Today we continue the Blackwell saga, and I have to admit, what started as something I was luke-warm about has over time become a better and better series. So seeing it cycle back to an active game was already a good thing... and then I played it and smiled just that bit more...
Story: Where the original title caught up with Rosa Blackwell as she first gained her power as a medium (and Joey, a ghost who lived in the 1930s and now exists as a spirit guide for the Blackwell family tagging along), we now rejoin her when she has been at her new calling of helping ghosts remember who they were and move on for a while now. You might say she is getting the hang of it. Tonight we catch up with our dynamic duo as they take on one of their more routine cases: a ghost on the window ledge and considering ending it all... again.
Finishing this case, allows them to retire to Rosa's apartment, at least so they thought, but a nagging feeling is bugging Rosa... something about a commitment to meet somewhere... at an art gallery... that she is now late to. Thankfully her neighbor that invited her is the forgiving sort, and a chance encounter there will set her on a whole new adventure with several ghosts to save and a very dangerous spirit from the family's past. To explain much more is to do this entry in the series a disservice, especially as this is a very short title which packs it's run time to the brim with details about what is going on and an actually engaging set of mysteries with a rather massive payoff.
All I can say is this is just plain good stuff this time around! I mean I can't even say it needs the previous games to make sense! The concept is fairly well defined int he interactive intro before the opening credits and it manages to fill you in on notes from the previous titles you need for this to make sense on it's own. Of course I recommend playing the others first for more detail, but this is legit a complete package like nothing before it in the series is.
8/10
Graphics: Keeping to the tradition of the series, you can expect another point and click game made up of pixel art reflective of days long gone. Running at a resolution you might have seen if you were playing games on an MS-DOS PC back in the day, you will find yourself exploring several locations littered with clues and characters which will tell the tale of the game as you go. It wears this style on it's sleeve, but the detail wrought within it is actually really good! While the game was clearly drawn and digitized as one would expect, it still manages to make most areas you will encounter look like they could almost be photos in low-resolution (which is even more appropriate if you see the extras). It can only be considered a tribute to the artists who put this game together.
Characters, however, are a lot more cartoon-ish. Do not get me wrong, they still look good and walk the balance of detail and the selected resolution the developers chose to work with quite well. This style also carries over to the portraits used whenever any of the characters talk. They will never be real faces, but they look very good in their stylized work.
8/10
Sound: I have to be honest, as I think about it, I can think of few times this game has much in the way of sound effects. There is some ambient work here and there, but it is not all that common, making way for what this series has excelled at from the beginning: music and voices.
And that music is absolutely top-tier. Often the game just oozes personality with a selection of saxophone and piano just playing it cool and smooth while you review your clues or question other characters in the process of unravelling this mystery. And honestly its the kind of thing anyone can just relax in the background with, even as it feels like something from Joey's era of life permeating the rest of the game. But it will pick up the pace when needed as well... sometimes with tension, other times with an eerie feel like you are about to see something horrible happen... or magnificent and beyond mortal comprehension. It all just gels shockingly well.
But the voice work is once again the real treat here... at least for most of the cast. There are occasional characters that I couldn't help but make fun of the voice provided, but almost everyone is believable and pouring into their rolls perfectly. Not to mention that Joey and Rosa are absolutely perfectly on point, which is great because they are absolutely who you will hear the most. (And in fact as always, Joey stands out as the true star of the game.) I can't complain about what you hear at all in this game.
8/10
Gameplay: If you have played the classic point and click adventure games before you already have an idea of what you are getting into with this gem of a game. If you haven't, these games generally take the form of a series of fixed view scenes (some scroll to make room for more then the screen shows, some do not) in which you will use your mouse to do just about everything. Want to position your character in a specific place? Click there and either Rosa or Joey will make their way over. If you clicked something they can interact with, they will. A right click in the same way will have them observe and comment on the thing, but right here we already have an improvement over a classic complaint of the game-type: pixel hunting.
You see, in most point and click games, you sometimes deal with objects that are very small and blend into the scene exceptionally well. When you are dealing with the retro-resolutions this game uses, that can be exceptionally true as those small objects can be too small to show as more then a pixel or two, making them exceptionally hard to see or find. To alleviate this issue, many games do small touches like having items twinkle to get your attention, and this game does this as well. However, it also makes sure if your cursor is over something you can use (or someone you can interact with) it changes to the name of the item, insuring you don't graze over it without even knowing.
In this case, however, you will be always controlling two characters (Joey and Rosa), selecting each from a menu that will drop down from the top of the screen at will, each with their own talents. For example, Rosa is going to have to do all the physical work requiring anything with any amount of weight to be moved since she's human and Joey is spectral. Joey is also bound to her, so the only way to swap between locations will be while controlling Rosa. Joey, on the other hand, is capable of more ghostly abilities, like passing through walls, interrupting electronic devices, or using a ghostly breath to send a chill down someone's spine.
But the truly unique mechanic is a notepad Rosa keeps. In essence, you may find a page or two useful to write things down while playing this game, but thats basically to keep your spelling write when you look on the internet for clues (again, something Rosa can do in this game). The important notes and locations she will write down in a notebook, allowing you to bring up these notes in conversations to learn more about them as you proceed, making for a nice touch to distinguish the game from others of the type.
All of this comes together for a package that even flows together well, ditching a lot of the obtuse puzzles and opting to do most things with conversational puzzles you will earn the pieces to as you discover more and Rosa jots them down. You might stumble once in a while but this is not one of those games you can call out for moon-logic to say the least. VERY well done.
8/10
Bugs: Once again, this is another game that ran absolutely perfectly, but carries the same error in design itself the previous two games in the series do: When you reach the end-credits at the end of the game, you do not go back to the main menu. Rather, you are just dumped out onto your desktop. And once again, this meant in order to see the extras, I had to re-enter the game. But since this is basically audio bloopers (and a few behind the scene art pieces) that this time requires you to unlock them in-game with the password it gives you, it probably wont be worth the time to a lot of people, making this an even smaller nuisance.
Score: For a series that started rather rockily, the Blackwell games have only gotten better as I have moved through the franchise, this one being the best one yet. It's short, but at $5 on it's own on steam, it is absolutely a great little game you will enjoy. Even better as one of 4 games in the bundle on Gog for $15, you get it all including the background to enjoy this chapter that much more. I am beginning to see why people praise this series and will be looking forward to continuing with the next one.
8/10
System Requirements:
- 1.8 Ghz processor
- 512 MB RAM
- Any GPU that supports Direct X 9.0c
- 1 GB hard drive space
- Windows 7
System Specs:
- Ryzen 7 (5700X) 3.4 Ghz
- 32 GB RAM
- AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT (8 GB VRAM)
- Windows 11 (64 Bit)
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