Agatha Christie: Hercule Poirot - The London Case and Some TNG Stuff
I finished Agatha Christie: Hercule Poirot - The London Case yesterday. This is the follow up to The First Cases. In this one you are investigating art theft and forgery, and of course, murder. I have to say I didn't quite enjoy this one as much as the first. It felt like from a gameplay perspective, inferior to the first game. But that's not the only problem I had with it. Technically, it drove me bonkers. This game really really badly needed a hotspot finder because some of those hotspots were nigh impossible to see. And you do have to rotate the screen around to see everything because not everything can be seen from one angle. It's so easy to miss stuff, so I felt like I wasted a lot of time just trying to find what I was looking for. And then even in the close up investigation scenes clicking in just the right spots could be really finicky. So, this annoyed me to no end. I could be mistaken, but I don't recall this being a problem in the first game. I really wished I could zoom in on the locations. And then the game won't progress until you've found everything, so I'd keep going back to the same places trying to find what I missed, only to give in and look at the walkthrough.
If there was another word I could use to describe the game, it's repetitive. There was a lot of backtracking and even investigating the same scenes twice. Why didn't you see it the first time, Poirot? It just makes for a duller gameplay experience. The game also seemed kind of buggy, but it might be my imagination. It was easy for Poirot to get stuck in front of objects or people, and there were a couple instances where I thought the game froze up on me, but I don't think that was what was happening. It was just that the game wasn't responding to my clicking or I wasn't clicking in the right spot or something. It was aggravating. There wasn't a lot of music either, and what was there was just the same tune over and over. We also didn't get to use the mindmap as much this time, which is a feature I liked in the first one. I wanted more of that.
It might sound like I hated this game. I didn't. It was just kind of frustrating to play. Despite being what I feel is a downgrade from the first game, I'd probably still play another Poirot game from this developer and hope they make improvements. There were some positives, like the voice acting is well done. There's a man named Arthur Hastings who accompanies Poirot on his case. He's kind of like Poirot's Watson, which I find ironic and funny considering it's the same voice actor for the current Sherlock Holmes. At one point, I thought he was the murderer. I was wrong of course lol. I did enjoy following along with the mystery of this one too. I liked the first game's story more, but this one wasn't bad. Adventure Gamer's high rating for this game boggles my mind though. Here's a screenshot. This is inside the art museum, which I would consider to be the hub of the game.
Now I've started Werewolf The Apocalypse: Heart of the Forest. These long names for games man. It's another perfect one to play for this time of year. Again, I really didn't plan this. I'm just going down my 13+ page (yes, really) list of games I want to play, and I've landed on this one. Great timing. So, this one is more of a visual novel with light RPG elements. I actually think it is based off of a RPG. Tabletop maybe? I like it so far...
One more thing I wanted to talk about. I thought I'd talk a little about TNG again seeing as not too long ago I finished season three. It introduced Reginald Barclay. He's kind of a relatable character to me. I identify with his anxieties. I had seen a bit of him before from Voyager, but he's moreso a TNG character. His debut episode was funny, but also gave me secondhand embarrassment lol. And also I got to see the finale episode where Picard gets assimilated by the Borg. I noted that Q had never mentioned that the Borg assimilate people, which left me wondering if he knew that or left that information out on purpose. After consulting his AI version, he informed me that he omitted that info on purpose, so that's now my headcanon. I wonder how things would have been different if the Enterprise knew about assimilation.
I also found it interesting that the battle of Wolf 359 seemed like such a hyped up battle hearing about it, but you never actually see the battle. Just the destroyed ships. Don't get me wrong, it was a dire scene looking at all the destroyed starships, but I was kind of hoping for some more action there. Data did end up saving the day though. It was a pretty intense two-parter and I'm glad they showed Picard's breakdown in the following episode because all too often trauma gets brushed aside, and that has continued to follow him to this day in Picard.
