Game Memorial

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Arantor

Day 13 in our voyage brings us to 'M', and in today we're looking at the interestingly titled MacGuffin's Curse.

A MacGuffin, for those not familiar with the terminology is a form of plot device that exists primarily to push the story forward but isn't in itself important - the Ark of the Covenant is a MacGuffin for the bulk of 'Raiders of the Lost Ark' for example. So a game that's telling you about a MacGuffin in the title is going to be interesting, one way or another.

Before we begin...
Upon starting the game, I note with interest that it is built using a tool called Unity. I almost can't help but notice this because of the box that pops up prompting about controls and so on which seems pretty common to Unity games. (I personally think it looks a touch unprofessional myself, because it's generic with a game-specific banner as opposed to in the game's own style, but that's just me)

And already we hit a hurdle, I selected I wanted it in a window (after seeing what happened with Lucid previously) and the game didn't listen to me... hmm. That said, 1024x768 looks better scaled up than 1280x800 does.

There's a vague screen about selecting a profile, a single click and I'm off into the game, little idea what I'm doing or what's going on... not a good sign, really!

Playing the game


I have no idea who or what is going on, other than a brief comic strip I've been shown, that somehow means I get from my character to what looks like a werewolf... right.



OK, I'm the guy with bright red hair - Lucas - and can walk around the level quite happily, but I still have no idea what I'm doing. Perhaps time to check the quest log.



So, my first job is to get into the museum, and there's been a helpful blue arrow indicating where I'm supposed to go, but more than once I've been able to press the N button to do something - namely examine what's in front of me... this pops up at the top of the screen if I'm able to examine something.

Already I'm getting the impression that there's more to this game than its mechanics and - probably - puzzles - it has humour.



Huh, so I get to the museum and the plot thickens, I discover I have an ally in the game!



Getting inside the museum and I'm beginning to get down to the meat of the game now - it's not just exploration, it's also about puzzles, as I suspected before.



I have to admit, by this point I'm not quite so keen on the twisted perspective that the game offers. Top-down is fine but the graphics have been set up to intimate a high-up top-down perspective view, while the character is not on the same perspective, which is a little grating to me, even if it does recall a certain green-clothed elf's legends.

The first few rooms are fairly straight-forward affairs, navigating simple mazes and of pressing buttons in the right order, but then we get to the amulet room.

And since we're here to steal it, we pick it up - and the curse kicks in, as the character turns into a werewolf!

Here's where the game really kicks up a notch. Now we have an overall puzzle component - in several rooms we have to get a battery to its slot, which is a classic puzzle style, known as sokoban. The problem, of course, is the way the walls will block you.

The twist here, of course, is the werewolf aspect to your character - you can only move the battery when you're being a werewolf, but you can only operate some of the switches and doors as a human - and you can only switch on certain squares where the moonlight is.

There are other, slightly artificial, constraints for puzzle reasons - the werewolf can't cross the water, though why there would be odd shaped ponds inside the museum gardens, I have no idea.

The controls are slightly quirky, but I find myself quite thankful for it, normally in such games, you only have to walk into the block to move it - but here you actually have to press a button, as well as the direction to move it.

For another couple of levels it all works pretty well, until I'm confronted with a seemingly impossible puzzle. So I try out the hint system - and I'm pleased to note that there are multiple hints on offer, combined with a facility to skip the level entirely. Now, this is a double-edged sword, because it means that there's no stopping the player dead just because they can't figure out a mostly-contained puzzle, but that it does potentially discourage the player from thinking quite so much if they're interested in the adventure and not the puzzles. Some might see this as an advantage, though.

Then I come to a second level which is just as intractable as the previous one, both levels are impossible to manuever the block around by pushing, and suddenly it dawns on me - you can actually *pull* blocks as well as push. The UI hint that shows the key to use does not indicate this is the case, it merely implies that you can only push.

In case of this new development, the previous level is not impossible in the slightest, but I didn't know that I could do what I needed to do to complete the level.

On that bombshell...
The game is a puzzle/adventure hybrid - it is mostly a puzzle game but is presented as something of an adventure, and there are certainly screens beyond the above that I've talked about that are less locked-puzzle-rooms and more parts of a story.

The humour is far, far more in-depth than I've intimated thus far, mostly because I don't want to spoil it. It seems like every room has two or three amusing things to read (and each of them varies depending on whether you read them as a human or as a werewolf)

The graphical style is cartoony, and it works (even if some of the character animation is perhaps not quite as polished), though I'm not a fan of the clashes of perspective as I've mentioned, while the sound is pleasant but otherwise unremarkable.

Ultimately this game is a puzzle/adventure game with its humour and puzzles and the 'what's around the corner' curiosity being its strengths and it plays to those very well.

I've enjoyed playing the game thus far, and if puzzle gaming is your thing, you could certainly do worse than this game.

It's also very versatile to get hold of - there is a demo on Steam, or you can buy the game on Steam (for both PC/Mac), directly from the developers without DRM, the Mac App Store for Mac desktop, or even on iOS for iPhone/iPad. The game will cost you $7 on the desktop (Steam or otherwise) and $5.49 from the App Store.

I haven't seen many developers embrace all the various options like that, especially not indie developers, but there have to be some good points going to the devs for being as flexible as possible about selling their game - and it is quite a good game to be getting!