Review of completed CE game. Graphics are really good and music, while dramatic, was okay Tales of Terror: Art of Horror starts out as a pretty good game. The storyline is compelling - receiving an anonymous letter stating the brother you saw being kidnapped 20 years ago (by what you thought was a monster) could actually still be alive! You go to the Artem Estate and are greeted by a sweet old lady and her butler, who appear at first like perfectly normal people - but appearances can definitely be deceiving! The game soon becomes pretty routine, however. HO scenes are fairly easy (tho I'm not a fan of the "morphing objects"). Can't understand why I threw away a perfectly good knife after only using it to cut a few vines off of a door (as I am trying to save my life from people who want to kill me, after all). And it wasn't very brave of me to have to find a "hand-fan" to "blow away" a tiny bug, I'm too squeamish to brush away a spider web with my bare hand, yet I have no qualms in cutting the head off of an innocent doll with a mini guillotine! The ending, tho ... well, that's the main reason I gave the storyline a "poor" rating. Not my cup of tea at all! All-in-all the game was ... just "eh". Give me Mystery Case Files: Dire Grove any day!
This game was just okay. Due to an accident you, Emily, end up in a coma in the hospital. But as you enter the hospital corridor it darkens and becomes "decayed". A being appears telling you that you have to helped loved ones who have died, ease their pain, etc. The graphics are good, as is the sound (I usually turn off any music as it is a distraction, but what I heard of it was good). The story was okay and simply a pleasant way to spend some time. There was nothing scary at all about this game. There were usually only about 3 to 4 screens to go back and forth to as you find objects to use later, piece together a special object or two, etc. The HOs were a little challenging in that things you needed to find were very small or hard to understand what you are looking for (as a "spanner" and a "wind rose").. But all in all the game was too short and anti-climactic (the "elixir" you need to find in the last part is not very hidden and I obtained it at the beginning early on and carried it around until I needed it later). It wasn't a "bad" game, but it wasn't great either. Nice story but just mediocre game play. If you want to be "scared" or "challenged" this is not the game for you.
I really liked this game. You play Mary, an investigative reporter, sent to this small, abandoned town because the previous reporter has fled in fear, saying he could see someone watching him from every window in the town, something not of this world. You discover the toy maker's shop is closed, the owner and the employees gone, most everyone in the town have run away. Why? The graphics are really good, very clear & sharp & fun. The HOG's are not too difficult (but not too easy, either). A fun element is that a few of the words describing the objects to be found are in blue. Clicking on the blue word gives you a choice of three words, only one of which is the object that is hidden. For example, you see the word "gun" in blue, but there is no gun in the HO scene. Click on the word "gun" and it will change, for example, to "rabbit". But there is no rabbit in the scene. Click on the word "rabbit" and it will change, for example, to "skull" - and there IS a skull! Different - keeps things interesting. I like the mini-games, too. You get to play a "Whack-a-mole" type game, and a game like the "claw" game you find in arcades. You take a boat through a haunted ride with things jumping out at you, and you even have to use the ATM machine to get money out as they don't take credit cards! LOL! I found this game to be fun, different from the "horror", "demonic" or "fear" games that are so prevalent lately. Great game.
Liked the storyline of the game - better than average HO games. Like the idea of finding parts of things to make the whole item that you need in the HO scenes, and the mini games were different with just the right amount of challenge. Voice overs were very good, graphics were excellent. Loved that there were characters to "talk" with at times. And the map and task list were invaluable! This is a top-notch HO game - so glad it wasn't a "collectors edition", which it very well could have been, it is that good. Only drawback is the very abrupt "out of the blue" ending. Highly unsatisfying ... unless there is a sequel VERY SOON to continue the story! All in all, well worth buying.