Useless Doctor Clock and his Toasted Sandwich of Lies

<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In a city far away&comma; in a hidden shed lives the inventor Doctor Clock&period; Together with his cat Franklin and his robotic and cynical backpack&comma; SACK&comma; he is about to have a most interesting day&period; Not going to lie&comma; I hadn&&num;8217&semi;t heard of Doc Clock or his friends until yesterday when they &&num;8216&semi;appeared&&num;8217&semi; on my recommended list&period; What the hell&comma; I thought&comma; since buying a spectre pack in Mass Effect 3 &&num;8212&semi; mistake much&quest; &&num;8212&semi; had left me with over eight quid in change I had the funds&comma; and recently I&&num;8217&semi;ve been surprisingly satisfied with most downloadable titles I&&num;8217&semi;ve played&period; So £7&period;99 later and there we where&comma; in possession of a game I&&num;8217&semi;d never heard and taking my first leap of gaming faith in months&period; In a household where money is tight&comma; this is kind of a big thing y&&num;8217&semi;know&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This made it all the more stinging when I discovered Doctor Clock&comma; quirky and alluring title aside&comma; had very little in terms of spectacle&period; Seriously&comma; I was better off planking on a highway over pass&period; So for the many of us who don&&num;8217&semi;t know&comma; <em>Doctor Clock and his Toasted Sandwich of Time<&sol;em> is a 2D puzzle driven platformer&comma; available for all good Steam&comma; WiiWare and PSN users&comma; which follows the adventures of the eponymous Doctor Clock as he journeys back through time to stop himself from turning Franklin into a cactus after he mated a grill with a toaster and a refrigerator&period; I s&ast;&ast;t you not&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>From the word go me and Doctor Clock got off to a rocky start&period; The jokes weren&&num;8217&semi;t making me laugh&comma; the obnoxious in game conversations between the bad Doctor and his backpack filled up most&comma; if not all&comma; the screen and the tutorials gave me little direction as to how the game would be played&period; It reminded me of my younger days when stumbling into my home&comma; long after everyone had gone to bed&comma; and resorted to sexually caressing the walls in search of a light switch&period; You know the idea behind everything&comma; but you&&num;8217&semi;re left to your own imagination as to how all the dots join together&period; &lpar;Hint&colon; Many of the puzzles involve actually building platforms&period;&rpar;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;meet-doctor-clock-toasted-sandwich-time&sol;doc01&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-11958"><img class&equals;"aligncenter wp-image-11958" title&equals;"doc01" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;04&sol;06215221&sol;doc01&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"405" height&equals;"213" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Game wise Doctor Clock again struck a sour&comma; cringe worthy&comma; cord&period; Clock can&&num;8217&semi;t jump&comma; he can&&num;8217&semi;t climb anything that reaches higher than his pelvis and his only capable invention&comma; SACK&comma; is just as awkward in practice as his inventor&period; The game makes mountains out of molehills&comma; sometimes literally&period; SACK collects and stores junk throughout the level and it&&num;8217&semi;s up to his boss to decide how to use it to step over that pesky puddle standing in his way&period; That would be hilarious if it were not&comma; sadly&comma; true&period; The challenge isn&&num;8217&semi;t so much figuring out what must be done so much as figuring out how you do it&period; Selecting the correct piece of junk one time literally took me minutes&comma; discovering how to operate the propeller&comma; a key piece of platform cracking equipment&comma; took me most of half an hour&period; Maybe I&&num;8217&semi;m thick&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s entirely possible&comma; but nothing should be this complicated for 238 megabytes of software&period; Then when you eventually  get to invent vehicles&comma; sculpted from a busted chair and a set of wheels&comma; the clumsy mechanics really hit their stride&period; Running over you&comma; crushing you&comma; demanding to veer off a cliff should you so much as dare to take control of the vehicle&period; Riveting&comma; but not quite so&comma; and just as awkward as the rest of the game&period; But hey&comma; at least it&&num;8217&semi;s consistent&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Presentation wise there&&num;8217&semi;s nothing to complain about&comma; at least&period; Nothing to praise either&period; The game just looks like a 2D side scrolling platform game&comma; with some dodgy animations glueing the action together&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s quite funny that Clocky boy can&&num;8217&semi;t seem to walk diagonally&comma; and instead must do a climbing animation over and over again until he reaches the top&period; So the uninspiring cartoon visuals get an overall mediocre&comma; so we can at least spare the design artist any grief&period; Even if we can&&num;8217&semi;t extend the same mercy to his colleagues&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;meet-doctor-clock-toasted-sandwich-time&sol;screen&lowbar;06&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-11982"><img class&equals;"aligncenter wp-image-11982" title&equals;"screen&lowbar;06" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;04&sol;06215140&sol;screen&lowbar;06&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"456" height&equals;"256" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Perhaps the most pathetically hilarious tool at your disposal is the power to turn back time using the time slider&period; Yes&comma; Clock had access to time travel from the word go and didn&&num;8217&semi;t think to use it after introducing his pet to photosynthesis&period; Undermining the point of why he needed to build another time machine in the first place and basically breaking the plot all together&period; As a small plus it also removes all fear of getting a game over&comma; since it&&num;8217&semi;s essentially an uncool version of the <em>Sands of Time<&sol;em> you will always be able to rewind to a point were you didn&&num;8217&semi;t screw up and try again&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Yet the most annoying thing&comma; without peer&comma; in this game is the dialogue&period; There is far too much of it for a game of this size&comma; its words per hour must be reaching the <em>Mass Effect<&sol;em> benchmark because it seems I cannot go ten steps without the backpack sassing me or Ol&&num;8217&semi; Clocky pointing out the obvious&period; What&&num;8217&semi;s worth is they try to be funny&comma; and they&&num;8217&semi;re not&period; I admit I smirked once the Robot Hippies&comma; oh yeah they&&num;8217&semi;re in this too&comma; came into play but I never once found what the developers thought would be funny enjoyable&period; They&&num;8217&semi;re sense of comedy is as about as enjoyable as a stroke&comma; this just lasts longer&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>I can&&num;8217&semi;t recommend this game&comma; I just can&&num;8217&semi;t&period; Don&&num;8217&semi;t buy this game&comma; please&excl; Don&&num;8217&semi;t be charmed by the quirky title and the promise of a toasted sandwich&comma; which are few and far between as well&period; Yet even as I say this I know some of you will&comma; just because I told you not to&period; You&&num;8217&semi;re going to want to find out for yourself&comma; well don&&num;8217&semi;t&excl; What are you &&num;8212&semi; hey don&&num;8217&semi;t you dare&excl; Get off the PSN &&num;8212&semi; oh god you did it&period; Well now we&&num;8217&semi;re both out of pocket and I was better off not warning you&period; The world would probably be safer without caution signs now that I think about it&period; Anyway this marks the disappointing climax to a very disappointing game&comma; you may go now or if you&&num;8217&semi;d like feel free to read something else on our site like maybe a game you <strong>should <&sol;strong>buy&comma; <em><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;shank-2-review&sol;">Shank 2<&sol;a><&sol;em>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; right&semi;">&&num;8230&semi;Just <strong>don&&num;8217&semi;t<&sol;strong> buy this game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;

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