Screenshots :.
Sam & Max Ep5: Reality 2.0
PC
Matt
16-04-2007
"Looking at this caused my eyes to burst."
"It's like Tron meets Super Mario!?"
Seconds out, it’s round five for our favourite capering dog and rabbit duo as Sam and Max return to save the world again in the latest episode of Telltale’s episodic series. With the previous instalment – Abe Lincoln Must Die – starting to edge the series back in a more pleasing direction after a couple of reasonably disappointing outings, Reality 2.0 sees the pair partaking in what is certainly their most enjoyable adventure to date by trying to find out why a mysterious computer surge is adversely affecting local residents.
Things get off to a suspiciously familiar start. Yup, you’ll need to visit your old friends Bosco and Sybil again in their stores, you’ll bump into your chummy resident rat Jimmy again and you’ll find each character has a remarkably similar gag to the ones they’ve been peddling all series long. I’ve said plenty enough in previous reviews about the repetition of jokes, locations and such and to an extent you could label the very same comments at the first part of Reality 2.0. There are a couple of new jokes sprinkled in for good measure and quite a few of these are pretty darn funny, but for the most part the game settles back into a well-worn rhythm.
But then, about midway through, things kick off into another gear completely. Without needing to go to new locations and introduce new characters, Telltale manage to shift the player out of his surroundings and plonk Sam and Max into an area packed with witty nods towards other games and a selection of amusing puzzles that’ll have you smiling more than your average Futurama rerun. It’s the first true time I’ve actually sat through a good-sized chunk of a Sam and Max game and enjoyed pretty much every moment of it since the first couple of episodes, which is a pointer that Telltale are beginning to fully grasp the series and run with it.
It’s something that comes across in the puzzles that the game throws at you, too. Whereas the first few games in the series were far too easy and the latter couple spiced with a few rather obscure tasks, Reality 2.0 feels much more consistent throughout. There’s one particular task that’ll probably leave a few people scratching their heads for a good while and relies on the slightly annoying try-clicking-everything-in-case-it-triggers-an-event method, but for the main part everything is logical and can be solved with a little creative thinking.
It all goes to show that there is most certainly a heck of a lot of life in this series yet. There’s never been much wrong with the leading characters themselves, but recent outings have seen Telltale juggling them in some sort of awkward middle ground, not really too sure if they want to take a few risks with the series. What Reality 2.0 ably points to is a team of developers and storywriters who have a lot more up their sleeve than people (and perhaps themselves) give them credit for, and that the series is not only in safe hands, it’s in hands capable of churning out fantastic gaming chunks at bargain prices. Even if you were jaded by previous instalments, a few hours of your time playing through Episode 5 will be more than enough to get the fire running once more. Episode 6, anyone?
Things get off to a suspiciously familiar start. Yup, you’ll need to visit your old friends Bosco and Sybil again in their stores, you’ll bump into your chummy resident rat Jimmy again and you’ll find each character has a remarkably similar gag to the ones they’ve been peddling all series long. I’ve said plenty enough in previous reviews about the repetition of jokes, locations and such and to an extent you could label the very same comments at the first part of Reality 2.0. There are a couple of new jokes sprinkled in for good measure and quite a few of these are pretty darn funny, but for the most part the game settles back into a well-worn rhythm.
But then, about midway through, things kick off into another gear completely. Without needing to go to new locations and introduce new characters, Telltale manage to shift the player out of his surroundings and plonk Sam and Max into an area packed with witty nods towards other games and a selection of amusing puzzles that’ll have you smiling more than your average Futurama rerun. It’s the first true time I’ve actually sat through a good-sized chunk of a Sam and Max game and enjoyed pretty much every moment of it since the first couple of episodes, which is a pointer that Telltale are beginning to fully grasp the series and run with it.
It’s something that comes across in the puzzles that the game throws at you, too. Whereas the first few games in the series were far too easy and the latter couple spiced with a few rather obscure tasks, Reality 2.0 feels much more consistent throughout. There’s one particular task that’ll probably leave a few people scratching their heads for a good while and relies on the slightly annoying try-clicking-everything-in-case-it-triggers-an-event method, but for the main part everything is logical and can be solved with a little creative thinking.
It all goes to show that there is most certainly a heck of a lot of life in this series yet. There’s never been much wrong with the leading characters themselves, but recent outings have seen Telltale juggling them in some sort of awkward middle ground, not really too sure if they want to take a few risks with the series. What Reality 2.0 ably points to is a team of developers and storywriters who have a lot more up their sleeve than people (and perhaps themselves) give them credit for, and that the series is not only in safe hands, it’s in hands capable of churning out fantastic gaming chunks at bargain prices. Even if you were jaded by previous instalments, a few hours of your time playing through Episode 5 will be more than enough to get the fire running once more. Episode 6, anyone?
8/10
