If you're eternal we guess you have time to waste?
look, the way we see it this adventure puzzle genre of games is passé. it's a fossil that marks the evolutionary step between the text-based adventure game and the modern role play game. this genre of gaming a one point represented the pinnacle of the gaming industry's capacity for fun, save pong and pac man.
we guess it's nostalgic for some... guess it delights people that are overwhelmed with satisfaction finishing crossword puzzles and word searches in the sunday newspaper... but... we just don't see the fun in it.
thought the goth motif and story would help... so far... it's not doing anything for us.
graphics are... alright... we suppose. the backdrops have to be accessible for that whole cursor crawling point and click search deal that has somehow come to be confused with "adventure," but they look nice. nice like... the best most interactive 3x5 glossy cardboard postcard you could imagine.
the models aren't that pretty... but how pretty do they have to be for what you're doing? we especially love how van helsing wears the exact same obligatory big black long flowing overcoat and suit everywhere, including the sun bleached desert. way to blend in with the locals?
the music plays over and over and never quite fits whatever it is you're doing. it seems a little too lively for staring at walls looking for something to click on. the voice overs aren't that much better... we don't blame the voice actors as much, the dialogue is going for that victorian feel, but... it just doesn't seem right. maybe it is the voice actors fault? Might just have been an editing problem. Sometimes it's disjointed and the emotions sort of flip between the lines. Eh... if they had something worth saying it would be a problem.
the puzzles... are not intuitive. we guess we just can't get over how they go about squeezing in puzzles where there really is no reason for there to be a puzzle there. secret passages everywhere? how does dracula find the time to get anything done when he has to do an elaborate dial flipping, code collecting, key finding, lever pulling math/word problem just to get to his hello kitty diary. some of the puzzles... ugh... more trouble than their worth. if you don't do everything exactly right, if you don't follow the very specific absolutely linear path, you wait around indefinitely.
"You can't get ye flask!"
there's a cut scene with dracula and he laughs... the graphics shouldn't be that bad. his mouth wasn't made to smile, so he laughs all fake like a sock puppet. maybe we're just spoiled with all the good games with good graphics? these cut scenes would have looked pretty good in 1998... right now... eh... they sort of look like twisted metal 3's cut scenes.
we don't know what to say, this game isn't going to have any replay value at all. playing through it once is already sort of a chore, can't imagine wanting to play through for a second time... it'd be like a used coloring book by that point.
the difficulty is difficult to assess. it's point and click and solving puzzles... but to get to the puzzles you have to do a tedious dance of the cursor on every screen... and you better hope to god you don't miss something as stupid looking as a veil, a stack of papers, or a spool of thread. some of the puzzles would make macgyver go, "wtf do you think you're going to do with that?"
don't know what sort of people like this style of gaming, but it's just not doing anything for us... and by extension, this game specifically. vampires everywhere hang your heads in shame.
we can't give the game a zero... as much as we'd want to. we'd like to give it a much worse rating than we've given it already... guess it's a pity rating. they make these games, people must play them. we don't like them... can't understand the appeal... but... yeah... we've got to assert some benefit of the doubt on their behalf even if we totally don't agree there is anything fun about playing through a 100% linear game that just has you... point and click... on postcards...
ugh...
shame vampires, shame.