Reviews by madstalk

This adventure game, despite being released in 2003, felt more like something out of 1993. It had Myst-like graphics and controls making it woefully dated.

The biggest issue, however, is that despite being branded a "Sherlock Holmes" game it simply doesn't feel like it. There's no character here - the protagonist might as well be Bob Smith for all they use the environment and characters. Luckily that Victorian era sleuthing was vastly improved on in later sequels.

This game was one of those surprises that came from out of nowhere to shock me with its quality. Tachyon follows the basic space sim shooter format. You upgrade your ship and your weapons and go out into the wild yonder to shoot other space ships up.

What sold me was the production values here. The universe is large and varied and the main character is voiced by Bruce Campbell. The story is an interesting one that gives the player a semblance of choice and lends gravitas to his actions.

Sure the missions become repetitive "go here and shoot X enemies" but Tachyon had enough character to give it a certain appeal lacking in other more academic space sims.

This actiony spin off from the hardcore Might and Magic series succeeds at stripping away almost all of the elements that made its brother games so memorable and engrossing. The gameplay basically consists of solo-killing tons of monsters with a variety of medieval styled weaponry and magic.

The graphics, for the time, were pretty solid but the game itself was buggy and repetitive. The voice acting was atrocious and really grated on the nerves. In the end this was an interesting, yet seriously flawed departure from the Might and Magic franchise. At least it laid some of the groundwork for the much more entertaining Dark Messiah of Might and Magic.

This was a tedious, borderline unplayable mess. Thank the lords it came bundled with Redneck Rampage and one of the Mechwarrior games because, as a stand alone product, Crime Killer couldn't come close to cutting it. The gameplay basically consists of driving around colorfully lit areas and shooting at random cars. There's not a lot of depth/story here.

Despite my general distaste for RTS games I had a pretty good time playing around with Command & Conquer: Generals. I'm no strategy maven but I got a kick out of the graphics, weapons and multi-player with equally unskilled friends.

I couldn't really get into the single player on this title but found the basic gameplay to be surprisingly enjoyable.

There's a ton of interesting ideas and creativity to be found in Black and White. The problem is that there's not really much of a game to be found here. Instead it comes off more as a sandbox in which you get to play with some of Peter Molyneaux's toys. Its fun to tool around in the world here but the job of obtaining more worship quickly becomes repetitive and boring.

The one saving grace is the humorous chaos you can cause with your godlike powers. Don't like a certain villager? Just pick him up and toss him in the ocean.

The sequel to the amazing first Broken Sword game keeps up the quality is almost every regard. The characters are still memorable and the art, music and writing is still vibrant and exciting. They throw a wrench in the original gameplay by including segments in which you play as original protagonist George Stobbart's girlfriend Nico but this doesn't detract from the overall quality of the game.

The story this time is a small notch below the original and the varied, fantastical locales sometimes come off as mere window dressing meant to make you marvel at the animation but this is still a great sequel to the original.

This is a true classic of the point and click adventure genre. It is one of the few games not produced by Lucas Arts or Sierra that met the same high standards for art and story.

The main character George Stobbart is an entertaining protagonist and the Parisian world he explores is populated by wonderfully memorable locations and characters. The graphics are bright and vibrant and, because of their classic animated style, still stand up today. The story is engrossing, the writing often humorous and the puzzles, while a bit overly difficult in spots, never made me want to pull my hair out.

In short, if you are a fan of the Monkey Island, King's Quest or any of those great old-school adventures you owe it to yourself to check out at least the first two games in the Broken Sword series.

This was a rather dreadful Myst-like adventure replete with FMV and highly detailed yet barely interactive historical environments. It felt less like a game and more like an overly boring history lesson.

The gameplay basically consisted of slowly walking through static environments and randomly clicking on objects to see if they go into the inventory or open a door or something.

With more character it could have been good - the graphics were up to Myst's standards - but it was just academic and boring.

This is one of those old school RPG titles that seems like it would be difficult to enjoy today. Certain parts, like the story and writing, were quite excellent but the world exploration and combat are almost excruciatingly repetitive. This is a massive, massive game (three disks when it was originally released) so massive that it is at times daunting. More variety would have been difficult to pull off in 1997 but would have been refreshing.