About the game developers
The Farm 51 is a polish game developing studio that created the NecroVisioN franchise and Painkiller: Hell & Damnation. The Farm 51 was founded in 2005 and since being founded has put their hand into helping create The Witcher and Two worlds 2.
Story
In Deadfall Adventures you take control of James lee Quartermain, the self-proclaimed smooth-talking and handsome hero of the Deadfall Adventures, who in reality is just trying to live up to Indiana Jones, but he forgot the whip and hat… and butchers every snappy quip. James is the great-grandson of Allan Quartermain also known as the main character of the Quartermain novels written by H R Haggard. It seems as though Allan’s’ unparalleled marksmanship has rubbed off on James, as when James makes his grand entrance he shoots a crane hook which is directed towards a thieves face, and although this is an impressive feat, I am impressed that the thief manages to escape with half his brain hanging out.
The story is set in the 1930’s and as you would have guessed Nazi’s now swarm every nook and cranny you come across, and yes you will be shooting countless numbers of these Nazis. It is explained that James is contracted by an agency to explore an Egyptian temple for a certain treasure which will “bring great power to the power of this treasure!” hence the Nazis.
Gameplay
Deadfall adventures attempts to make the Indiana Jones game everyone wanted but didn’t manage to deliver, when it comes to bugs this game takes the trophy for the most obstructive bugs in a FPS award, I say this because when I’m behind a column that is over 4 foot thick I don’t expect to be shot from the other side of the column by every other combatant in the fight, this also applies to many other pieces of cover in the game, so playing the game on any of the harder game modes will require you to have taken some bullet dodging lessons from Neo. I also had trouble with aiming my reticule at enemies and puzzle panels, as it seems that finer movement of the right analog stick is completely non-existent.
The biggest fault I had with the game is that the A button is tied to interact with the world, that is by far the worst button you can make into the interact button, especially for an action game. When I’m running away from Nazis and I need to pull a lever I don’t want to stand there jumping at it, when I want to pick up a weapon I don’t want to be stomping on it. I honestly think that using the jump button as an interact button has never worked in an FPS game and never will, unless of course the game doesn’t include the ability to jump.
The puzzle side of Deadfall is more satisfying than the combat side, but it doesn’t go without its own bugs. Puzzles range from as simple as standing on a panel to as silly as individually shining light onto the back of statues which would have been more interesting to reflect the light from many mirrors to simultaneously light the statues up. None of the puzzles are particularly hard until it comes to skill based puzzles for example shooting panels on the floor to protect that area from fire and the running between multiple of these panels, though these kind of puzzles wouldn’t be that hard but if you merge this idea with the troublesome aiming of the game and it becomes a luck based puzzle.
For a game that feels like it’s trying to be on the same level as tomb raiders in terms of puzzles the game is very unsatisfying, and it holds your hand all the way through the game where puzzles are involved. The AI always blurts out hints and usually does so before you get to know your surroundings, therefore voiding the entire puzzle aspect of the game, though these hints are in context to the puzzle, so for example, “These two rotatable columns are meant to be guards protecting this gate” which you wouldn’t know from any of the surroundings. But what’s worse is the AI doesn’t consistently shout in your face, so you can be left without a contextual hint at all, so enjoy solving some puzzles by trial and error. Luckily for James though he doesn’t need to put on his thinking cap because his Great-Grandfather Allan Quartermain has already been and done all of the puzzles for you and left there solutions in a notepad, and guessing by his handwriting Allan was also a doctor. Yes, the notepad is very useful for when the AI stays quiet or if you are tired of the puzzle, but whenever you pull the notepad out, you can’t help but feel like you have failed the puzzle and the game loses its charm as a puzzle.
Unfortunately there are bugs in the puzzle side of the game, these are most present when no hints are given by the AI, I found myself at a light based puzzle trying to figure out what the symbols around each gem meant to find a path to light up,10 minutes later and to no avail I turned the game off and carried on with my life, but it wouldn’t be right if I rolled over to let this puzzle beat me, so I started it up again and returned to the quiet room to which surprise! “Press right on the D-pad to check the notepad” and in it was the solution to this unhelpful puzzle. It turns out that my first try had encountered a bug where my notepad didn’t update to where I was; meaning that without any hints from the surroundings, the AI and the notepad the game is unplayable.
Multiplayer
I briefly tried the multiplayer for Deadfall adventures and was met with zero population and I was lagging around the place, the maps themselves accommodate traps that are set off with gunshots so you can get a cheeky kill on someone passing through a bottleneck, though problems arise with the traps, the main problem is who is going to prioritise setting of the trap when you could just shoot them and get it over with, and the traps themselves take a moment to go off, in which time the victim would have long vacated the premises.
Graphics
The graphics of the game aren’t hideous but they don’t feel current gen at all, as there are discrepancies that occur during cut scenes. As you look around the world you see that environment is visually appealing, and the lighting effects are subtle but effective, even going as far as you needing light to see the notepad and the amount of light drastically changes how visible the writing is. Some objects are poorly rendered in the game which makes them look as if they should be the walls that you have to destroy to move on, but that is not the case.
Conclusion
Deadfall Adventures is a game that uses themes that are popular with game developers, and tries to make itself stand out of the crowd by doing so, but unfortunately the game is riddled with bugs and utilises a system that holds your hand when you enter a puzzle section, because of this the game is very linear and plays itself until a bug crops up.
The multiplayer portion of the game feels like it could have been something special, but by accommodating the traps, the maps feel like they would be way too big for the lobby size, but the lobbies I entered didn’t have more than 3 people in, so multiplayer felt very lonely.
PC Overview
We where much hoping for the PC version to be better than the console version, Yes the graphics are much better on the PC version, however this does not make up for all the issues that surrounds the game, However I love Indiana Jones and I rather enjoyed the exploration, puzzles, the damn traps and the well designed environments. The voice acting is not great, neither is the animation, but with approx 6hrs + of gameplay this maybe a game you wish to dig your teeth into, if you are willing to ignore all the glitches. The best I can give this game is Demo before you buy.
Disclaimer:All scores given within our reviews are based on the artist’s personal opinion; this should in no way impede your decision to purchase the game.
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