Speaking of Picard, I watched the final season of that fairly recently too. They did kind of drop the ball on the plot in the end, but I still loved it so much. I'm glad I had already watched some TNG because it made that season more special to me. It was pretty much a love letter to the fans. And then I did kind of see a spoiler about Q coming back, but I was so happy that I didn't care. I guess technically he's still dead, but this is a younger version of him? Q doesn't exist in linear time anyway, so they can do anything they want with him. Now I really really need Star Trek: Legacy to happen to follow along with Picard's son and Seven's crew. It just has to happen! I scream for it lol. And I know I'm not alone on that one. And come on, John de Lancie isn't getting any younger so, get on with it. I don't want to have to resort to reading fanfics (I already did read one or two :P). Anyway, I think that's about it.
If there was another word I could use to describe the game, it's repetitive. There was a lot of backtracking and even investigating the same scenes twice. Why didn't you see it the first time, Poirot? It just makes for a duller gameplay experience. The game also seemed kind of buggy, but it might be my imagination. It was easy for Poirot to get stuck in front of objects or people, and there were a couple instances where I thought the game froze up on me, but I don't think that was what was happening. It was just that the game wasn't responding to my clicking or I wasn't clicking in the right spot or something. It was aggravating. There wasn't a lot of music either, and what was there was just the same tune over and over. We also didn't get to use the mindmap as much this time, which is a feature I liked in the first one. I wanted more of that.
It might sound like I hated this game. I didn't. It was just kind of frustrating to play. Despite being what I feel is a downgrade from the first game, I'd probably still play another Poirot game from this developer and hope they make improvements. There were some positives, like the voice acting is well done. There's a man named Arthur Hastings who accompanies Poirot on his case. He's kind of like Poirot's Watson, which I find ironic and funny considering it's the same voice actor for the current Sherlock Holmes. At one point, I thought he was the murderer. I was wrong of course lol. I did enjoy following along with the mystery of this one too. I liked the first game's story more, but this one wasn't bad. Adventure Gamer's high rating for this game boggles my mind though. Here's a screenshot. This is inside the art museum, which I would consider to be the hub of the game.
Now I've started Werewolf The Apocalypse: Heart of the Forest. These long names for games man. It's another perfect one to play for this time of year. Again, I really didn't plan this. I'm just going down my 13+ page (yes, really) list of games I want to play, and I've landed on this one. Great timing. So, this one is more of a visual novel with light RPG elements. I actually think it is based off of a RPG. Tabletop maybe? I like it so far...
One more thing I wanted to talk about. I thought I'd talk a little about TNG again seeing as not too long ago I finished season three. It introduced Reginald Barclay. He's kind of a relatable character to me. I identify with his anxieties. I had seen a bit of him before from Voyager, but he's moreso a TNG character. His debut episode was funny, but also gave me secondhand embarrassment lol. And also I got to see the finale episode where Picard gets assimilated by the Borg. I noted that Q had never mentioned that the Borg assimilate people, which left me wondering if he knew that or left that information out on purpose. After consulting his AI version, he informed me that he omitted that info on purpose, so that's now my headcanon. I wonder how things would have been different if the Enterprise knew about assimilation.
I also found it interesting that the battle of Wolf 359 seemed like such a hyped up battle hearing about it, but you never actually see the battle. Just the destroyed ships. Don't get me wrong, it was a dire scene looking at all the destroyed starships, but I was kind of hoping for some more action there. Data did end up saving the day though. It was a pretty intense two-parter and I'm glad they showed Picard's breakdown in the following episode because all too often trauma gets brushed aside, and that has continued to follow him to this day in Picard.
Speaking of Picard, I watched the final season of that fairly recently too. They did kind of drop the ball on the plot in the end, but I still loved it so much. I'm glad I had already watched some TNG because it made that season more special to me. It was pretty much a love letter to the fans. And then I did kind of see a spoiler about Q coming back, but I was so happy that I didn't care. I guess technically he's still dead, but this is a younger version of him? Q doesn't exist in linear time anyway, so they can do anything they want with him. Now I really really need Star Trek: Legacy to happen to follow along with Picard's son and Seven's crew. It just has to happen! I scream for it lol. And I know I'm not alone on that one. And come on, John de Lancie isn't getting any younger so, get on with it. I don't want to have to resort to reading fanfics (I already did read one or two :P). Anyway, I think that's about it.