MORTIMER BECKETT AND THE CRIMSON THIEF

by PAPRIKARI; GAMEHOUSE

Jud’s Game Rating:

Graphics: ****  Player participation (PP) ****  Satisfaction Factor (SF) ****

Frustration Factor (FF)  **     Fair Play (FP) ***

I was really excited about this new MORTIMER BECKETT finally coming out.  But I was rather disappointed by it.   It was the less than clear Graphics – one of my ‘pet hates’ – which was surprising considering how good they were for THE LOST KING game.    I find that a game where the Graphics don’t ‘shine’ leaves me feeling deflated.    It means that no matter how clever the Graphics are re their authentic depiction of the genre of the game, their impact is lost in the gloom or blur of the images.  And this detracts from the game experience.

Also the fact that you are now looking for complete items, from ALL the areas within each city, to be used amongst them all, is a let down.  They lie along the bottom of the screen in what doubles as a List and an Inventory Bar.  This is great as it frees up a lot more of the screen for the game.  I can understand that the game designers felt that they needed to be able to fit them all in this way – but if they’d broken it down area by area as with the other 3 of the Series, then they could still have fit in more items, fragmented as before, below their respective areas.

The Tutorial – if you choose to use it – is clear, concise, helpful, quick, and hands-on which is the best way to learn something.  I only checked it in case there were new systems of play from the other 3 games – not a bad idea in any case, as often there are changes that you may not pick up till part way through the game.

The Options is basic, but the Premium Edition has a Strategy Guide you can use if you get stuck.  I had to look at it for a couple of puzzles as they weren’t always self-explanatory, and the hints for them only activated if you clicked on the right item in one of the scenes.  So make sure that you check anything that looks worth clicking on – it could be important, though it probably isn’t.  Also you have to Save & Exit back to the Main Menu in order to access the Stategy Guide.  This makes it less user-friendly.

The Premium Edition, as well as having the Standard Game locations of Paris, Rio,  Philadelphia, London, Moscow, Beijing, Cairo, and Rome, also has an added location in its Epilogue – aboard a Cruise Liner in the Mediterranean Sea.

The red arrow cursor fades during collection and task actions then recharges back to red – like it did with the other games – still slowing the whole game process down.  This is quite frustrating FF, and rather annoying.

The Map allows you to move from area to area within the city, and there are also sub-areas in some of these that you need to explore.  The Notebook stores information about the puzzles which you can access easily.  However if the info hasn’t been put into it, then it isn’t much help.

Overall this is a good Hidden Object/ Adventure Game – but I found it didn’t live up to its hype!  Nor to the standard of the 3rd Game in the Series – that of THE LOST KING.  It’s worth a try.  Let me know what you think.

For Walkthroughs of this Game try UHS Hints at:   www.uhs-hints.com/

(C)  Copyright Jud House 19/09/2011

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