Update Sixty-Three: 12 October 2017

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

Written by LucasArts veterans, the Perils of Man shows kind of why the adventure game genre died. It’s….. it’s competent. There’s some charm to it. It’s good! It’s fine!

But that’s all it is.

Nothing really makes any sense, and nothing you do matters. The best part of the game is the opening cutscene, a mix of a Twilight Zone episode and one of those ‘Unsolved Mysteries’ shows. It’s all slowly downhill from there. You play Ana, a daughter from a line of scientists who tend to disappear, and you’re looking for your father, who has indeed disappeared. You think you find him, throughout the game, but it turns out you haven’t. It’s someone else. You never get resolution on that front. Where’s your dad? Doesn’t matter.

Same with the main conceit of the game. You go to two different locations to stop huge tragedies, and solve many moon-logic puzzles to avert them. And then they happen anyway. Why’d you go through the trouble? Eeeeehhh…. doesn’t matter!

It’s not BAD. It’s not bad. I’ve played bad games and this is not one of them. It’s just…. I mean… I’ve also played incredibly good games, and this is not one of those, either. It’s all right. It’s a pleasant way to spend an afternoon…. but not more pleasant than your middling-to-above-average hidden object game, and with worse production value.

There were no text walkthroughs to speak of anywhere on the net, so I made one. Baby’s first walkthrough guide. I figured after using so many over the years I should give back, and I did.

Next up: I can’t believe I haven’t played this yet and I’m choosing to no longer live in sin.

See you soon!