Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

10 Hours or Less

The Bottom Line:

"Almost, but not quite"

Firstly I have to say I think its hilarious that Yahtzee's point and click horror games are associated with Erotica Island and Barbie Fashion Show. I'm sure that would make him happy(!)

The game picks up a few years after the original game 5 Days. In this game you control Trilby again (Clearly meant to be an idealized Yahtzee) as you try and track down the artifact from the first game. This is not a "point and click" like the first two games, or the one after this one, and I think it suffers for it. You move near object and type to interact. It is basically a text adventure with pictures (as poorly put as that was, the interface is the same). You walk in a direction with the direction buttons, and press them again to stop. I have seen this control mechanism used in other 2D adventure games, and as simple as it sounds, it isn't when you are used to holding down buttons to make characters walk. The 2D environments were slightly shoddy too, and at some points Trilby will get stuck on the wall when climbing the stairs. Frequently you are too far away from the object you want to interact with, and as my adventure game-savvy flatmate pointed out you could not shorten "examine" to "x", which is a bit frustrating. However, this is a homebrew game made by essentially one man, and any minor criticisms should be read with this in mind. I have played worse handling games made by teams of hundreds, so I don't think it detracts too much from the over all game play.
The storyline in Trilby's Notes was interesting, and while I think the Cthullu/ Hellraiser-esq plot was a neat idea on paper, I don't think the games needed it. The baddy that never dies doesn't need a reason to come back, you've suspended your disbelief this far. It also could have worked just as well if these had been spin offs, then the previous two games could have avoided the slightly mediocre taint associated with the plot of Trilby's notes.
I liked the old-school graphics, which still manage to be high enough resolution to make the corpses disgusting. The character design was good in parts, particularly of the people in the past. The music was also well chosen (read made), and the other-world sound effects are subtly creepy. The puzzles are fantastic, and make good use of the shifting between worlds. Overall, I think this is a very good game, its not too long or hard, and very atmospheric. Its brilliant if you consider that it was made by one person. I also feel that the game stands well on its own, and really is brought down by the plot, trying to tie down all the loose ends. Bits didn't make sense, and some dramatic tension between the character was lost because of this forced story-telling.
Well worth playing however, particularly as its free.