Blackwell Epiphany review

I started playing Blackwell Epiphany at 7:00 PM. By 00:00 AM I realized I was going to finish it in one go. By 01:30 I was on the edge of my seat, mouth literally (I mean literally) open, and not even caring I had to work the next morning.

How many points should a game review cover? Is that something professional reviewers do? Take notes? I suppose it depends on the game. But I couldn't be bothered with putting down my mouse.

Let me tell you. Blackwell Epiphany must be one of the better written narratives in the last decade. If you liked the saga, this title will provide the climax ending you craved when Deception ended.

At first I didn't like how the game puzzles were constructed. It seems like a trivial matter, but it takes effort and know-how to guide the player through a graphic adventure game. I feel that's a lost art these days, and Blackwell Epiphany takes some time to get used to. At least it did for me. I was tempted to look at a walkthrough once or twice, but the game is well balanced in terms of difficulty. It will squeeze your brain just right. Once you have spent a couple of hours on it, you will just flow through it. And there's when the story comes in.

You see, all Blackwell games have exceptional writing. Even if the first one, Blackwell Legacy, is a bit rough on the edges (specially in the graphical department), the script is still great, and will keep you playing, and will make you buy Unbound, and by that point you will be sucked in inevitably. This last one, though, was the first one that made me think I was playing through a TV show or a movie saga. Yes, you have to like ghost stories, I guess, but you can't deny Dave Gilbert could be writing TV show scripts better than some by now.

The graphics, as it's natural, get better with every release. And this last installment is no exception. In my opinion, as always, with Blackwell Convergence graphics reached professional level, and they get better all the way to Epiphany.

I'm really licking butt here, aren't I? Well, what didn't I like? It felt short. I spent more than 6 hours on this indie graphic adventure, and still, it felt short. And why is that? Well, at least from my point of view, pacing is not all that good in this one. Maybe it's because I teared through it in one sitting (but that's the game's fault, it just wouldn't let me go). I didn't get that feeling you get from good old films where you feel you have really lived through a film, grown with the characters, spent more than the couple of hours the film lasts, but instead you have been watching those people for years, you know?

Is that fatal? No, not at all. I didn't even care by the time I got to the end. I was doubting on buying this game because I'm going to be really tight on money this month, but now, now I would buy it again. I won't, though. I'm really tight on money this month...

What I'm going to do is recommend it to anyone I know that enjoyed the previous installments of the Blackwell series. This kind of games have to be promoted if we want to see any kind of healthy future in the videogames industry.

The voice acting did almost disappoint me on occasion. The voice actors and actresses are not the best at the most demanding times, but they are more than enough to hold the game together and believable. You won't feel pulled out of your immersion because of them. So, the voice acting did almost disappoint me on occasion. But by the end of the ride, I loved them.

And that's the point, you see? I need not make this review any longer. The key to this whole thing is that it oozes love. Blackwell Epiphany (and the whole saga for that matter) is a child of love. High production value? Yes, definitely. The writing, the graphics and music (I can't believe I didn't mention music yet) are the strong points of this game. Puzzle design is a tad weak. Voice acting, I stay neutral on that one. Total score? Epic. And I mean it. As a culmination to a series, this game is the real deal. You will be sad it's over, but you will feel the closure, you will feel it with watery eyes.

I'm proud of you if you made it this far. Now, go buy that game!