.

What happened to the 'End of the Story'???

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: February 05, 2008
Author: Amazon User

It was a very difficult game to get anywhere. It hung up all the time and then you had to start over. Every once in a while you would stumble over something and think, "Great, now we're getting somewhere!" alas, then it went back to boring and repetitive. I will say that it was 'spooky'. And I really wanted to know the ending. I did finish it and then sat there and wondered how it ended. It just seemed to run out of steam and a lot of the things that seemed so interesting were just dropped. Never explained or 'wrapped up'. It was like taking on a complicated jigsaw puzzle and getting to the very end only to find that too many pieces are missing to complete it satisfactorily.
Maybe I'm too critical or expect too much but I thought the ending would be a WOW rather than something so mundane.

I Wanted to Like this Game

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: January 11, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I really wanted to like this game, but I eventually found the problems I had with it over-rode any enjoyment I was getting.

The setting was gorgeous, the storyline spooky, and the music (something that will often bother me) was completely appropriate.

However, the controls were wonky and the panning (even on the highest setting) was unforgivably slow. I am a hard-core adventure game fan, but this tried my patience to the point that I gave up on the game, something I have never done. It was getting to the point that I could get up and make myself a sandwich before the game panned to where I needed it to be to get to another room. The game offers a feature to correct for this - which I tried - but I couldn't use it, as it rendered the game virtually unnavigable.

It really is a shame. If the game had been set up like Darkfall (it reminded me a great deal of both Darkfalls) as far as navigation is concerned, I could easily see it being one of the best adventure games I had played in a while. But, unfortunately, I cannot handle feeling out of control of my game, and this was the case here. I would stop my mouse at the place I needed the pointer to stop, and the pointer would swing wildly past that point. Opening doors (once I made it to them) became a massive chore.

I sadly cannot recommend this game for anyone with my level of patience or lower. And I really feel bad about that.

This game is so boring.

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 3
Date: January 30, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I have to agree with the reviewer Mystery Maven. I have played many adventure games and Scratches has to be one of the most boring ever. The first day of this game is painfully boring. It's like torture with nothing happening. It's just searching through rooms in a dull house, examining everything again and again, opening every drawer in the house, placing a few phone calls, mailing a letter...etc. I had to force myself to stay interested and keep going. It's hard to stay awake playing this game. Yes, it picks up a little on the second day but the first day is so excruciatingly dull that by the time the second day finally rolled around I was not into it anymore. The first day is really that bad. It ruins the game for me.

You also have to do certain things to trigger the game so you can continue.. like searching every inch of the house looking for candles before you are allowed to make a phone call to progress. Also, each of the many doors that you open has a cutscene and sometimes these cutscenes will get stuck. I had the game freeze up during some of these and I had to control alt delete and restart the game. You will also be opening the same doors over and over and over again. This gets old after a while.

I just got through playing one of the best adventure games ever, "Darkness Within, In Pursuit of Loath Nolder". Scratches seriously pales in comparison.

Creepy, dark, and flakey...not in a good way...

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: May 20, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Know that I love to watch people play point and clicks because I love the graphics and like the feel of the game being like a movie. I buy point and clicks so that both my wife and I can enjoy them. We also like a game that has a good mystery and a jump factor like any good thriller should. In scratches we were very pleased with the graphics, music, & overall mood of the game. There are two major drawbacks though. The first was that even though we had a screaming PC to run the game on, we still had several crashes that taught the meaning of Save-Try-n-Die. The second problem was the clues and content that would allow the game to move forward. Had we not found a walkthrough to assist with the overwhelming puzzles & clues, this game would've been a complete bust. On the positive side of things, we loved the dark content and turned off the lights for this game. A storm was brewing outside one night and we found ourselves jumping with several scenes - great creep out factor and a wonderful scare factor. Horror enthusiasts - need not apply; this game is for sure dark, but not a game that will make you jump. Just turn up your speakers and get ready for the creepy audio. A nice feature that was also displayed was the ability to mandate whether the player wishes to use the director's cut version or the standard version - very nice and thank you to whoever setup the game in such a way!

