Dead Synchronicity Is The Striking New Point-And-Click From Fictiorama Studios And Daedalic Entertainment

Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today is a crowd-funded point-and-click adventure game with a dark expressionist comic book style, old-school puzzles and a story about a shattered world in the wake of a cataclysmic event. The game launched on Steam this week, with a DRM free version to follow.

Fictiorama Studios' stylish new game was covered on GOL during its run on Kickstarter a year ago. It has since been picked up for publishing by Daedalic Entertainment, like several other promising games lately.


Story and look
The story of Dead Synchronicity takes place after a cataclysmic event has destroyed cities all around the world and replaced civilization with chaos. A gruesome pandemic gives the affected unexplainable visions, before they dissolve in a mess of pain and blood. In the midst of this, our protagonist Michael wakes up with no recollection of his past in a refugee camp on the outskirts of a city.

You soon start learning about the state of things in the new world, where most live in misery and everything is controlled by the military. Of the many unfortunate souls you encounter, the one that made the strongest impression on me was that of the disturbed and abused girl Rose, who is pimped out for money by a couple of lowlifes. Your journey to uncover your own past and try to find a cure to the pandemic puts you in several situations where you have to perform some unscrupulous actions to progress. One such situation is the defamation of a corpse, and though brutal, these circumstances very effectively add to the mood of the story.

I'm not fit to judge the scientific basis of the underlying plot of the game, but as a casual consumer of science fiction I found it to be enjoyable, and the writing is good. The story had me hooked throughout and it was with no small amount of distress I reached the sudden end of the game after 7 hours, and realized I will have to wait a while for the conclusion. Don't get me wrong; the game is complete in its own right, but even more so than with the Deponia trilogy, you are left with a lot of unanswered questions after the first game. The twist at the end probably won't come as a surprise, but it left me a bit unsatisfied and yearning for more. I hope that the fact that Daedalic Entertainment is the publisher ensures that we'll see the continuation in a timely fashion.

I really dig the style of this game. It nails the graphic novel look with its hand drawn backgrounds and comic book panel close ups. Cutscenes are done as a series of still frames where thick contours and a modest color palette expertly underscore the emotions of the characters. The voice acting is good, and the protagonist especially carries the story well, even through a few monologues that I felt were needlessly protracted. I also really liked the voice of Hunter, the bad guy head honcho, and found that his poised British sounding voice added something very menacing under the surface of his calm outward appearance. The score is good too, and it adds to the dystopian atmosphere of the game.

Puzzles
If you like your puzzles on the harder end of the scale, you needn't worry. Dead Synchronicity puts the difficulty bar higher than most modern adventure games. There are many items to pick up and use, and several hotspots per location. And as you progress, you open up well over 20 locations, which are almost all accessible to the end of the game. This makes for a large number of possible permutations, and since the puzzles aren't always on the intuitive side, this adds to the challenge.

Since there's no walling off and only minor inventory purges, this can make the pacing feel a bit uneven from time to time. There were a couple of occasions where I felt really stuck, like when I needed a light source and the game didn't even recognize my attempt to pick up the only portable source of light I could find. Another time I needed fuel, but had no idea how to trigger the events that would lead to me getting it, even though I knew where it was. I appreciate that the game doesn't give solutions away, but some feedback from the game could have made these moments feel less frustrating.

Conclusion
This is a Unity game, but apart from the initial resolution being wrong when I first started the game, I've had no issues with it. What I did find a bit annoying is that you only have 10 save slots. As someone who likes to save often, it didn't take me long to fill them all. I ended up making a tarball of my first 10 saves to free up some slots.

I really enjoyed this game, and in spite of my few complaints with the writing and puzzle design, this is a very solid point-and-click adventure game. It is on the short side compared to Daedalic's own full length games, but it is not a game that is needlessly padded with cutscenes or minigames. If you don't mind the mentioned shortcomings and you're looking for a game that captures some of the essence of the LucasArts classic, with a striking new look, Dead Synchronicity is a game for you.

The game is can be bought directly from Steam or as a Steam key from the Humble Store. GOG has Windows and Mac builds of the game, and according to their announcement, a Linux version will follow. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.