Basement Couch

I look at three demos for indie adventure games. Then I choose a winner.

This secene never happens in the demo, but I really wanted to show you guys the dinosaurs.

Time Gentlemen, Please! -

• The self referential humor of the game is specially tailored for the demo. The characters make references to playing the full version.
• The demo is for the second game of the two (They are bundled on Steam for 5 bucks, though you can get the first one for free off the Zombie Cow Studios website) so a lot of the intro is spent catching the player up. This also kind of spoils the entirety of the first game. Which stinks! At least I got to see a picture of a dude punching a T-Rex in a wheel chair, though.
• Dialog is done entirely in text. It’s paced cleverly and well written though, so a voice acting isn’t missed.
• The humor’s hit or miss. Most of it I thought was very funny, but there were some groan worthy jokes in the Demo.
• The art design of Time Gentlemen, Please! is neat but a little too jagged for my tastes. Even during the demo I started feeling discomfort just from looking at it.
• Puzzle solving doesn’t appear to be very difficult but Ben and Dan’s comments make every step entertaining.

Look at how neat this looks!

Machinarium

• There doesn’t seem to be any sort of narrative behind the events.
• The game is structured into progressive “Levels”. Once you complete a level it doesn’t see like you’re ever to return.
• The art style manages to be dirty and decaying while still charming and with personality. There is a painterly quality to it. And it looks like a better Tim Burton film than Tim Burton could ever make.
• The puzzles are logical and require actual brain power to complete (a plus!). There’s a lot of experimentation to discover the specific string of events you need to create to complete a level.
• I could see the lack plot-based motivation as something which would make Machinarium grow stale.
• While the art design pops (Even the title screen looks awesome!) the music is incredibly boring.
• You can earn a level’s detailed walkthrough by completing simple mini games. It helps make completing a difficult feel a little bit earned. …Even though you are totally cheating.

Those ropes look great, but that dog looks ugly.

Jolly Rover

• Holy crap, this game wants to be Secret of Monkey Island !
• The animations look pretty cheap. Particularly whenever a character speaks.
• While backgrounds are nicely detailed, the characters themselves look like they were designed by second year DArt students.
• The parrot gives you hints in exchange for crackers, and fortunately the demo has more crackers in it than you’ll ever need.
• Puzzles are less about solving a problem with the given tools and more about discovering which action moves the plot forward. Some puzzles are just mean. Like when I had to open a wine bottle. The only way to do this was with the tooth of a random skull found in a dude’s yard. Secret of Monkey Island would have introduced you to a character with a spiral hook for a hand or something. You are not Secret of Monkey Island, Jolly Rover.
• Voodoo, pirates, a unimposing main character, cooking, even the way text appears over characters head… pretty much every aspect of this game is ripped from the original Secret of Monkey Island. The only thing it’s lacking it Monkey Island’s charming puzzles.
• The dog theme in Jolly Rover is interesting, but it doesn’t add anything for the plot or humor.
• Sometimes the voice acting audio would be cut a half second too short, so it sounds like the actor’s microphones kept turning off. With the text above their heads I wouldn’t have know what they were saying.

The winner: Time Gentlemen, Please!:

Machinarium had the better puzzles but I think I would get bored with the lack of plot quickly. Jolly Rover looks like it’s trying to be a larger scope adventure game, but misses the spirit and fun of the games it is ripping off. Time Gentlemen, Please! Admits to everything its ripping off with a bizarre plot and decent humor. Thus, Time Gentlemen, Please! Is the winner. It’s simplistic graphics may be hard to look at sometime, but it did a good job at constantly winning me back despite them. I WANTED to keep playing this demo, whereas I felt relief when the “BUY NOW!” screen for Machinarium and Jolly Rover came up.