Here's how I conducted my start rating:
1) Scripting & dialog was mediocre; however the ambient & background sound track is excellent
2) Graphics performed well; see next item though
3) Overall performance was less than good; several crashes. Be sure to keep saving after each accomplishment, this was a topic that lost a star for my review
4) Storyline was good and will keep you guessing.
5) Clues, hints, and adaptability basically will require a walkthrough this aspect also lost a star in my review

Know that this game is way worth the $20 and the game play options listed in the beginning are heaven sent; did I happen to mention how cool that option is and that other game companies should model after that?...anyway...good creepy game, the crew just needs to work on stability and playability.

A haunting vacation you'll never forget...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 9 / 9
Date: September 09, 2007
Author: Amazon User

In the independently developed Scratches, you play as Michael Arthate, a British horror writer who's hard-pressed to finish his sophomore novel. In an attempt to seek inspiration, you arrange to stay at a dilapidated Victorian manner in the English countryside. The next three days will change your life forever. If I had to sum up Scratches in one word, it would be dark. Dark ambiance, dark motivations, dark secrets await you.

The game is set in the year 1976, and during the course of your investigations you'll revisit the shocking past of Blackwood Manor. Feverish dreams (or are they reality?) keep you from sleeping, and there are sounds that can't be explained away by creaky old houses. You are drawn deeper and deeper into the mystery of James Blackwood and his misfortunes. The only sound in the manor is the grandfather clock, the squeak of ancient stairs, and your lonely footsteps...until night falls.

The game's Argentinian creators Agustín Cordes and Alejandro Graziani are horror fanatics, and their devotion to their craft shows in loving homage to Lovecraft and Easter Eggs that poke fun at other adventure games. Scratches truly shines in creating a foreboding (dare I say downright evil??) atmosphere without gore. At times, the horrifying music by Cellar of Rats makes your hair stand on end when you realize that you're not alone. Every small nuance has been seen to, from the reflection of light in cut crystal to the trinkets that line the house. Blackwood Manor is almost an art museum, what with the numerous reproductions of famous paintings. Although the prerendered environments are lush and lifelike, the animations left a lot to be desired, but hey, this is an independent developer's first game, so I'm not going to fault them on that. Like many horror games, there are "standard" areas to explore, like a crypt, chapel, greenhouse, cellar and garage (after playing Scratches, you might avoid going into your basement for a while). You may also recognize a familiar name in the credits: Jonathan Boakes, famed creator of Dark Fall: The Journal and Dark Fall: Lights Out.

Although some reviewers complain that the first third of the game moves very slowly (you are mainly exploring the manor at this point), I found the pacing to be brilliant. Little clues gradually emerge as you scour the house looking for candles on your first night...stacks of old newspapers and faded scraps of paper start to raise questions. You're able to phone several outside sources for help as the game progresses: your friend Jerry, your secretary Barbara, and two other surprise guests that are directly involved in Blackwood Manor's shady past.

The puzzles are largely intuitive and inventory-driven (no combination locks or devilish slider puzzles, thank goodness). The inventory management is adequate, but you do acquire a bloated inventory by game's end, with no way to get rid of extra objects.

Scratches: Director's Cut features a patch, but I still found mouse performance to be severely laggy on an above-minimum-specs laptop, and a very frustrating lag on opening any doors that resulted in minute-long lockups every time I tried to enter or exit a room. Otherwise, I didn't run into any crashes or other bugs.

This is the Director's Cut, which features improved resolution on the prerendered graphics, an alternate ending, and an additional brief chapter called The Final Visit, where you visit Blackwood Manor in the present day shortly before it's to be demolished. If you don't already own Scratches, this is the version to get.

Fans of horror and adventure will enjoy Scratches. If you like Scratches, also check out indie Barrow Hill: Curse of the Ancient Circle. Nucleosys is to be commended on a job well done!

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