Black Mirror Review: Fairest Of Them All

<p>I&&num;8217&semi;m a gamer who has missed out on a lot of great point-and-click adventures due to the fact that I never had a gaming PC&period; I&&num;8217&semi;ve been a console gamer my whole life&comma; and I don&&num;8217&semi;t see that ever changing&period; While I&&num;8217&semi;m saddened I missed great games like <em>Grim Fandango<&sol;em> and <em>7th Guest<&sol;em> it is nice to see that THQ Nordic is publishing a reboot of the decade-old <em>The Black Mirror<&sol;em> series&period; Most of the point and click adventure games that I have encountered have been pretty dry and lose my interest reasonably fast&comma; not so for this <em>Black Mirror<&sol;em> reboot&period; King Art Games did a great job making this game extremely atmospheric and timely&period; I enjoyed every point and click I had to do with this game&comma; and look forward to this little survival horror point and click taking off&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Seeing that this is a point and click adventure&comma; the game is very story driven with lots of surprises and twists along the way&period; I&&num;8217&semi;m just going to lay the setting down for you so I don&&num;8217&semi;t spoil anything for anyone&period; You are the son of a man who recently died&comma; and you were willed an old estate called Sgathan Dubh&period; Your name is David Gordon and the house that you must sign for has a nickname&comma; Black Mirror House&period; Your father&comma; being a smart man&comma; has left you clues so that you can solve some seriously difficult and interesting puzzles&period; As you do this you slowly learn about the house&comma; your family and what ultimately drove your father to his death&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132065" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132065" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-132065" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;11&sol;23012954&sol;black-mirror-2&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"360" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132065" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Black Mirror<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; THQ Nordic&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The controls of this game aren&&num;8217&semi;t too difficult to master&comma; the left thumbstick moves David around the mansion and the right thumbstick controls the camera&period; Unfortunately&comma; the camera doesn&&num;8217&semi;t rotate completely for you&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;ll move a tad but won&&num;8217&semi;t follow your full control which kind of makes all the pointing and clicking a tad more difficult&period; David is also a very sluggish walker so when you are wandering around the mansion it takes quite a bit of time&comma; even more time since you don&&num;8217&semi;t have a map and some of the darkened hallways look very similar&period; You can also get caught on the geometry of the game as you try to pass a table or plant in the way&comma; this doesn&&num;8217&semi;t make the game unplayable by any means but be prepared to walk and get nowhere if you&&num;8217&semi;re not paying attention&period; Since this is a point-and-click adventure with a controller you use the left thumbstick to control your reticle once you decide to examine something&period; Make sure you use the right thumbstick to examine even more closely&comma; I lost an hour trying to find a secret in a desk and it was right in front of me the whole time&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The graphics in this game carry the mood to perfection&comma; as I wandered the mansion in the middle of the night I was legitimately nervous that Cthulhu would come get me or some other unnamed horror awaited me&period; KING Art Games made sure that every little detail was included&comma; and that every corner of the house was a scary place to investigate&period; The time period of the early 1800&&num;8217&semi;s is very much alive in this game&comma; the clothes&comma; the set pieces&comma; and even the language capture it all so perfectly&period; The mansion is a beautiful yet horrifying place&comma; the voice-acting is top notch which I didn&&num;8217&semi;t really expect for this title&period; I expected people to phone it in yet they gave great performances&period; Even the puzzles built into the game gave off an air of timeliness&comma; one&comma; in particular&comma; was a very ornate desk that you would never be able to buy from IKEA or anywhere in this decade&period; KING Art Games did a phenomenal job bringing this era to life on my PS4 and I commend them for it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132087" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132087" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-132087" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;11&sol;25000451&sol;black&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"360" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132087" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Black Mirror<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; THQ Nordic&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Honestly&comma; I went into this title expecting very little and being very surprised once I finally got around to playing it&period; I kept wanting to wander through the mansion more and more&comma; every time I did I found some new hint as to what happened to my father&period; If you like survival horror&comma; you will love the atmosphere and mystery of the game&comma; point and click fans will fall even more in love with the genre and fans of puzzles will have many tough ones to figure out&period; The puzzles were not very forgiving in this game and since I had no walkthrough to look at I struggled a bit with a couple of them&period; Be ready to think a lot&comma; jot notes down&comma; and take pictures of clues with your phone so that you can reference them easier while in the menu portion of the game&period; If you were on the fence about this game when you first heard of it&comma; jump off that fence and find a copy of this title&period; In a huge year for games&comma; this is one of those unique games that will stand out and make you wish for more unique titles once you play it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong>A Playstation 4 Review copy of Black Mirror was provided by THQ Nordic for the purpose of this Review&period;<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;