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Good Story with abysmal delivery

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: August 17, 2008
Author: Amazon User

If you like Doyle and Lovecraft, than this nice mix will definitely suit you, assuming you don't put an ax through your computer first. The story starts out simply enough, with the servant of a nearby neighbor disappearing. This sets Holmes off on a quest that takes him from London to Switzerland to the US, on the trail of a sect of Cthulu worshippers.

The gameplay is where this nice startoff falls flat on its face. While the mystery parts of it are tolerable, the mini puzzles and mix-n-match inventory is where it truly enrages a player. You can pick locks, but only some, the guards can see through walls and doors, and finding the right piece of inventory to advance the story is a familiar hated enemy for any adventure game fan.

Simply put, you'll need a walkthrough, no if ands or buts, to spot the one piece of data or overlooked interactive piece of environment. either that, or you'll need microscopic eyes and an ability to see the spirites you can actaully interface with.

Enough soapboxing for one review. The voices are great, though some of the extras were awful. When you hear groaning thats more pornographic than painful, you'll know what I mean. The atmoshpere is just right, a median between too creepy and too cartoonish. The graphics are barely passable, but the group, being fairly new, can be forgiven for some start off stumbles. Assuming they learn from their mistakes, their next release could be a 4-5 star.

Favorite Mystery Adventure Game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: August 13, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I love this game! I loved the face-off combination of Sherlock Holmes and the supernatural forces of Cthulu, it's very original. Also, I personally enjoyed the dark subject matter, the gore, and the scenery...it emphasized the pure evil of the enemy and made the story that much spookier. The voice acting was great, the adventure was fun to unravel, and I think the graphics were awesome; the use of an all 3D landscape makes it even more engaging.

There are a few cons, but not enough to turn me off to playing the game again in the future. The background music isn't too great...it's just a bit of ambiance between chapters and during dialog scenes, and nothing much other than that. Also, if you don't really pay attention to all the clues, it's hard to figure out exactly what to do next, especially when you are asked a question by one of the characters and you need to type an answer. I had to use walkthrough websites just to figure out the answers, and it doesn't allow you to opt out and answer later. If you don't answer it at the moment, you're SOL. Another problem is that the controls are a bit hard to figure out -- the best idea would be to customize them as you see fit and really try to get a feel for everything before heading out on the adventure. Lastly, if you don't play it on a computer with 1 gig of ram, it is SLOOOOOOWWW. But most if not all computers come standard with 1 gig of ram now, so it's all good.

Anyway, I highly recommend this game, especially if you're into period games (as this is set in the late 19th c.) and are morbidly curious about the occult. Most gaming website have given it an 8 out of 10 and I would give this a 9. It's a great game for adults and definitely worth the money.

Sherlock Holmes Puzzler with Great Atmosphere

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: July 13, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I enjoyed Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened and recommend it to adventure/puzzle game fans, particularly if you enjoy the Sherlock Holmes world, and moreso if you enjoy the Call of Cthulhu mythos of HP Lovecraft.

The atmosphere of the game blends these two themes very well, though ultimately it is a Holmesian quest and not a race against madness that takes you across London, Switzerland, New Orleans, and up the Scottish coast for the finale.

The puzzles range from easy to very difficult, sometimes the latter because of the arcane nature of Holmes and Watson uncovering all the clues at your feet with the magnifying glass so that they can continue, even if you've already figured things out. In this case, I had to refer to a walkthrough online to get unstuck. Otherwise, the most challenging puzzles did a good job of keep me engaged and trying everything I could think of to solve the next move.

The game world is 1st person 3-D with inventory management, in which you pick up items to use later, often combining them to new items in MacGyver-esque innovation.

The voice acting is not Shakespearean but I did like the feel of the Holmes and Watson personas and you meet a diversity of other characters along the way.

I'll be picking up the next adventure, Sherlock Holmes: Nemesis because the feel of the game and a majority of puzzles were well done.

Absolutely terrible

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

Graphics:
For an adventure game, the graphics are average and acceptable. The textures are good for the most part; however, some of the scenes are overly dark and appear washed out and bland.

