Whenever I have to analyze any type of title, I like to talk a bit about the context in which the development is involved. Muchos casos este aspecto es conocido o hasta irrelevant para lo que es la producción final, sin embargo, para este Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened, creo que el trasfondo que rodeó a esta production hace al juego y afecta, de una manera u otra al final result.
frogs He is known for creating a good fan base with his work, especially with the Sherlock Holmes series, a saga that managed to create a unique atmosphere with each delivery with graphic investigation/adventure games with a very particular rhythm and system for this era when action and immediacy games are the kings of the market.
Getting back to context, Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened is a redo of a title that returned in 2007 and not a sequel to the great Sherlock Holmes: Chapter One, which we analyzed in this house not so long ago. Why not do a sequel to the last episode and release a redo in its place? The answer is more than anything geopolitical, since the studio is located in Ukraine, in the midst of war, which is very clear from the first screen of the game. The developers rightly thought that under the circumstances it was much easier to work on a smaller project (which, in fact, took them a year) than a larger production of the caliber of Chapter One which took a good three years.
Chronologically, this Sherlock Holmes adventure takes place immediately after chapter one, and in this redo some lines and plots have been changed to make the timeline much clearer. In this case, the adventure will take Holmes and Watson from dark London, to the Swiss Alps and New Orleans to investigate the mysterious disappearances of people, in a twist that unites the worlds of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with the legend of Cthulu. by HP Lovecraft, a recipe for success in the minds of English literature fans, which for some reason doesn’t quite fit.
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technical part
There’s a substantial graphical improvement over the original release, but it’s still convenient for the player to keep in mind that they’re dealing with a release that’s more of a remaster of a past title and that of a full title redothis means that while the graphics are better, they still feel a bit rustic in places or with certain textures anyway, nothing that detracts from the fun of the game or feels downright bad.
The voices (only in English) are very well done for all the characters who, in one way or another, get involved in the various cases to be solved, but unfortunately this very good acting work is overshadowed by the terrible synchronization between the dialogue and the mouths of the characters, something that on many occasions passes from a bug funny to become somewhat uncomfortable to watch.
The music has also been more polished than in the original edition, so players who have already enjoyed the previous opus will be pleasantly surprised by the improvements.
The game is located in Spanish, but not in the voices. The work on this aspect has been very detailed and allows those who do not speak English to enjoy a game that has a lot of text and understand that it is vital to be able to advance in the story.
gameplay
Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened takes us to different parts of the planet to investigate mysterious disappearances and establish their connection, one that always points to the paranormal. This last point is something that the developers had known how to work very well in The Sinking City, but this Lovecraft-Doyle fusion never ceases to enchant. On the one hand, although the atmosphere manages to trap the player in each of the scenarios, I think that there is an effort to be made to give a very large part of terror that never becomes.
The game leads us to solve cases using observation and Sherlock’s mental maps which, by gathering enough evidence by talking to witnesses or investigating the scene, can become conclusions. However, unlike in chapter one, there are no consequences for mistakes (innocent prisoners might even go) so there are often cases where you can try many combinations until until you find the right one, which seems a bit basic in a game of these characteristics.
Exploration is another negative point, because if good the scenarios are wide, there is not much motivation for the player to see the quality of the surroundings since you can’t even talk to all the NPCs and even though there are side cases in various places like spy killing or kid’s challenge, there is no reward worth it. As the story progresses, Holmes’ mind deteriorates, leading him into a world of illusions from which he can emerge by solving different puzzles or repeatedly throwing the character into different traps, which, far to cause terror, generates the opposite effect.
One of the menu options allows Sherlock to disguise himself but to no apparent effect, a mechanic that was important in Chapter One, but not done justice here.
Duration
It is a title of medium duration, approximately 11 hours will separate us from the end after the start of the adventure, obviously it will depend on the experience of the player and his desire to fully explore the scenarios, but even for the most exhaustive people in the details it will not be necessary to wait more than 14 hours to finish the title.
conclusion
Considering the difficult circumstances in which the development team worked on this production, I would say that the title is a real achievement, although perhaps for what we have been used to this team, it seems like a step in back, although it’s a very difficult, enjoyable game. If you don’t compare it to chapter one, and it’s the first Holmes game you got your hands on, then you’ll enjoy it if you like graphic adventures, but you should know that it’s not even the pinnacle of IP, this one is called Sherlock Holmes: Chapter One.
Gabriel Ignacio Fuentes
Good
- The immersive atmosphere of each of the scenarios.
- Changes made to the story to include what happened in the first chapter
- the music is great
The bad
- The terrible synchronization of the voices with the mouths of the characters
- Very little need for exploration
- Absence of consequences for errors
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