They put a .. ”what” … in my adventure game?!

Now time out for a small rant about puzzles. I have watched with amusement and occasional irritation, as people attempt to narrowly construe what is an appropriate or recognizable challenge in an adventure game. I think that a puzzle/challenge exists whenever you have to think, strategize or finesse a victory over a challenge. I would add that defeating this challenge should also advance the game in some noticeable way. Now the puzzle may be abstract, it may be mechanical, it may be verbal and it may be physical. The shoot the arrow through the hole in the rock in Timelapse comes to mind as a classic strategic physical puzzle. But assuming a loose adherence to the two conditions above, if it hits those marks, to this reviewer it is a puzzle.

This leads to the controversy over Revistronic’s decision to place a must win shooting gallery puzzle in the game. This is a difficult item to categorize. On the one hand it is an arcade-style challenge, complete with graduated levels and all that jazz. But, the degree of difficulty in the levels varies according to how well or poorly you shoot your targets in the earlier rounds. By thinking a bit about the rewards for the puzzle and adapting your game accordingly, you can get an easier or harder challenge depending on your preference. This added strategy element turns this into more of a physical puzzle rather than just a straight “twitch” challenge. After painstakingly playing this every which way to test out some things, I beat this easily enough after I made some calculated adjustments in my shooting. One thing worth noting for some players: For those with high-speed broadband access to the net, you might want to disable your net access and associated firewall as it plays havoc with running this part of the game. But whether it is beatable or not, the real question to me is should it be in the game at all?

I had a chat once with a developer about puzzle choices and they admitted liking a particular type of challenge even though they knew most adventure gamers did not share their love. So I asked, “Well, is this a game for you or a game for them?” Though I did not have a particularly hard time with this arcade-type puzzle, knowing how adventure gamers as a rule (even those who don’t mind them) would prefer or even insist that their games not have this type of puzzle, I have to ask, “ why put this in the game?” I think that even if some players tolerate this sort of challenge and maybe even a few others enjoy it, Wanted would have been more gamer friendly without it. And that is a reasonable request—to have a game that is enjoyable and engaging, rather than merely beatable. I think the game quality would have been raised a notch if this puzzle had just been eliminated.

A Likeable Tale

At the start of Wanted and through the first third of it, I felt it was very story light. However, as the game advanced, I came back around to warm up to this aspect of the game. It doesn’t have a tale full of detailed depth, but it was better than I thought at first and the ending is definite fun. It redeems the game in many aspects and gains back some favor with this gamer. Wanted has a cute plot, with a few little side ventures and even a few nods to the past. The story’s growing appeal has much to do with the developing characters and the increasingly better dialogues and cut scenes. Now again, this isn’t the deepest of plots, but then again neither were the Monkey Island games. But the game captivates at times and shows some solid charm. The initial storyline is beat the bad guys, save the homestead and get the girl. It evolves to include revealing a murderer, though you have a good idea of the killer from nearly the beginning. To top it all off, there are also some fun little vignettes that charmed: a son who really wishes his Dad was a bad guy about to be hung, rather than a simple farmer; or the bit about what getting the girl might really involve in the end; and other little witty observations along the way.

So we are at the trail’s end with good old Fenimore. How does Wanted measure up? Middling is what I would say. It has its fair share of misguided inclusions or errors in judgment, but it has sparkle and sure does look pretty. I was not thrilled with this game initially, perked up about midway through and by the end had to give it fair credit for what it did right. I also laughed myself silly one or two times and am very forgiving of a game that wins a genuine laugh.

I think that if you are a fan of Monkey Island styled games and badly need a fix of some great cartoon styled graphics, offbeat characters and insult sword – er –“Sarsaparilla” fighting then you will have a good time with this game. Otherwise, keep it in mind, but perhaps until after the current feast of better titles slows down. I do have high hopes for future efforts by Revistronic. They have a great new graphical style that is original and wonderful to experience. I think by focusing on all the things that were done well and letting go of a need to have a game fattened by busy work, their next game should be a solid hit.