Game Review: The Book of Unwritten Tales

In a world torn by war, the aged gremlin archaeologist Mortimer McGuffin harbours the dark secret of a powerful artifact. Whoever calls this artifact its own, will determine the fate of the world. While the Army of Shadows sends out its best and most devious agents to discover the secret, the Alliance's three heroes find themselves involuntarily drawn into the crisis...

The Book of Unwritten Tales
Released: 2011
Console: PC
Rating: 3.5/5 stars
Genre/Mode: Adventure/Single Player
Buy: Amazon (US) || Amazon (UK) || Steam

REVIEW:
This is my first game review, so try not to be so mean with me. Finally i'm free from uni and i found time to start playing again and what a better way to start than an adventure game (i always had a thing for them). Unfortunately, the companies don't make adventure games anymore. "The Adventure Company" is pretty much dead and acquired by the Nordic Games and they only have one new title..."The Book of Unwritten Tales".

BoUT is a 3rd person game, where you have to solve puzzles and riddles. This is the 1st adventure game based on a fantasy world i've ever encountered. You get to play through the story with Wilbur (the gnome), Ivo (an elf princess), Nate (a human treasure hunter) and that pink weird animal called Cricket or something. You either play with only one of them, or you can change between them and have to combine what they are doing to solve the puzzles. There are things, Ivo can do but Wilbur can't because he is small,etc. So you have to think in each situation what to do and with who.

The negative thing here (at least for me) is the everything is extremely easy. When you are used to riddles of Syberia and Still Life, those here are so easy. You just have to listen to all the discussions and be careful to find all the things around. Even when you have to search in 4 different places to find something, if you were really careful the 1st time you will either already have it or remember it because someone mentioned something. Plus, the fact when you completely search a place the microscope dissappears from the screen so you know there is nothing else there make it faster for you. At least the game is long enough.

The inventory is the simplest inventory i've seen in my whole life. You just pass the mouse over the bottom of your screen and there it is. And you just take whatever you want, you pass it over another thing, click and combined. There is no limit as to how many things you can carry either.

What really makes the game stand out, is it's graphics, the fantasy world and the lines. They are cartoon-ish but they are really beautiful. I've already talk about being in a fantasy world, which is a really interesting change ( you have to cheat every single contest or achievement, instead fighting to win like at RPGs). And lastly is the script. Some may find it silly, but if you are geeky enough and know your stuff through movies,books,games you will find it funny. The are references to Indiana Jones, LOTR, Harry Potter, WoW, Mission Impossible and many other things. I was grinning half the time.

In general is a good and enjoyable game. It's been said that is the adventure game with the highest score the last 10 years, but i don't know how fair that is. I mean, it's not like we get any new games except Sherlock Holmes and some other old ones who don't say to stop releasing sequels. "The Adventure Company" is dead. "Microids" is dead. Yeah...Anyway, still worth your time.