Donald Dowell and the Ghost of Barker Manor is an old-style point-and-click adventure game, inspired by the great Sierra and Lucas 90's classics. It has an old-fashion graphic style, totally hand-drawn. The drawings were scanned and colored with simple photo-editing programs. Game interface is old style too (maybe not like current games, but great fascination for old-gamers, inspired by old Sierra and Lucas games (such as Sam & Max). The dialogues, the characters and the situations have a sense of humor inspired by games like "Day of the Tentacle" or "Monkey Island". Donald Dowell is a nice old man in his eighties, retired for many years. Donald s life, except for his "intolerable" wife, is quiet. But Donald feels empty. He has the socalled retiree's syndrome : he s bored to death! The only way to cure his boredom is TO GO BACK TO WORK. After many hours spent in his city, trying to get hired for various jobs, he finally finds his calling: to be a GHOSTBUSTER!
Un jeu dans le style "old school" avec de l'humour et des clins d’œil à d'autres jeux d'aventure des années 90.
Graphically, very very pleaseing and charming. Wonderfully witty and clever dialogue and story. Great characters and a very engaging story.
I am not a natural or frequent 'point and click' game player, so this was a different experience for me. That perhaps contributed to how difficult and sometimes obtuse puzzles and their answers were to me. There is one puzzle which hinges on you giving a gift to one of the NPCs with only a very slight hint towards that even being possible. I know it's a mystery and that you can't lead your players hand in hand through the story - that rather negates the 'mystery bit of it and I'm glad this game doesn't - but sometimes you're going to get a player (like me) to whom this is not a natural thought process, so a gentle nudge or a kindly hint on screen or in a journal might occasionally be useful.
Those personal feelings aside, I would happily recommend this game. If you do like point and clicks (and even a touch of hidden object knowledge or expertise might help in this one, but I don't do them either so take that with a pinch of salt) and mystery games, then this really is a great choice! The style and the writing are brimming with charm and tongue-in-cheek wit, beautifully delivered and realised.
And if you're new to this kind of gaming, and you fancy a bit of a good, fun challenge that will really get you thinking about fifty-miles outside the box, then this is a great starting point!
A good, solid game that perhaps occasionally needs to direct the player a touch more. 7/10
I looked forward to playing this game but it was tediously unresponsive