With a Maniac terrorizing citizens in New York
1901, it’s up to you James Palmer, a reporter for one of the competing New York
papers to uncover the clues to what is shaping up to be the return of Jack the
Ripper. As inept policemen stumble through the crime scenes and you in turn find
clues to the killer you become somewhat of a curiosity to the Ripper and it
becomes only a matter of time before you meet him yourself as you attempt to
stop the murder spree.
Man, this game was different. In lieu of a
traditionally controlled game, the developers chose to bring back an almost Myst-like
interface. Players move from fixed position to fixed position where they look
around the location and place the cursor on points or objects of interest. If
the area of interest proves to be something of relevance, the cursor changes and
an action is enabled, whether merely getting a better look at a poster or
speaking to one of the many people you come in contact with.
Players will find the initial trial and error
period kind of a put-off as it felt to me like it was a throw back in terms of
gameplay. The cursor players use is somewhat spotty and even though you may see
something of interest, sometimes you would need to put the cursor in the exact
precise pixel for the cursor to change. Needless to say this was quite
frustrating for me as one can only be so patient when playing a game of this
type. The map function was also somewhat confusing to me since the programmers
made an unnecessary step when going to other areas. This step also took me about
10 minutes to understand but only because I broke the "Guy" rule of actually
looking at the instruction manual.
The game has strong rendered graphics that look
engaging and authentic. The items of interest do stand out clearly against them
so I felt like I was being led around by my nose as it was almost too easy to
find items. The characters in the game also look authentic and appropriate for
the time frame that the game takes place in. The game developers did their
homework in trying to make the game appear as authentic as possible and I felt
this was the game’s strongest qualities. The voice work provided in the game was
also done quite well with characters having accents and quirks that seemed
correct for the time period. Remember, the game takes place in the early 1900’s
and good grammar wasn’t found in the seedier slums of New York city.
Our friend Jack has been subject of several
games, TV shows and Big screen movies with varying opinions on who he was. With
the exception of the Graphic Novel and movie From Hell (
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120681/ ) there hasn’t been a commercially
successful medium on which the subject can be examined. Yet, our curiosity
remains the same. I guess I was hoping for a game with a little more sinister
tone and scary feel. I just can’t recommend this game to the average gamer, only
fanatics of the subject will get something out of the game, the other 99% of the
gaming population won’t play it more then 30 minutes as it goes by a tad too
slow and the gameplay is scattered.
Gameplay: 5.0
A clunky interface that only lets you examine items and places if the cursor
changes. No real movement to be found and the puzzles are simply not
challenging.
Graphics: 7.7
Not bad for rendered graphics and 3-D modeling. But if you think about it, it’s
really just like looking at a picture since there is very little movement and
the programming difficulty is scaled down considerably.
Sound: 7.1
Nice voice acting done by the cast. Accents, shady voices and even a song or
two give the game some credibility of skilled game making.
Difficulty: Easy
The only real difficulty is the spotty controls. The puzzles are fairly simple
and the game just doesn’t take that long to complete.
Concept: 6.0
It’s not an entirely new idea, having the Ripper come back to wreck havoc on the
populace. Been there, done that.
Overall: 5.8
It’s too easy, the controls stink, the game is not engaging and it’s too short.
I was really disappointed in this title because I had really thought this was
going to be something special.
