There is quite a bit of inventory to pick up and use along the way. Some inventory items are easy to spy, others not so much. Where things get really tricky is when you start trying to figure out where to use some of it. The game gives you the option to play with hotspots turned on, which I did. What this means is that a thin black box appears around objects or interactive areas. This is helpful when simply wandering the streets of Anacapri, but it only helps marginally with the puzzles, as there's no indication that an inventory item can be used there. If you don’t just plunk something down randomly at times, just to check it out, you might completely overlook it as a viable option. This wouldn't be so bad if it was more clear where items need to go, but it is far from obvious at times what to do with the items in your possession. On an island the size of Anacapri, this is a problem.

The interface isn't the only obstacle, however. There are many times when more exposition or clues are needed to let you know what to do next, as your direction is often unclear. The designers do pepper clues throughout the game, but some are so obtuse that you just won't realize what the reference is meant for. Some puzzles require jumping in and out of the dream world mid-puzzle, a scenario for which I felt the game had poorly prepared me. And I am not talking about two or three difficult puzzles; I mean that the vast majority are at this level of difficulty. While certainly not opposed to challenging puzzles, a better variety would have helped the game greatly. No doubt some players will relish the opportunity to contantly chew over what to do next. I suspect, though, that the majority of gamers will find the sheer amount of contemplation required to be exhausting. For me, I started to feel that this game could be another Blue Ice, a beautiful but deadly difficult game.

One of the strengths of the game is that is has a large number of characters to interact with. Character animations consist of static images of real people in a series of fluid poses; it has sort of a stop-motion feel to it. The characters provide the player with a great deal of information and sometimes objects that you will need. However, these exchanges are one-sided. They talk and you listen. You don’t have the ability to ask questions.

Unfortunately, the character interaction also highlights one of the game's major flaws. Originally made in Italian, Anacapri shows some serious localization problems, particularly in the area of voice work, which teeters on laughable. There are a couple of characters who rise above the median, but the large majority sound like the actors were reading directly from a script they had never seen before. In particular, the voice of Roman Emperor Augustus will convince you it's done by the same guy who does Porky Pig. Not the best choice for a man who was supposed to have led the Empire. Most dialogue is delivered in a halting style, which suggests that either most of these people are not professionals or had inadequate time to rehearse with the script (or both). While this might be understandable from the perspective of a small developer, for any commercial game this element should be far more polished than it is. Even smaller independent games like the Carol Reed series are ahead of Anacapri by comparison.

The localization problems also factor into the in-game reading material, as the many notes and letters you find are full of grammatical errors. As a teacher, I can’t abide this, but any gamer would find this type of slapdash work to be unacceptable, if not unforgivable. There's simply no excuse not to have properly edited the content for such things.

The sound work is shaky in other spots, as well, though it does seem to pick up the further you get into the game. The ambient sound is fine, but the attempt at creating a small soundtrack is not always as successful. There are a couple of pieces that sound like they were put together by someone on a Yamaha with high school band experience. The only time the music rises to the occasion is with songs that sound culturally native to the island, as if such songs had been played for years and could not be performed incorrectly here.

With such wonderful source material to use, Anacapri: The Dream was already ahead before it entered the race. The sheer number of slides in the game must have taken countless hours to photograph, and the effort pays off handsomely. But it seems that the designers relied too much on the beauty of their setting to enchant gamers. Despite the incredible scenery, this level of dedication was not extended to the rest of the game's elements, seriously hurting its credibility in a commercial marketplace. So while the developers can be lauded for a job visually well done, and Anacapri will no doubt acquire a cult following and a steadfast, hardcore fan base due to its level of difficulty, the vast majority of gamers are probably better off spending their leisure time elsewhere.