A nice point & click adventure game, set in a dark atmosphere. Discover the secrets hidden in Samuel's family.
The Black Mirror is described as a horror-mystery adventure, although I find that description to be somewhat misleading, as horror is an exaggeration.
Nevertheless, the game is set in a pretty dark atmosphere, as you take on the role of Samuel Gordon, a member of the Gordon family who returns to his family mansion after the passing away of his grandfather, who has supposedly committed suicide. Of course, Samuel does not believe this and he decides to investigate what has really happened.
The game
The game is a classic point-and-click adventure game and getting the hang of it is really simple.
As mentioned, you are Samuel Gordon, grandson of the lately departed William Gordon, who has also left behind a wife and a son, presumably your uncle. Since William lived in a big mansion, you of course also get to meet the butler, the stable hand and the gardener.
After a short time of playing, you’ll find that Samuel had left the mansion many years ago never to return again, but he got not ignore the death of his grandfather. You’ll also find that Samuel often has headaches and what appear to be visions or disturbing dreams.
There are many aspects of the game which will be liked by true adventure fans, the somewhat harder puzzles in the game that surface every now and then, being an important one.
Besides the puzzle solving, the game does indeed play like a classic point-and-click adventure as you need to talk to and use and combine objects a lot to progress.
The game is pretty mysterious indeed as you’ll investigate the death of William which won’t be the only death you’ll encounter through the six chapters of the game. And I’m not just talking about your own death, which can occur at some points in the game.
I am only aware of one point in the game which has a time limit on it and although you have enough time to solve that part, it can be a bit repetitive because you’ll have to figure out what to do in that limited amount of time. But this shouldn’t be too hard (I got it the second time). If you like mysteries that are set in a dark atmosphere, this is certainly a game you’ll want to play.
The main character however, is not one that I sympathized with, however. Often I found him to be pretty insensitive or quite frankly rude (tsss, aristocrats). This does not only go for the main character, but for many others in the game as well.
I cannot say much more about the game itself, without giving too much away about the story. I can tell you this however: you may want to find the ending a bit of an anti-climax. I personally wouldn’t go that far, but I can imagine that you’d expect a bigger ending than this. I however, found part of the (near) ending pretty predictable, as I already had figured that part out for myself somewhat earlier in the game.
The story of the game isn’t too bad however. Of course you could say it’s farfetched, but hey: it is a mystery adventure game, so what do you expect? Not that it is that highly supernatural or anything, but there are some supernatural elements in the game.
Nonetheless, an adventure game is an adventure game, so if you’re a fan of point-and-click and you’re not frightened off by mystery adventure games, then you’ll probably amuse yourself with this game.
A thing that I particularly liked about the game is that you can travel around with a map. Although this isn’t that big of a deal, it gives you the idea (like Broken Sword 1 does) that the game is somewhat less linear, although it is of course quite linear due to the fact that it is an adventure game.
There is also an aspect about the game which I found to be quite annoying. At certain points in the game you’ll have to wait for another character to perform a task for you. Since that is the only way to progress in the game, you’re stuck until that person performs that action for you. The actions seem only to be triggered by you walking out of the screen with that character and then back in again to ask that person if he’s performed his or her task already. Only after a certain number of you asking the person, the task seems to be done. You can imagine that this is quite annoying, since apart from walking around and asking the character numerous times about it, you can do nothing.
The controls The controls couldn’t be more simple: you use your left mouse button and on very few occasions you use your right mouse button. The left button is used for almost anything: walking, using, talking, picking up, looking, etc. On some occasions the right mouse button will let you examine a person/object closer (as it does with all objects in your inventory), but often nothing happens when you right-click an object. There are very few occasions when you use your right mouse button to turn certain objects in your inventory, but it’s pretty easy to find out for yourself.
The inventory is very straightforward as well: move your mouse pointer to the bottom of the screen and the inventory appears.
The options screen can be accessed by moving the mouse pointer to the top right of the screen.
The graphics
According to the information I have, the game was released in 2003, which make the graphics okay. They’re not exceptionally good, but they aren’t bad either: they’re decent.
Backgrounds are in 2D, which gives you some pretty detailed surroundings set in a dark atmosphere.
The characters appear to be in 3D, although I wasn’t too impressed by them. They lack expression and their movements aren’t very natural. But the graphics aren’t too bad.
The sound
There is some music in the game, but to be honest, I cannot recall how it went at this time. I think this tells you enough about how good the music was: okay, but not so good that you’d remember it the day after.
As for the voices: yes, once again a game that I have in German. I thought the voices were done quite okay, though. Nothing unnatural about them actually. The funny thing is that in a few reviews I’ve read about the game, which were obviously about the English version of the game, it was said that the voices were absolutely horrible (I am not certain if the voices were originally in English, since the company that made the game is Czech I believe). Maybe this has something to do with the Germans having much experience with voice-overs and all that.
There’s nothing special to mention about the other background sounds and everything: they were okay, but not remarkable.
Overall
A decent adventure which could entertain you for some time. Especially if you like point-and-click adventures and if you’re into longer conversations. This game is also quite doable if you’re new to the genre: with the exception of a few puzzles the game is not too hard. So if you see this one somewhere in the bucket bin, and the above applies to you, go ahead and give it a try.