A Review
Hello, my name is Chrono212, the Tin Dog of the Escapist TARDIS crew ( http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/The-Escapist-TARDIS-crew ) and I will be guiding you through this review of the first episode of 'Doctor Who - The Adventure Games'.
Now, for those who are unfortunate enough not to know what Doctor Who is then let me give you some background.
It is one of the greats when it comes to British television shows, running from 1963 till 1989, with a hiatus in the 1990s and returning in glory in 2005 after an extensive reboot and is currently on its fifth series on BBC One. It follows the life of the Doctor, a time and space travelling alien (who resembles a perfectly normal human being) known as a 'Time Lord', and his many companions using his TARDIS (an acronym for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space) which resembles at blue 1950s British police box which, naturally, is bigger on the inside.
No, I am not making this up.
The current series, starring Matt Smith as the Doctor and Karen Gillan as Amy Pond, the Doctor's assistant, is on episode ten of fourteen. However, Piers Wenger, Head of Drama, BBC Wales and Executive Producer of Doctor Who - The Adventures Games, explains "There aren't 13 episodes of Doctor Who this year, there are 17 - four of which are interactive." The first of these interactive episodes was launched today and is the subject of the following review.
'City of the Daleks' opens with the classic view of the inside of the TARDIS, with the Doctor tapping away at the console at the centre and Amy walking on and having a chat about 1963 where the Doctor complains that "no one ever wants to meet Ringo". First impressions, bearing in mind this is already using the in-game engine, is rather flat. This is mainly due to the dull textures used for both the environment and character models. The same can be said for the animations, where the lip sync is frequently off, place holder animations for the arms and face are used multiple times even within the first few minutes of the game. Oh dear. On the other hand, the voice acting, where both Smith and Gillan have reprised their roles as the Doctor and Amy Pond, manages to hold the whole scene together. Also very impressive is the sound, which is authentic to the show, both in terms of the background sounds and music.
On arriving in 1963 it is immediately apparent something is amiss. The scene that greets Amy and the Doctor is not one of 'Swinging London' but of a post-apocalyptic vision of Trafalgar Square, complete with Lord Admiral Nelson's head lying on the ground to meet them. But they are not alone. Several Daleks, the Doctors ultimate nemesis, appear, chasing a typical 60s swinger...but one with a bad attitude. Using dynamite to destroy several of the mechanical monstrosities, she darts through a man-hole in the street.
And then the classic Doctor Who title sequence re-rendered using the in-game engine and models which, although admirable on the part of the developers Sumo Digital, does take away from the feeling that this is a genuine Doctor Who product.
After the intro sequence, the player gets to take control of the Doctor. This is done either by the classic AWSD keys for movement and using the mouse to control the camera or using the left mouse button as forward and movement of the camera dictating direction. Both these control schemes work well, however, the movement animation is not entirely realistic. Not terrible, but not smooth, either.
Wandering around, the player might discover a few glowing objects, such as a Route master bus or a hackney carriage taxi. By clicking on these you are treated to a short fact file including a description of the object, a real world fact and a fact to do with the 'Whoniverse'. It just wouldn't be the BBC if it didn't include some kind of educational value. There are also purple 'collectable' Doctor Who fact cards, with information about the show, which are scattered throughout each level. Some are placed reasonably openly while others might require some skill in finding.
These collectables are probably included because the main audience for this game is much more likely to be a younger fan of Doctor Who rather than an older fan of video games, although both are catered for.
The first portion of gameplay after getting used to the controls involves avoiding scanning Daleks. Unfortunately this is forced stealth gameplay with no option to go in guns blazing, as the Doctor does not believe in such things (he has only handled a firearm three times throughout the whole running of the show). The Dalek's scanning area is represented by a sweeping green arc in front of each Dalek which is conveniently predictable and is blocked by piles of rubble or sand bags. It uses a coloured warning system: Green - undetected, Amber - detected, and Red - Dead. These moments are genuinely tense as the Daleks are the most dangerous enemy the Doctor has...also it is a one hit kill although there are a suitable amount of checkpoints between objectives. Amy follows closely under control of the AI which easily stays with the player-controlled Doctor, no matter how erratic their movement.
After avoiding the Daleks, the Doctor and Amy proceed underground in pursuit of the mysterious Dalek-destroying woman. This is followed by a short cut scene, still suffering from the same problems of erratic lip-syncing and basic animations but again the script, written by Phil Ford (co-writer Doctor Who 'Waters of Mars') and James Moran (Severance, Torchwood Children of Earth) holds it together. The player is given a choice of questions to ask but none of which are mission critical.
After another stealth section of avoiding Daleks, the first of many mini games begins. This involves re-wiring a fuse box without the wires touching which is trickier than you might expect. Not impossible or annoying, but does require a good amount of thought.
And that is the basic game play of the whole game. As said before, the story, acting and music hold a lot of this game together and the places that the Doctor and Amy go to are genuinely interesting, especially for someone like me who has watched every episode of the new seasons but not any of the classic episodes which the game uses as inspiration for settings for later levels.
It took me with a decent internet connection to download the whole game in about 20 minutes and the whole game took a little over an hour which, as a free game, I would say is a very good deal. I would describe this first episode of Doctor Who - The Adventure Games a diamond in the rough, although I doubt that anyone is planning to put any more polish on the following three episodes.
