Customer Reviews

Agatha Christie: And Then There Were None

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

You'll probably enjoy this game if you're a fan of Agatha Christie. Otherwise, you'll find And Then There Were None a journey of boredom. To put it simply, there aren't really many things to do in this game apart from walking around, picking up items, and then using them. Yes, this basically sounds like a typical point-and-click adventure game, but one can't help but feel that the developer could've given the game a better boost in terms of gameplay.

Based on Christie's popular novel of the same title, And Then There Were None puts ten people on a desolated island, and has them killed off one by one by their invisible host. Playing as the 11th man, you've to find out the truth before the murderer kills them all. You do so by exploring the various areas on the island, including the mansion where the lot of you stays in, and its surroundings. Unfortunately, there aren't much you can do to prevent the deaths of these people, not until late in the game at least. As such, most of the time, you'll be simply exploring areas for conversations and events to trigger the beginning of the next chapter of the game. Before long, you'll be wondering why do you even bother.

The good thing of this game is that it offers a different murderer (and motive) than what the book prescribed. This would certainly please Christie fans, who must have read the book several times before playing the game. Also, depending on what you do during the later part of the game, you've the opportunity to save some characters, and therefore unlock different endings. Regardless of which ending you achieve, however, you'll get to solve a last puzzle to view the original ending, so players who've not read the book can still admire at how amazing the plot is.

What the game really lacks is a better challenge. Despite being an adventure game, the amount of puzzles to solve is few and far between. They're also extremely easy to solve, making the experience more like going through the motion at times. Players who're expecting a reasonable amount of challenge could find themselves really disappointed by this game.

The situation isn't help by some inept attempts at graphical and audio presentations. The characters modeling look decidedly slipshod, even though you do have an option to sharpen their features in the main menu. Needless to say, this requires more memory from your PC. Therefore, if you prefer more defined looking characters, and don't have a high-end machine to run the game, you may have to do without them. The music is actually quite nice, and fits the mood of the game greatly. However, there's only one number throughout, and two chapters into the game, you'll be wondering whether you'll have to listen to this for the full ten chapters. The answer is yes.

Now, it may sound like I'm slating this game throughout this article, but that's hardly so. I enjoy the game despite its flaws, and I thought it was a credible effort from The Adventure Company on the whole. However, as a Christie fan, I find the game too ordinary for gamers who're not fans of her to engage in. At times, it feels like a trimmed down version of Trace Memory (for the DS), albeit with much lesser puzzles to solve. I'd still recommend this game for Christie fans though, if only as a tribute to the author. Otherwise, you should consider other options. That said, I do hope to see more of her books get adapted into adventure games in future, since it's a genre that I particularly enjoy.

And for that game, I hope that's it's a little more difficult than this one.

An enjoyable little game for the Agatha Christie fan. As you know if you've read the book or seen the play or the movie(s) by the same name, the plot is designed so almost anybody can be the actual murderer, so you needn't worry about knowing whodunit; it's not who you expect it be. And it's always fun to be in the middle of a plot you're familiar with, to see how the characters and situations actually play out.

That said, there are definitely some areas where improvements could have been made. The voice acting is mediocre and the character graphics wooden and clumsy; in many scenes, you have the feeling a couple of Barbie and Ken dolls are being bounced around a doll house by a hyperactive child. There are also far too few puzzles, and none of them are either challenging or even particularly interesting. The action consists mainly of questioning your fellow dolls about the latest death and wandering aimlessly around, trying to find something that will trigger the next scene.

All the same, I'll keep it on my machine for a while. The game has some replayability, and the scenery has a lovely brooding quality to it. I'd also like to see these publishers be encouraged to try again; they'll do better next time, and there are lots and LOTS of Christie novels that would make great games.

As an added bonus, the original novel is included with the game. If you find the game doesn't do anything for you, you can always shut off the computer and go read for a while. (grin)

I bought this with the intention of giving it to my mom, but naturally I thought I'd "test" it out first to see if it was something she'd enjoy. After playing it through, I have decided to sell the game rather than subject her to its frustrations.

This game is based on a mystery, but this is not a mystery game. Don't worry about trying to figure out who's the killer because even if you did figure it out, there's nothing you can do about it. Your job is just to explore things, pick up objects, solve a handful of puzzles (mostly object-manipulation based), and figure out what is going to trigger the next cutscene and "Chapter." (In each chapter, one of the 10 characters gets killed.)

Technically the game seems to be stuck in a past era. The character animations look hokey. The areas you move through are static shots from one angle. Isn't it time all games had 360-degree views and movement? Your character runs from one side of the screen to the other. It gets dull. Even worse, whenever you talk to a character, there is no way to bypass the dialogue if you've already heard it.

The game does not function like a mystery. There are few clues. Everybody is equally suspicious and always has equal opportunity to commit each crime (so watching who's where when doesn't help). Even if you solve the mystery (which you can if you figure out how to test for fingerprints), there is nothing you can do about it. You have to progress the game to chapter 10, watching people get murdered, by jumping through the game's predetermined hoops.

