And that's certainly not intended in a positive sense. Despite a scant few graphical flourishes that probably would've been viewed as revelatory back in the day, this game feels as lackluster, cheap, and clunky as any low-grade early 3D adventure title from them days.
And that's a bit of a shame, because this a pleasing, archetypal Sherlock Holmes yarn of a not insignificant magnitude, with brilliant deductions and megalomaniacal schemes galore. The writing's right on the money, with Holmes and Watson's classic complicated friendship front and center, being the object of a fair few heartbreaking moments. The puzzles and gameplay, too, are worthy of the Holmes name. Devious and clever, if not exactly very realistic... I swear, every door in that game has some kind of wacky puzzle-related combination.
It's just such a shame that the end product is hampered at every turn by a level of shoddy facial and bodily animation that Video Brinquedo couldn't achieve on their stoned-est of days. It does not help in the slightest that the voice acting is a bit hit and miss, Watson in particular making some pence-a-dozen odd inflections and wooden deliveries. Moreover, I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse that this is all displayed with a framerate that would make a cut-rate Wii port blush. I don't know if it's budgetary reasons or a poor optimization job or whatever... Hey, God only knows the ol' PS3 has its fair share of limitations, but games that look several times as good regularly run several times better on it.
Oh, and that soundtrack... holy shit. Described as "fully orchestrated", I could discern no more than three or four different tracks altogether, all of which are short, unimaginative, and are about as "fully orchestrated" as a low-grade MIDI synthesizer score from way back. It became distracting to the point that I just had to turn it off as time went on. I've had my share of shovelware-quality guff over the years, but this is below even that.
The final product feels cheap and rushed to the point of narm, and not even of a good kind. It's a bit of a disgrace to the developers that this was shipped as-is. If this Holmes yarn had been released as a book it might've made for a nice experience, but as an interactive video game it's pretty much the pits.
The '90s called, they want their game back.
And that's certainly not intended in a positive sense. Despite a scant few graphical flourishes that probably would've been viewed as revelatory back in the day, this game feels as lackluster, cheap, and clunky as any low-grade early 3D adventure title from them days.
And that's a bit of a shame, because this a pleasing, archetypal Sherlock Holmes yarn of a not insignificant magnitude, with brilliant deductions and megalomaniacal schemes galore. The writing's right on the money, with Holmes and Watson's classic complicated friendship front and center, being the object of a fair few heartbreaking moments. The puzzles and gameplay, too, are worthy of the Holmes name. Devious and clever, if not exactly very realistic... I swear, every door in that game has some kind of wacky puzzle-related combination.
It's just such a shame that the end product is hampered at every turn by a level of shoddy facial and bodily animation that Video Brinquedo couldn't achieve on their stoned-est of days. It does not help in the slightest that the voice acting is a bit hit and miss, Watson in particular making some pence-a-dozen odd inflections and wooden deliveries. Moreover, I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse that this is all displayed with a framerate that would make a cut-rate Wii port blush. I don't know if it's budgetary reasons or a poor optimization job or whatever... Hey, God only knows the ol' PS3 has its fair share of limitations, but games that look several times as good regularly run several times better on it.
Oh, and that soundtrack... holy shit. Described as "fully orchestrated", I could discern no more than three or four different tracks altogether, all of which are short, unimaginative, and are about as "fully orchestrated" as a low-grade MIDI synthesizer score from way back. It became distracting to the point that I just had to turn it off as time went on. I've had my share of shovelware-quality guff over the years, but this is below even that.
The final product feels cheap and rushed to the point of narm, and not even of a good kind. It's a bit of a disgrace to the developers that this was shipped as-is. If this Holmes yarn had been released as a book it might've made for a nice experience, but as an interactive video game it's pretty much the pits.