Gameplay:
Painfully bad. The voice acting is stiff, unimaginative and absolutely annoying at several points. Hearing Sherlock Holmes's line "I have no reason to go over there" is the single most annoying line I've ever heard out of an adventure game. The characters are also flat and one-dimensional; the developers chose to be WAY TOO LITERAL in their take on the Sherlock Holmes storyline. If this character was derived back in the 1890's, it certainly shows in this game.

Controls:
Buggy. At times, the character will begin to drift aimlessly and one will have to hit the 'Esc' key and the directional keys to have him move in the proper direction.

Value:
This game should be no more than $15-$20 dollars MAX. If you paid more, you got screwed. Unless you enjoy hearing annoying dialogue, bland graphics, unresponsive, buggy controls and flat, boring characters, there's almost NO REPLAY ABILITY WHATSOEVER.

OVERALL:
Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened is a boring, flat, tedious game with terrible dialogue, one-dimensional characters, and a buggy controls system hosting bland graphics. Stay away.

P.S. The Sherlock Holmes thing needs to be spruced up a bit. Time for he and Watson to get modern. I've never been so annoyed by a video game before playing this one. If you are seeking interesting, well-done adventure games, see Jane Jensen's Gabriel Knight series under Sierra On-Line.

It was basically fun

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: June 15, 2008
Author: Amazon User

The voice acting was pretty decent. The settings were detailed and looked good. The gameplay was very linear which is either good or bad depending on how you like your games. The story was fine though the ultimate bad guy kind of came out of nowhere and it left me feeling a bit disconnected. It wasn't all that scary though. The only real problem I had was with the graphics. After I'd been playing for a while the textures would go wonky and I'd have to save and restart the game. On the plus side one of the bad guys does an interpretive dance and Watson shoots an unarmed man so... I'm glad I got it fairly cheap. I'd suggest it if you can do the same and you're looking for a few hours to kill.

Nice surprise - Jumped a Few Times Too!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: May 20, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I bought this game being very skeptical; however the graphics, storyline, & dark atmosphere kept the attention span. Know that I like to watch people play point and clicks just as though I'm watching a movie unfold. Note to anyone who's frustrated with back-tracking, you'll be doing a lot as well as go over material that's not very obvious to find; which is why I knocked off a star from my rating. I'm `very' experienced with point and clicks and truly enjoy the dark image that they `can' provide if well written and the right mood is set. When both my wife and I nearly jumped out of our skins with a few scenes, I was hooked! Here's how I conducted my start rating:
1) Pretty good scripting & dialog, the voice acting was well done
2) Graphics performed well and for sure conveyed a `lights out' feel to the game - well done!
3) Overall performance of the game to include installation was solid
4) Storyline was good and keeps the viewers attention (not too confusing)
5) Clues, hints, and adaptability to continue game play was harsh (for sure requires a walkthrough; nixed this star due to many clues being too obscure.

Note that my wife and I love to get a good scare out of our games and we look forward to the next installment of this point-n-click. Before buying, I'm sure we'll be researching walkthroughs for those next to impossible clues that we'll inevitably overlook.

Great Game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: April 06, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Once I figured out how to play the game I was able to get into it. I really enjoyed the graphics. It was suppose to be guesome but that didn't bother me because its just a game. You just follow the clues to solve the mystery.

Painfully bad

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: March 28, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I played the previous Holmes adventure and really enjoyed myself. This one departs from the last in a number of ways. Firstly, it's in a FPS format, so the graphics are blocky and the animations jerky (why, why, why on a PC?!!!). I wasn't impressed with any of the graphics in this game. And of course, it's stomach churning. I'm confused why this type of interface is used, as there aren't any real actions scenes where such an interface MAY be useful (such as running around shooting monsters with unlimited ammo).

Second, the hot spots were a pain. You often can't tell where the hot spots are going to be located until you get very close and see the icon change. This ends up requiring sliding along a wall or staring at the ground while moving (some more nausea) & wasting time getting close to everything, just in case. You can't just enter a room and observe it to see what you want. You have to search it with a fine tooth comb. In real life, that kind of searching would be appropriate for a detective, but in the game, it's just a pain.