Simply put, the game isn't much fun. It also doesn't show much imagination. The way they've shoehorning a popular Agatha Christie novel into a tired old game format is (1) a shrewd way for the game company to turn a profit, and (2) an exercise in blowing the opportunity to make something innovative and cool. If you've got the rights to one of the best-selling mysteries of all time, why phone in an uninspired adaptation of it? Why not jump on the opportunity to make something that people will really dig and recommend to friends?

I would like to see somebody make a real computer-game mystery sometime. It wouldn't be that hard to do. So far, it just hasn't happened. I guess mysteries, with their definite endings, aren't open-ended enough to be considered worth the time and money it takes to develop a detailed, high-quality game. Too bad. A long time ago I played the all-text Infocom games, which included some mysteries -- "Deadline," "Witness" and "Suspect." They were quite enjoyable little mysteries and they had multiple ending possibilities ("And There Were None" does, but each ending is very nearly the same). They had the added advantage that you could type in precise questions for the suspects, so you actually had to come up with dialogue to solve the story (rather than selecting from pre-fabricated dialogue). The Infocom games also had a sense of humor, and they had red herrings and game results that showed the creators had anticipated various things the players would try. How hard would it be to use these same principles in a modern game?

This series has the potential to go far--with so many grown women doing the Nancy Drew mysteries, maybe game companies are finally trying to target the older female audience. As an adult female, I do feel kind of funny getting into the latest Nancy Drew pc mystery! This reminds me very much of the first few Nancy Drew mysteries--blocky, board-like characters, but that series improves all that with each new game.

Instead of the little puzzles to solve, in this game, the idea was go around and steal everything you could that might be of some use to figuring out the mystery. Then you figure out what you can take apart to rebuild into something else--very MacGuyver-ish! But, without a walkthrough--pretty hard to figure it out. You need to find batteries for the flashlight you pilfered--and you dig into a bag of flour to find them. (Exactly where I woulda stuck them!) Combine a turkey baster with some of the flour you stole, and some scotch tape and voila! A fingerprint kit! Now why didn't I think of that! Then the fingerprints led nowhere anyways...

Finding a walkthrough on the internet, minimizing it, then tab-alt'ing back and forth between the game and the walkthrough will help you when you are stuck. Once we got stuck forever, and thought we had talked to EveryOne, only to find we had missed one of the 9 characters, and then finally speaking to that one triggered the next chapter.

The walkthrough also had us come up with a glass of juice to give to someone to butter her up so she'd be more "helpful", and another character talked more when you gave him a pipe--but absolutely no clue was given from the character to prompt that along.

Also, there were a few different endings of how the whole thing turned out--depending on who you saved in time. That was way cool! This would be cool for the Nancy Drew games to work on, while this series could take the idea of "Second chances"--when you do something dumb, blow your cover, and get yourself killed off!


All in all, an enjoyable experience. Can't wait to do the next one--but I think I'll buy a used version! I didn't feel nearly so dumb when I got stuck as I do when Nancy Drew stumps us!

The scenery in this game is very beautiful. The characters, however, look like cardboard. The failed attempt at a hair-do on the female characters is horrible.

The gameplay is slow. Very very slow. You can double click and Naracott will run, but this doesn't speed up things much.

My biggest problem with this game is that Naracott gets about 3 steps in before we have to wait on the next screen to load. This will make you want to kill everyone yourself.

I did find the game to be much more enjoyable when I used a walkthrough. Yes, I know thats cheating, but how else are you supposed to magically know how to build a smoker to subdue the honey bees, or how to make apple cider and throw it onto the thicket to get the goats to eat you a path?

I cheated. But if I hadn't, I would have set fire to the disks by now.

i just got this game and played it all last night. its really moody - play with your lights out! the people seem well thought out and the puzzles are cool. i felt tense the whole time i was playing. pretty sure i know who did it!

I'm an adventure/mystery game player. I love those games where you have some puzzles that aren't too hard to figure out, and character to interact with to figure out what to do next. This is one of those games. The mystery is well done, the characters are well done and the all around storyline and gameplay is well done.

Since it's Agatha Christie, you already know the story has to be good. The game didn't move to choppy (graphic wise) for me, and there was none of that problem where you find yourself die from a wrong move and have to reload to start again.

I recomend this game to anybody who is an adventure player. There is no gore, but some of the scenes are disturbing and it will definatly keep you on your toes!

I was very excited about this game coming out. Once I started playing though, I was getting really bored because there really wasn't any action or interesting puzzles to solve, just asking alot of questions as well as the same questions to the characters.

Sometimes I would just run around the house going in all the bedrooms until finally it would jump to the next chapter.

I think they are on the right track with this, however, a little more suspense and maybe some more action scenes. I hope that they will take note of games like Syberia....

Being an avid roll-playing gamer, I thought this game would fall into the lines of Darkness Falls, Black Mirror, Syberia, The Longest Journey, or even Nancy Drew.
I was extremely disappointed. The graphics were pretty decent, and initially the story line compelled me to want to play more. But the game is SO slow. Everytime something happens, you need to talk to everyone in the room, and it is so time consuming and pointless for the most part.
If you are an Agatha Christie fan, you might appreciate this game more, but if you are looking for a good adventure/mystery, this is not it.

This started out as a fun, addicting game. By the time I got half way through it, I felt it became a chore. The character has to run all over an island searching for clues that have to be found in a pretty specific order. Nice idea, but it should be more fun.