'City of the Daleks' is available to download for free in the UK from the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/dw/theadventuregames
Hello, my name is Chrono212, the Tin Dog of the Escapist TARDIS crew ( http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/The-Escapist-TARDIS-crew ) and I will be guiding you through this review of the first episode of 'Doctor Who - The Adventure Games'.
Now, for those who are unfortunate enough not to know what Doctor Who is then let me give you some background.
It is one of the greats when it comes to British television shows, running from 1963 till 1989, with a hiatus in the 1990s and returning in glory in 2005 after an extensive reboot and is currently on its fifth series on BBC One. It follows the life of the Doctor, a time and space travelling alien (who resembles a perfectly normal human being) known as a 'Time Lord', and his many companions using his TARDIS (an acronym for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space) which resembles at blue 1950s British police box which, naturally, is bigger on the inside.
No, I am not making this up.
The current series, starring Matt Smith as the Doctor and Karen Gillan as Amy Pond, the Doctor's assistant, is on episode ten of fourteen. However, Piers Wenger, Head of Drama, BBC Wales and Executive Producer of Doctor Who - The Adventures Games, explains "There aren't 13 episodes of Doctor Who this year, there are 17 - four of which are interactive." The first of these interactive episodes was launched today and is the subject of the following review.
'City of the Daleks' opens with the classic view of the inside of the TARDIS, with the Doctor tapping away at the console at the centre and Amy walking on and having a chat about 1963 where the Doctor complains that "no one ever wants to meet Ringo". First impressions, bearing in mind this is already using the in-game engine, is rather flat. This is mainly due to the dull textures used for both the environment and character models. The same can be said for the animations, where the lip sync is frequently off, place holder animations for the arms and face are used multiple times even within the first few minutes of the game. Oh dear. On the other hand, the voice acting, where both Smith and Gillan have reprised their roles as the Doctor and Amy Pond, manages to hold the whole scene together. Also very impressive is the sound, which is authentic to the show, both in terms of the background sounds and music.
On arriving in 1963 it is immediately apparent something is amiss. The scene that greets Amy and the Doctor is not one of 'Swinging London' but of a post-apocalyptic vision of Trafalgar Square, complete with Lord Admiral Nelson's head lying on the ground to meet them. But they are not alone. Several Daleks, the Doctors ultimate nemesis, appear, chasing a typical 60s swinger...but one with a bad attitude. Using dynamite to destroy several of the mechanical monstrosities, she darts through a man-hole in the street.
And then the classic Doctor Who title sequence re-rendered using the in-game engine and models which, although admirable on the part of the developers Sumo Digital, does take away from the feeling that this is a genuine Doctor Who product.
After the intro sequence, the player gets to take control of the Doctor. This is done either by the classic AWSD keys for movement and using the mouse to control the camera or using the left mouse button as forward and movement of the camera dictating direction. Both these control schemes work well, however, the movement animation is not entirely realistic. Not terrible, but not smooth, either.
Wandering around, the player might discover a few glowing objects, such as a Route master bus or a hackney carriage taxi. By clicking on these you are treated to a short fact file including a description of the object, a real world fact and a fact to do with the 'Whoniverse'. It just wouldn't be the BBC if it didn't include some kind of educational value. There are also purple 'collectable' Doctor Who fact cards, with information about the show, which are scattered throughout each level. Some are placed reasonably openly while others might require some skill in finding.
These collectables are probably included because the main audience for this game is much more likely to be a younger fan of Doctor Who rather than an older fan of video games, although both are catered for.
The first portion of gameplay after getting used to the controls involves avoiding scanning Daleks. Unfortunately this is forced stealth gameplay with no option to go in guns blazing, as the Doctor does not believe in such things (he has only handled a firearm three times throughout the whole running of the show). The Dalek's scanning area is represented by a sweeping green arc in front of each Dalek which is conveniently predictable and is blocked by piles of rubble or sand bags. It uses a coloured warning system: Green - undetected, Amber - detected, and Red - Dead. These moments are genuinely tense as the Daleks are the most dangerous enemy the Doctor has...also it is a one hit kill although there are a suitable amount of checkpoints between objectives. Amy follows closely under control of the AI which easily stays with the player-controlled Doctor, no matter how erratic their movement.
After avoiding the Daleks, the Doctor and Amy proceed underground in pursuit of the mysterious Dalek-destroying woman. This is followed by a short cut scene, still suffering from the same problems of erratic lip-syncing and basic animations but again the script, written by Phil Ford (co-writer Doctor Who 'Waters of Mars') and James Moran (Severance, Torchwood Children of Earth) holds it together. The player is given a choice of questions to ask but none of which are mission critical.
After another stealth section of avoiding Daleks, the first of many mini games begins. This involves re-wiring a fuse box without the wires touching which is trickier than you might expect. Not impossible or annoying, but does require a good amount of thought.
And that is the basic game play of the whole game. As said before, the story, acting and music hold a lot of this game together and the places that the Doctor and Amy go to are genuinely interesting, especially for someone like me who has watched every episode of the new seasons but not any of the classic episodes which the game uses as inspiration for settings for later levels.
It took me with a decent internet connection to download the whole game in about 20 minutes and the whole game took a little over an hour which, as a free game, I would say is a very good deal. I would describe this first episode of Doctor Who - The Adventure Games a diamond in the rough, although I doubt that anyone is planning to put any more polish on the following three episodes.
'City of the Daleks' is available to download for free in the UK from the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/dw/theadventuregames
