Adam's Venture Trilogy - Time for ADVENTURE!

Yep, I have been a bit... lazy with the writing as of late. There has been a good reason though and that is this site http://expansivedlc.com/ where I am now writing reviews, overviews and allsorts for. Whoohoo! This may mean that I will be a little late in writing stuff here... but I will try and keep up with things none the less.

Anyway. Adam's Venture Trilogy. Lets get stuck in shall we?

Now firstly, this is an episodic game with three chapters, each taking about an hour to two hours each to complete. They are not exactly big games nor are they anything that difficult so I thought it would be fairer to go through all three before making this post. Turns out this was definitely the right choice. Why? Well... Lets begin with Episode one and you'll know why.

Episode 1 - aka:' The Search for the Lost Garden' starts off the series in a really bad way. Here Adam is sent to try and find the lost garden of Eden. Cue puzzles and 'ADVENTURE'. Only... the 'Adventure' part of it is insultingly minimal, areas usually consist of narrow passageways and boring samey looking tunnels. The plot here seems to mostly revolve around a mysterious black smog who taunts, teases and... never really gets explained ever, almost as if the writers just gave up part way. Where the game really falls apart though is the puzzles the game throws at you. The issue is there just isn't enough variety throughout, the same three puzzles being chucked at you over and over again, never really getting difficult in anyway at all. The whole thing ends in a very sudden way too. The whole chapter just feels rushed and boring to play through.

Then comes Chapter two which thankfully saves the entire thing through simply adding a slightly more complex plot, adding more characters, more locations and more puzzle types. All of this makes the game run smoother, makes you generally want to continue onwards and has the game at least try for a plot. Come Chapter three though and things are going wrong again, 80% of the game is made up of flashbacks which, while it means more varied locations, it also hits the plot hard. Puzzles in the third chapter also go back to the 'Repeat pattern' the first game had, though at least there's more of them to add variety.

If I had to pinpoint one major issue though the game has through all three chapters, it's probably that the main characters are both just completely irritating. Adam, the lead, happens to be cocky, arrogant and flat-out dismissive of people in general. Then we get Evelyn, the 'Assistant' who stumbles through all three chapters, dismissive of Adam's abilities, repeatedly telling Adam to do all the legwork/puzzlework and then throwing a hissy fit of dangerous proportions when its thrown back in her face. Neither character is likable and hopefully I see neither of them again.

All in all its an okay series... just skip the first part and mentally mute out parts of the main characters and you'll be fine.