Now, I know I've reviewed animated movies on this blog since the start back in July, but now I've decided to do something a bit more unconventional. It is animated technically, but not a movie. Now, I am a fan of a specific genre of PC games which are hidden object games. I have played a variety of them rather they be an original work or an adaptation of a book or fairytale. I know I may be a bit dated with games like I don't have Disney Infinity (nor do I intend getting it cos of how much money it would cost), but I love PC games and in particular from a company called BigFish Games. You can download games on their website & become a member, but that would cost money so I prefer to buy the discs from places like Game, Amazon or PC World. And today, I'll be reviewing the very first one I got called Mystery Legends: The Phantom of the Opera, based on the book by Gaston Leroux. Not only I'll be reviewing the story, characters and design, but also the gameplay and special features. I will say that am a fan of The Phantom of the Opera, but in particular the book and the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. So can this game show the classic love story is good for gaming, or has this Angel of Music hit a bad note? Let's take a look!
Story: You'd think the plot would be a direct adaptation of the book and you collect the objects to continue the story. No, actually! It's a sequel taking place years later and you play Christine and Raoul's daughter, Evelina, who is invited to the Opera House where the Phantom lives after a child confuses her for Christine. The Phantom makes her find black roses throughout the opera house and other tasks which will eventually lead up to him meeting her again, even though it's not her and each chapter ends with a flashback to an event from the book which shows the explanation as to what happened between him and Evelina's mother and what lead the Phantom into despair. The story is actually really good and I like that the protagonist Evelina is the one to do everything all by herself, and it is easy to follow. The The only problem I have is the ending. It feels very disappointing after everything you have to do in order to get to the Phantom and we don't actually know what happens to Evelina after The Phantom takes her to his lair, nor does he ever know that she's actually Christine's daughter. I could argue that it was made to be left ambiguous, but it does imply that there will be a sequel, but there has been no news thus far. Even in the bonus level, nothing happens to progress the plot after the game, but even with that, the story is still really good for a game like this! Heck, if anything, this plot is better than Love Never Dies as a Phantom of the Opera sequel!
Design: From the start of this game, you can see that the visuals look fantastic. Each cutscene looks like a painting with the style being similar to an old movie. The designs of the characters are perfect, especially the design of Christine which in particular looks beautiful. But clearly the Phantom's design is my favourite, and I find the take of the mask covering his whole face being creative. Actually, is it me or does he look similar to the Phantom in the Australian version of Love Never Dies? The attention to detail is perfect, and even the design within the game looks amazing. The inside of the opera house looks beautiful, with a Gothic style and it gets creepier and creepier as you go further into the game, like in the prop storage room or the church. The lighting also helps create an ambiance with the dark colour scheme, but places like Christine's room look very beautiful. The architecture actually looks amazing and honestly, I don't have any flaws with the visuals of this game! When going into this, I thought it was going to look cheap, but the designers really put effort into the look of the game!
Characters: Like I mentioned before, this is a sequel and there are only a few characters in this. You play Evelina de Chagney, Christine and Raoul's daughter who look eerily similar to her mother. We may not know much about her personality, but from playing her she seems to be brave and independent as she goes through the neglected and haunting opera house all by herself. Christine and Raoul only appear at the beginning of the game and in the flashbacks, but in the bonus level, Christine seems to be kind as she clearly cares for the Phantom and knows how frail he is and that he still wants love. The only other characters who appear in the flashbacks are Joseph Buquet and the managers, but we know who they are and how they came into the story. Finally, there's the Phantom himself and is easily the best character in the game! He's still the twisted yet tragic and mysterious man who yearns for his love to return, and still believes he's her Angel of Music. The voice acting is superb, especially from Gavin Hammon (I think that's who it is. I looked it up & according to tumblr that's who it was) as The Phantom, having that tragic side, but while also sound really hot. Sorry, that's my honest opinion. The rest of the voice acting is professional and I like the characters in this game, and I'm glad to see my favourite ones are back.
Gameplay: The gameplay is pretty simple and easy to follow thinking about. It includes the basics like a tutorial at the beginning of the game, a time limit for the minigames which gives you the chance to skip if you can't do it on time and the difficulty is pretty easy in the games. Another thing I loved was if you were stuck at finding an object or don't know what it is, you can put the cursor over the word and a silhouette of the object can be seen in the mirror at the corner, which makes things much easier if you want to avoid using the hint button. The collector's edition also has an integrated strategy guide for each quest, and it is very helpful if you don't know what to do in the game.
Special Features: If you have the collectors edition, which I do, the game will include a bonus level which takes place after the game in the Phantom's lair. It doesn't do much to progress the plot, but it is still enjoyable. There's also a scoreboard up depending on how long you played the game and how much of it you accomplished in a percentage after finishing it. May not do much, but it's still fun to see the names of other characters from the book who aren't present in the game. The final one is a digital edition of the original book by Gaston Leroux. No, seriously, it's the full novel. I had the book beforehand, so it is enjoyable to read if you don't have it. And that's it for the special features. Not as good compared to others which would normally include wallpapers, the soundtrack, cutscenes and concept art, but still fun nonetheless.
Overall this is an amazing PC game with a very well written story, amazing and gorgeous visuals, likeable main characters, easy gameplay and easy level of difficulty, but a downer ending and a couple of good special features. I recommend this to Phantom of the Opera fans as well as hidden object game fans like me because this is actually a great sequel! Just go and buy or download it because it does have replay value, if you can ignore the ending.
Story: 8/10
Visuals: 10/10
Characters: 9/10
Gameplay: 9/10
Special features: 7/10
Overall: 9/10
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