The game itself is painfully linear. I'm usually OK with some linear games if the story unfolds nicely and the game plays nice with me. This one was a head banging fight from start to finish. There were plenty of times I KNEW I needed an object, but wasn't allowed to pick it up. I had all the clues available to know I needed the object, but still I had to play through a whole bunch of other actions in the order it was written, then go back and re-do earlier actions to activate the item for pick up. This was terribly annoying and caused me great confusion more than once.
I was often stuck trying to figure out what I was supposed to do, rather than enjoy the environment and the story. Hints are nearly non-existent and they are desperately needed since it's so linear. Sometimes in the beginning Holmes will say what needs to be done (usually the obvious), but after that, there's nothing. If you want to find out the hint, you have to open the dialog section where all the dialogs you ever had are kept, and find the pertinent entry. You can't just turn to Watson who is trailing behind you every where and talk to him. He just says something stupid like "What now Holmes?" over and over again. I think the mark of a really bad game like this is when there is an official, extremely detailed walk through available. Nothing else. No hints, no one else's version of a walk through, just one. And even with that there were 2 sections I was stuck on trying to get the game to move forward.

Voice acting left me wanting, not that the inflection was so bad, most in fact were good. But Holmes sounds like a non-Brit actor trying to sound Brit. Some of the pronouncements made me cringe. Watson however was bang on. The actor had a very pleasant voice, very British, and was almost always able to get the mood right. He sounds the way I imagine Watson to sound.

The music was sub-par, especially considering the last game's beautiful classical music which matched so well to the story. Well, except for one happy piece near the end. I think they were going for scary, but it just came across as lazy and boring, so boring that I can't remember one motif, sound, or effect.

And now to the worst offense. This game is supposed to be atmospheric and scary. It's not even a little. The areas where you expect to find people are completely void of any life, which left the "scary" abandoned areas just like the rest of the game. There is some gore, but again it's so blocky as to be funny (the blood is always fire engine red). The expected "monster" never materializes, which I found to be the most egregious of offenses. Throughout the game are hints that there will be a monster, as well as idols of the beast (so that we already know what it looks like), but in the big ending, there was nothing. I'm tempted to pretend that they wanted to instill the idea that it was all a delusion on the bad guy's part, but it looked more like they just didn't feel like putting the effort into it. In fact, the whole thing feels that way.

At the end, Holmes sums up the whole game. It's as if the creators thought we were all too stupid to not remember the hours we wasted on this tripe. They were also kind enough to prime us for the next installment by mentioning a future evil whose face Holmes knows well. Well I wonder who/what that can be? It was such a ridiculous (and abrupt) 2 lines I actually laughed out loud.

Please, save your money on this one. I wish I could recommend someone buying it, as I really want to sell this junk, but I can't. Borrow it if you must, but don't waste both your time and money on this bomb.

I loved this game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 7
Date: February 11, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I really enjoyed this game. I am a frequent PC game player and I can say that this is at the top of my list.

The puzzles were not obscure and nonsensical like many games. I used what I learned from the game and didn't have to rely heavily on "cheat sights" like I have with other games to solve the puzzles.

One glitch is that you have to move just right to go some places.

I really enjoyed the eerie atmosphere and the gore. The graphics are great and the story is easy to follow. Great locations. Quick moving. I recommend this highly if you love a good spooky mystery.

Painfully Linear

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: February 02, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I enjoyed the Lovecratian themes within the story, and thought the voice acting of Watson and Holmes were great (indeed), but as previous reviewers have commented, the game requires you travel such a narrow path that it's downright distracting, even maddening at times. Pixel hunting, I've heard some call it... I enjoy puzzle games, but I don't enjoy having to figure out how to work the game as whole as a puzzle. Others in this set have commented on this lacking better than me.

It wasn't as fightening or off-putting as I thought it may be. It has an M rating, which is a borderline call, in my opinion. Drop a few of the dead bodies, and it could be a children's game, graphically.

Overall, the game was not that difficult, and had a great Nineteenth Century atmosphere. The creepy Lovecraft themed underworld that the duo uncover is really what compelled me to continue and finish the game. My dissatisfaction with the game is with the suffocatingly linear approach throughout the entire game-- I even had to start over once because I needed an item from a previous chapter and had saved over it... You'd think developers and programmers would be smarter than this by now.

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