Agatha Christie: Murder on the Orient Express

 

 

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The story is much like the book but with one basic difference. Hercule Poirot is injured and can't get out of bed so you, a French woman (Antoinette Marceau) who works for the train company, are to do his dirty work for him.

To begin with, I don't like this Marceau character. It doesn't bother me that she's not in the book but she often appears out of place and can sound annoying. Her voice does not suit a detective and her tone often seems completely out of context. And though she's supposed to be French, her accent is 100% British (she got higher education in England) while she can't pronounce French words properly. But enough about her.

The early puzzles in the game are quite ridiculous. For example, a woman won't let you pass unless you find her umbrella, whereas in reality she has no authority (or physical power) to block the road. Quite silly.

Then you board the train and the puzzles get better. Hercule Poirot gives you two options early in the game. You can either ask for his help, or challenge him. If you ask for help, he will give you clues throughout the game, but if you challenge him then you're on your own. But naturally, you do have to go and report to him every time you accomplish something in the investigation. I recommend you not challenge him the first time you play the game.

The characters on the train are quite dull. They seem unanimated and don't do much , move or say anything until you talk to them. This may be due to the fact that the game makers did not want to introduce too many things that weren't in the book, but this makes the train seem like a ghost town. You often enter a person's compartment, check out their belongings without them saying a single word unless spoken to. The game is too linear for my liking.

Visually, the game is satisfying. The train is faithfully and beautifully reproduced. The gameplay is decent, although I would have preferred it to be in first person perspective rather than third.

The problem though is that too much of the game relies on repetition. You have to interrogate all characters several times. You can choose which questions to ask first, but that never changes the outcome of the game. The dialogues are often long and non-entertaining.

Other than these mechanical tasks such as interrogating and taking fingerprints and passports, there are some somewhat complicated puzzles that mostly involve combining two or more objects in your inventory and using them somewhere.

Overall, the game is just not exciting. You are never in anticipation of anything interesting except for one or two moments.

Fans of Agatha Christie might feel they've seen it all because it is too close to the book. However, there is a nice surprise and a twist in the plot in the end that is different from the book. If you've never read the book, then you might also be disappointed by the lack of activity that game suffers from, mostly due to its close following of the book.

Anyway, I bought this game hoping it would be more like "The Last Express," which is one of my favorite games. But while in the Last Express the characters seem alive and the train atmosphere seems real, in this game you feel like you're all alone with these still, dull characters solving boring puzzles. Heck, even Poirot is in his bed the entire time.

The game was a huge disappointment to me. I can't give it any less than 3 stars though, as an Agatha Christie fan, and as a fan of the Orient Express.
That's a shame... it had the potential to be great.

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