"Rather elementary, my dear Watson" is not always the best way to make games.
I of course, used this opportunity to grab a couple adventure games I wanted to try for some time, namely Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened and Dracula: Origins. Now I have to admit I'm not a big fan of 3D-adventure games, and in truth haven't played any of the newer titles, like Sam & Max (episodic ones), Tales of Monkey Island, Sherlock Holmes, Nancy Drew etc., but I also can't say they're bad until I've tried them :D.
On paper this game sounds amazing. Sherlock Holmes investigating disappearances of lower class foreigners related to a mysterious sect that is trying to invoke an ancient dark diety -Cthulhu. Arthur C. Doyle meets H.P. Lovecraft. Freaking sweet right? We'll see...Story is compelling enough that you want to follow it to the end, taking you from London to Switzerland, Louisiana and Scotland and is in truth the only good side of this title. But that's fine, if the rest of it follows classic adventure game mechanic it'll will make for a good game, right ? Besides, only important thing in adventure is it's story and atmosphere. Unfortunately The Awakened shows how a game that fails on few key aspects can ruin overall experience and lessens the impact of its good sides. Nowhere is this more obvious that in the atmosphere. No matter how much you try to ignore it there are always some things that break your immersion, there is always that nagging voice yelling "WTF guys???". For example, during second chapter, when trying to pick up more than one lead pipe Holmes says something like "This is too heavy to carry more than one", while on the very next puzzle he picks up a whole table-trolley. And this keeps repeating through the entire game, character placing entire trees and ship masts in their pockets. Now, don't get me wrong, this is completely normal in adventure games, but this one is trying to take realistic and sensible route, not even scratching the surface of paranormal aspects of Chtulhu mythos but playing it safe. It's just lazy design. And game is riddled with such inconsistencies. There is this one puzzle towards the end of the game that really pissed me off. You're supposed to douse the poison gas with some random water filled container. So I picked up a bucket lying next to a ruined house that was miraculously empty despite the fact that it was raining heavily entire time I was on that island. So how to find water? God forbid you can fill it with sea water, being on the island and all, or just place it outside for two minutes, or indeed lower it to the underground river with one of the many ropes lying around. You need to use some random barrel behind the very house you found that bucket which is very easy to miss, especially if you're playing in first person. Oh yeah, main gimmick of the game is being able to easily switch between first and third person view (as long as it doesn't screw up the camera). Playing in first person makes navigating the environment easier, but will sometimes make you miss some items since the pick-up icon only appears at a certain angles. Third person makes locating those items easier, due to good camera positioning but makes transferring between screens annoying, as some times you won't be able to find the spot where which your cursor changes to transfer icon. Speaking of environments it's worth noting that this game avoids usual trap of cluttering the backgrounds with many unusable items to make them more detailed, but that's only because they're bland and lifeless. This is painfully obvious when you're exploring area around Baker street. There aren't many people;even during midday, only 2-3 NPCs to interact with, and it's quite clear they made very few character models.
Main reason why I'm bashing on this game is it's unused potential. Game doesn't get repetitive, but there are few moments where it's painfully obvious that minor gameplay changes could add so much to overall experience. There is one sneaking section which would have been so much better if the GAME HAD A FRIGGING sneak button instead of doing it automatically. You could crouch in the demo, why you can't do that in a full game is beyond me. Also a scene where you chase a thief down the streets of New Orleans would be awesome if you had full control and could jump. This way it just feels out of place and does nothing gameplay wise because guy will always wait for you to catch up. Truly, a worst thing you can do to a players is take control out of their hands. At several spots you take control of Watson. I don't know why these sections exist because Holmes is using him as a glorified errand boy having him do a couple of fetch quests. He's not really contributing,only pointing out how risky , dangerous and irresponsible some of Sherlock's ideas are . Oh yeah, he also shoots a guy at one point but since you can't control that it's barely worth mentioning. No using his doctoral expertise, no dissecting bodies, no exploring deep friendship he has with Holmes, nothing. Lack of ambition at it's finest.
I'm only gonna talk about technical stuff because most of my complaints can be countered with a fact that game was made by an indie studio. There are some things cannot be excused. Despite this being a "remastered" edition there is no widescreen support, and if you're using 16:9 monitor you'll need to edit .cfg file if you want to play it fullscreen (game is locked to 4:3 aspect ratio). Awful voice-acting and occasional poor dialogue writing can really break immersion and make you lose that feeling you're playing brilliant detective. Animation is pretty stiff, there are some audio problems (Holmes talking in Watson's voice while using certain items) and graphics aren't all that impressive . This however wouldn't matter if game had
So does the game ever come into it's own? Well yeah there are some decent puzzles (even though it's not always obvious what you need to do) and the story is interesting even if the end is a bit unsatisfying. At certain points you will have to decide where to go next, by examining documents and reports and then typing the destination with your keyboard. Solutions are pretty straightforward and not that difficult, but still offer great sense of accomplishment. Sections where you use your magnifying glass to search for clues at certain spots are highlights of the game and never become tedious.
So, after playing this one and reading up on other games in Sherlock Holmes series I came to the conclusion that Frogwares studios can't really play "we're indie" card anymore. After releasing several of these titles it's apparent they are doing just enough work to get by, all the while displaying worrying lack of ambition. Still if you can get past the lazy design and just enjoy the story it's worth picking up (on a sale). It's closest you'll ever be to being Sherlock Holmes.