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brief adventure log - inherit the earth: quest for the orb

i felt quite strongly about this game at first. it's been a While since i last played anything that needed scummvm. i should start writing down how i run into these games, or at least what makes me decide on picking them up, because i remember this wasn't on my list, i just ran into it purely by chance and i'm dying to know where because, well, what circle still talks about some old, time-discarded game like this

anyway, i googled it a little and man it looked stunning so i decided to pick it up. it's in eXo scummVM collection so i could just start playing on the spot

1994, the dreamer's guild of i have no mouth and i must scream fame or infamy, whichever way you look at it, don't let me down

the start of the game is beautiful. calling the art and atmosphere charming barely begins to describe it. enchanting is probably a better word. then it soon hits you with something a little different for adventure games, especially at the time, the isometric perspective!

general areas like towns or villages are drawn in an isometric perspective. i wouldn't have expected it but it turns out to be a pretty cool way of creating an alive feeling world. instead of having a few spread out, disjointed locations and a screen listing them all when you move to an exit, this is a great way to connect them all. sprinkle in the odd npc you can talk to with character and personality that may or may not be able to give you hints or nudges in different directions and you've got yourself a real alive feeling world. it's a really fantastic idea

i was so excited about this game for the first two pages of my notes. the village is full of houses you can actually walk in! another cool idea! if it's a small area like a house, instead of moving you to a different screen altogether it just overlays the room on your current screen. it's a great choice to make you feel like you're just checking in someplace. again, makes the whole place feel alive. the writing and voice acting are both equally charming. the story is kind of simple, it is more or less aimed at children and you can't hold it against the game, but it still feels great to experience

the third and final S tier game of this year i was talking about was kathy rain 2: soothsayer. we're not talking about kathy rain 2: soothsayer tonight

it feels great to experience. up to a point. eventually you make it out the village and into the world map. with like, nearly zero direction of where to go. i explored a little but then slowly but surely ran into the fatal issue of the game. it's all fucking mazes. everything. everywhere

i said it already it's a children's game. maybe due to that fact the puzzles are also somewhat simplistic. they're functionally all fetch quests. which wouldn't be theeee woooorst thing in the world if the game wasn't a maze made up of mazes. those charming isometric town maps i was gushing about? yeah that's a large area with 40 houses that all more or less look the same with tiny doors and unclear paths. go ahead, find the one you have business in next. the cute little settlement you need to find enter in order to talk to a single guy and literally nothing else? a LITERAL MAZE. it's impossible to find your way without a map. even with a map, it's so difficult to find your way without a walkthrough. even with a walkthrough, it's so TEDIOUS to walk from any point A to point B you need to walk to!

but then, oh boy, then it takes you out of the isometric view. a new kind of maze emerges. in different places you'll see yourself in a third-person-like perspective, seeing just the corridor ahead of you and maybe left and right turns if available. think dungeon master on the snes. you think isometric perspective mazes where your field of vision isn't that wide are bad? try these mazes where you have no frame of reference since all rooms look the same and you get disoriented if you try backtracking unless you draw a map of every choice you make

i dunno man, conceptually i like the idea of drawing maps and taking notes while playing. i don't think you should rely on your players doing it lest they spend 40 minutes running in circles staring at the what could be 100 different screens that all look the same. even more so, i don't think you should make your players navigate that maze multiple times and making it take still like 5 full minutes to go through once you solved it

these mazes take you out of the game so bad. at every step of the game after the initial maybe thirty minutes it's just tedious to play

about halfway through the game you can tell they've given up. i think they actually did though, i remember reading somewhere that the studio got purchased and they didn't know what to do with the game anymore and they just wrapped it up as quick as they could, though don't quote me on that. the world map becomes a maze too as when you're granted passage to the wider portion of the continent it like blows up in size and you're left wondering around for places to wonder around in. the fetch quests stop even having some attempt at a story behind them, instead solutions start flowing to the tune of "on this corner of the map on a random cliff you find an ancient keycard, that's just there and has been there for thousands of years, not blown by the wind or anything, it's just there and you have to run into it in order to unlock the door of this ancient facility on another corner of the map." nobody says a thing about a possible location of the keycard or that you might even need one. there's just, nothing. there's just keys spread around for you to pick up and use on locks spread somewhere else. that's it. that's the game

the dreamer's guild why did you let me down :(

it's such a shame. terrible, terrible shame. there was so much potential, so much charm, so much love and artistry poured into this. such a shame. it ended up in D tier, though only for how charming the art and music and writing is, otherwise it would've probably landed in E tier (F being the lowest)

vivmaeve (at) disroot (dot) org let's chat dear reader i may or i may not reply