The second entry to the short-lived MPS Labs' point and click adventure series was the relatively easy Return of the Phantom. Unsurprisingly it is a kind of a retelling of the classic horror tale originally released in 1910.
1993, in the Paris opera house, a premiere of the opera written by Erik, the infamous phantom of the opera. The opera, Don Juan Triumphant, is about to begin when a disaster strikes in a form of an ancient chandelier crashing down on the audience. Luckily enough, an opera-loving detective Raoul Montand, who is also a personal friend of the opera manager, is in the audience, so he is quick to jump on the case of the supposed accident.
It soon begins to look like that the fall of the chandelier wasn't an accident. All things begin to point to the possibility of the culprit that has been dead for at least a hundred years. It all becomes even more evident, when the lead singer of the opera, Christine, is killed by a culprit that looks like how the phantom was described, the possibility of the Phantom begins to seem even more like a reality, no matter how fantastical that might be.
Raoul chases the murderer to the lofters of the opera house and is promptly pushed down by the murderer. Raoul is knocked out cold and when he comes to, he is surrounded by somehow familiar, but still strange faces. The most familiar to him is the woman, who introduces herself as Christine Daae, whom Raoul knows to be the original object of desire of Erik's, the Phantom of the Opera. It doesn't take long for him to realise, that he has travelled back in time just moments before Christine is to perform her first lead role in the demand of the phantom.
During the performance, Erik appears on stage and kidnaps Christine, as he knows she has sent Raoul, whom everyone calls Vicomte Raoul de Chagny because he looks like the original hero of the story, a secret message pleading for his help against the phantom, who has used his sinister powers on her. Raoul finds the secret passage to the catacombs under the opera house and rescues Christine. But, alas, Raoul ends up fighting the Phantom on the same chandelier he felled upon the audience a hundred years in the future. Again, the chandelier crashes down, Raoul and the Phantom in tow.
When Raoul comes to, he is again back in his own time, in 1993, surrounded by familiar faces. There he sees his friend, Monsieur Brie, manager of the opera, as well Christine, whom he saw dead before he was taken back in time. He also learns, that there has been no accident at all. He checks a book about the Phantom only to learn, that the original ending has changed. Somehow, he is sure of it, he changed history when he confronted the phantom in a fight.
The story of the Return of the Phantom is far better than the game itself is. While it does have, as far design goes, some nice toches like dying taking you back to a moment before you die, eliminating the need to rely on constant saving, it is even at best just an okay game. It looks nice, the rotoscoped animation is more than good enough as is the voice acting for the time, but as a whole, it just isn't a fun game to play. It also suffers from a terrible soundtrack, which is a common thing with all MPS Labs adventure games. I don't know if it's on the composers they used or the audio tech their engine utilized, but the music does sound dreadful. Music sound awful in every MPS adventure game.
The game also loves leaving red herrings around. Some characters you meet have nothing to do with the game itself and some puzzles seem to exist only because they had the inventory items, but didn't have a proper puzzle for them. A good example is the audience box keeper Madame Giry. who seems to know that Raoul is from the future and demands him to present her three objects from his own time before she helps him. These items are three colour gel filters for light fixtures that for some reason have found their way to the past. There's no other need for them. And, as for additional red herring, you can pick them up in the future of 1993 as well, where you have even less use for them. They made me think they were surpluses from a puzzle that was axed from the game at some point.
On the subject of puzzles, Return of the Phantom is actually pretty light on them. The biggest puzzle of the game really is the maze under the opera house, where you have to navigate through copy and paste rooms. The amount of rooms you need to navigate through depends solely on the difficulty level you've chosen to play in.
Oh, yes, there's a difficulty level selector. The game does allow you to play in either easy or hard more. The biggest differences seem to be, that you don't need to pick up as many objects and that the maze is a bit easier. Other than those, the game is more or less the same.
Out of the three adventure games released under the MPS Labs banner, Return of the Phantom is definitely the weakest. While Rex Nebular wasn't a great game either, it at least offers more to do. If you like it or not really depends more if you warm up to the clumsy comedy it offers. And neither of the games can hold the candle on the best adventure title MPS Labs released, Dragonshpere, which despite its problems is the most memorable of the lot.
If you do want to give Return of the Phantom a spin despite what I said, you can get it from GOG. The two other titles are there as well.
Comments
Post a Comment