Point And Click Adventure Treads Well-worn Ground
Point and click adventures have given us some of the best gaming moments of the past few decades. And although they have fallen a bit out of style as of late, they can still push the envelope if they bring something new to the table or present a really compelling storyline. Unfortunately, Book of Unwritten Tales does neither. While it’s not a bad game, it treads the same ground we’ve all seen and played a million times over. And having an average game in a somewhat unpopular genre is not a recipe for success.
The adventure starts with a cut scene of a gremlin writing in a book. Here is where I noticed the first of many audio issues. I was unable to understand over half of what the gremlin said due to the background music overriding the voice acting.
Finally the music volume lowered as some kind of goblin (or orc, they all look alike to me) walked in and started talking. Audio error two, cheesy voice acting in nearly all the characters. The goblin’s (or orc’s) voice was so irritating I could have swore my ears started to bleed. After enduring the seemingly never ending rant, the game continued on with the gremlin being taken prisoner.
As they are making their way towards the crudely drawn pink dragon, I got to meet the first character I’d be using, which turned out to be an elf. Somehow I wasn’t surprised by this new development. It fit in with the generic tone the game was setting.
The next cut scene showed the dragon flying through some snowy mountains before zooming in on my character hanging on to the dragon. After jumping rope to rope like Tarzan I made it to a little wooden platform where the gremlin was in a cage. After going through a few dialogues I hatched a plot to free the gremlin by cutting the ropes holding his cage.
After the imprisoned gremlin gave me a whip, because most prisoners have weapons with them, I tried to be Indiana Jones by using the whip as a rope. To my surprise, it worked, and after playing MacGyver and making a fishing rod from some string and a stick, I managed to get a sword to cut the rope. I cut the rope, sending the gremlin and his cage free falling towards the snowy ground.
With another quick cut scene it switched to the next character as the gremlin’s cage hit the ground. Shortly afterwards the mediocrity spiral continued. As I worked farther through the game it began to wear on me to the point my fiancée had to make me a pot of coffee to keep me awake.
Overall this game is a middle of the road point and click adventure.
I enjoyed the sarcastic humor and occasional cheesy references. Unless you are a die hard point and click adventure type of player, you probably won’t find anything too new here.
If you are curious, then you can play a sneak peek at unwritten-tales.com. I give this game a 3 out of 5 GiN Gems. It’s not bad. It’s just nothing to really write home about.