Broken Sword 5: The Serpent's Curse

The Broken Sword series is a hilarious adventure series fans come back to again and again for a point-and-click adventure puzzles and murder mysteries that need to be solved. In this latest installment, George Stobbart and Nico Collard get together to solve the murder of an art gallery owner.

During the game, you will switch between these two characters located in Paris and London, as they work together to solve the crime. The story is laced with humor, a seedy romance, and other twists and turns including a Russian mobster. If the Monkey Island series had murder as the plot instead of pirates, you would get Broken Sword 5.

New Features

Broken Sword 5: The Serpent’s Curse is newly released on Steam, and with it comes a whole host of new features not seen in the PC version. As you solve the mystery, you can also unlock a making of documentary that shows concept art and behind the scenes footage of how the game was made. This isn’t necessary for enjoyment of the game, but it is a really nice feature that adds extra content to the game.

Intuitive design

While the puzzles will keep you entertained, they’re not going to break your brain to solve. Most puzzles involve having a combination of items on hand, often random objects such as a paperclip or nail clippers. The game helps you figure out when you are closer to solving the puzzle by playing a positive sounding musical note when you find a clue.

Most of the time clues can be found through searching the nearby environment, but if you do get stuck there is a helpful, built in hint system. This system is optional, so you prefer to go it alone you don’t have to use it.

The game also helps in other ways. If you’ve ever spent hours in a game wandering aimlessly trying to find where you’re supposed to go, you may find this game a bit more refreshing. If you wander too far in the wrong direction, the game will come up with some reason for you to go the right way, helping to streamline your search.

Incredible graphics

The graphics in the game are very well done. The backgrounds are nothing short of beautiful, and the carefully shaded characters never look out of place on these artful backgrounds. This actually leads to a drawback of the game being more noticeable.

While the artwork is amazing, the animations need a little work. They are often very rough, which seems out of place against the raw beauty of the artwork itself.

This is a fun game for those who enjoy solving puzzles, playing murder mysteries, or simply want a humorous plot line. Hard core gamers may not like how helpful the game can be in getting the player on the right track, while others will appreciate not having to search for hours to find a needle in a haystack.

Pros

• Great artwork
• Streamlined gameplay
• Hilarious plot
• Added features

Cons

• Archaic animations