Update One Hundred and Twenty-Six: 21 February 2018
A New Beginning
6 hours, 28 of 28 achievements
4/10
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
This was pretty bad.
Oh, it hurts my heart at how bad this was. Whenever there’s something that’s lopsidedly bad - where one thing about it is actually pretty great but other aspects of it are so bad it renders it unplayable - it really pains me, because that meant that there were people on this project that were really doing good shit, pulling out the stops, and deserve to feel good about themselves. So when I condemn this game I’m indirectly condemning them, and I so wish I didn’t have to.
A New Beginning is a game with gorgeous 2D animation and backgrounds…and really bad writing. The real leg-breaker is that this game has some of the worst voice acting I’ve had to sit through. It is BAD. I’m aghast at how bad it was. The ridiculous VA means that this point and click - a genre which lives and dies on its story as much as its puzzles - was rendered toothless. How can I care about a serious story when the actors are reading lines doing their best G-Man impression? It was painful. So painful. And the writing as bad. So bad.
Ugh. The 6 hours I spent playing this game felt like an eternity. I don’t want to talk about it anymore - just avoid this one if you can. There will always be better point n clicks.
Next up: Ooo, I heard this was mad good!
See you soon!
Well I was wishing you the best but I can’t say I am surprised :P. It also felt like an eternity to me but I pushed on since I won it on Steamgifts. Daedalic Entertainment has so many great games, but this was not one of them. The terrible voice acting is about all I remember from it.
Hope you have better luck with Juniper’s Knot. I might also play it since it looks really interesting!
Prob. not the best point and click but the german speakers where okay.
At least I don’t remember than pretty bad. Same for the story. It’s a bit to “pc” but not superbad… (if I remember right, it’s a game from a german team so prob the translation killed the story a bit).
I actually have a feeling they were Russian? Or they did the Russian translation before the english one - there was one area where two objects had ‘Look at’ and ‘Use’ written in Russian instead of english.
The translation was actually pretty passable (although the political aspect of the story was certainly ungracefully hammered home WAY inelegantly), it was more the voice acting itself and how stiff it was, and how the line readings didn’t fit the scenes at all. They were so stiff and unnatural, and completely unlike how regular people spoke. They were completely accentless, too, so it wasn’t non-native speakers doing a bad job of speaking English or something. Very strange.
Oh no sorry you didn’t enjoy it. :( Voice acting can be quite the deal breaker in P&Cs. I checked out a video to see what the voice acting sounded like, and the line that was said was “While others risk their lives, Milady takes some time off to read. Well done” I can see he’s supposed to be a not likable character. :P
I’ll be really interested in hearing your thoughts of Juniper’s Knot!! I’ve looked at it a few times but have some apprehension. It reminded me of the book Daughter of Smoke and Bone (though quite different) so I listened to the audiobook of that instead instead of reading the VN haha. Really hope you enjoy it! It’s awesome that it’s free.
p.s. I wanted to let you know that I finished Tacoma and thank you so much again!! I loved the way it was told, I’m a sucker for walking sims like this where you interact with people/the world to see the story unfold. Though I think they definitely could’ve fleshed it out more, I really enjoyed it and fell for the characters. I was engrossed even more than I expected! I super appreciate it. :D
I’m more relieved that at least it’s out of my backlog now!
I’ll definitely let you know on that front - it’s a VN I’ve heard highly recommended. I should probably be able to start and finish it tomorrow (Thursday), because it’s quite short.
P.S. Yessssss! I’m very very glad! I can’t wait to play my copy. I’m very happy I gave it to you instead of some rando on SG - I’ll try to do this more c:
Yeah it’s a shame when games don’t work out but I feel ya with the sense of relief! It’s almost like spring cleaning haha makes the bad games have a positive side to it. :P Fingers crosses you enjoy it!
The past couple years I’ve been giving away keys to people on my friend’s list first or ones who leave some random comment talking about how excited they are about a game and I’m like ooh I have a key for that! haha It’s nice to know when they go to good homes with at least the intention of playing. The super cool part of this community though, get to see some friendly, generous!! people sharing games. :)
Oh wow, I didn’t realize this was so bad (haven’t played it yet). I usually just assume a Daedalic P-n-C will be good. Thanks for the warning!
There’s certainly production value here - the art is truly wonderful - but it’s like a sports car with a gangplank for a seat: you’re never going to be comfortable driving it, and one part just ruins the experience.
Thank you for the review. Seeing it’s from Daedalic I probably would have grabbed it at some point. But my biggest gripe with video games is poor voice acting, added it to my Not Interested list.
If by any chance you are interested in the Runaway games, the voice acting is horrible in the first one. If that bothers you so much you might want to avoid it.
I haven’t heard of those - but I’ll definitely keep that in mind and avoid them.
I’m glad my review could be useful c:
finally junipers knot!!!