This lack of a sense of history extends to the characterization. In particular, Joey scarcely seems different from his thirty-year older self. Alright, so as a ghost he obviously doesn't age, but one would still think that post-mortem existence would leave some mark on his personality. As it turns out, his interactions with Lauren Blackwell are exactly the same sitcom bickering his relationship with Rosa consisted (or will consist) of. There are minor differences in their dynamic, but they are subtle indeed, to the point that this could easily have been another Rosa and Joey adventure.

On an individual level, Joey Mallone is nevertheless the character that comes off best, admirably holding up the spooky end of the ghostbusting duo. Though his personality remains unchanged, his Prohibition-era wise guy affectation has been toned down since the first game, and his more active role in this outing gives him a chance to demonstrate a greater range of emotions. Returning as the voice of Joey, Abe Goldfarb (who also played Rabbi Stone in The Shivah ) shows himself eminently up to the task.

Lauren Blackwell is revealed as a tougher cookie than her niece will grow up to be. She is more confident, more aggressive, and far less awkward. Other than that, her character remains curiously blank. Throughout the game she suffers from generic ennui, but when the end credits roll we are no closer to understanding her blues than we were at the opening titles. Sometimes it seems as if chain smoking is meant to substitute for real character development. Dani Marco, an actor with a number of film and TV credits to her name, does the most with the part, and radiates charisma whenever she gets to act anything other than fed up.

When it comes to the secondary characters, the performances are far more variable. A number of the actors are very good, but a few are distractingly bad. In particular, the old women are all played as cackling caricatures, and don't sound remotely convincing. The recording quality is adequate, except that on Lauren's lines you can frequently hear the actor blowing into her microphone.

By far the most impressive aspect of the audio is the soundtrack. Thomas Regin provides a melancholy jazz score that is a pleasure to listen to on its own, and never intrudes on the other aspects of the game. The background tracks complement their respective scenes seamlessly, and the game happily provides several opportunities for musical numbers to take center stage. A lack of memorable hooks arguably stops it from ascending to true classic status—barely; but this is unquestionably a first rate soundtrack.

On the visual side, Blackwell Unbound retains the low-resolution, VGA-like style of its predecessor. This time around, most of the in-game art is provided by Erin Robinson, whom some may know for her Underground game Spooks . She gives Unbound a simpler, less sophisticated look that is not without a certain naïve charm, but that underwhelms following the sleek pixel art of The Blackwell Legacy. Many of the exterior backgrounds feel unfinished; sketchy and with occasional Photoshop smudges. Even though the game is set at night, there are no deep shadows, and locations that should be hauntingly atmospheric are not the least bit spooky, just a bit dim. The interiors, on the other hand, are nicely detailed and sharply drawn in vivid colors.

The uneven quality extends to the character sprites. Care has been taken with Joey and Lauren, but the sprite for one of the major secondary characters, a crazy old lady, looks almost inept. Although the characters are bigger than in Legacy, they seem less detailed and expressive. Somehow they lack the dynamic verve seen in the first game. That is not to say that the graphics are bad, precisely. Just that while The Blackwell Legacy could pass for a major commercial release from the early '90s, Blackwell Unbound looks more like an ambitious Underground title.

To be fair, the characters seeming less expressive probably has a lot to do with the fact that the character portraits have been eliminated from conversations. The game's micro-low production budget is sorely felt in the omission of this simple yet effective device. It is the only major change to the user interface, the game sticking to a simple and intuitive point-and-click model. I didn't come across any fatal bugs or serious glitches, but on a couple of occasions the conversation logic was slightly off, allowing me to talk about things I hadn't learned yet. A small number of typos must also have slipped through testing.

Finally, Wadjet Eye Games again provides a number of juicy extra features. These include concept art, bloopers from the recording sessions, additional music tracks that didn't make it into the game, and most substantially, a commentary track by writer and designer Dave Gilbert, joined by artist Erin Robinson. The commentary, which is interesting and highly likeable, makes replaying the game almost obligatory. All the extras apart from the commentary must be unlocked as in-game Easter eggs, which just adds to the fun.

Blackwell Unbound is easy to criticize, but hard to really dislike. Although it improves on some aspects of the design of The Blackwell Legacy, notably by making Joey a playable character and increasing the doing-to-talking ratio, it introduces a number of problems of its own, such as an ending that doesn't make sense and a more or less broken notebook system. On top of that, the presentation suffers from the game's low budget, and the whole package just doesn't have that polished, professional feel established by Legacy. Still, the bottom line is that Blackwell Unbound is fun to play. At $10 US (for a 150MB download—the game is also available, with the soundtrack, on CD-ROM for $20), it's not at all a bad deal for fans of the first game. Anyone looking to see what this Blackwell thing is all about, on the other hand, should check out The Blackwell Legacy first. Hopefully, Wadjet Eye Games can take the lessons learned on the first two games, improve the production values, and make the third Blackwell title a truly great game.