Scratches: Directors Cut

by Got Game

Product Features

• Delve into every dark corner of the mansion and its untended grounds
• Probe your way through musty rooms, an overrun greenhouse, a sinister chapel, and a forbidding crypt -- and discover you are not alone in the house
• Inventory-based and deductive-style puzzles, in an eerie and immersive story

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000KMCF0G
• Item Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: April 7, 2007
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,810 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Scratches is an atmospheric mystery adventure game for the PC brimming with eerie twists and terrifying surprises. Set in and around a solitary Victorian mansion concealing a terrible secret a long since forgotten story from the past emerges to haunt the present. A careful combination of inventory-based and deductive-style puzzles integrated with a riveting storyline non-linear gameplay intricately detailed graphics and an entrancing soundtrack immerse you in a haunting Gothic atmosphere until the final shocking revelation.As famed horror writer Michael Arthate you arrive at Blackwood Manor your newly acquired home an old Victorian house lost in the outskirts of a small English market town. While the ominous weather bodes of darker days you are initially charmed by this peaceful and quiet place. The pleasant stillness is soon broken however as the rooms of this exquisite if faded glory mansion speak of past events their tales echoing through its walls. As the odd noises in the basement grow ever louder you set about solving your sanctuary s long-held mystery.Isolated by a washed out road and in search of clues you delve into every dark corner of the mansion and its untended grounds via a point-and -click interface. Examining probing and hunting your way through musty rooms an overrun greenhouse a sinister chapel and a forbidding crypt your investigation deepens and you slowly become aware of one terrifying fact: you are not alone!System Requirements:Minimum system requirements : 800 MHz CPU 128 MB RAM 16 MB OpenGL-compatible video card 24x CD-ROM drive Sound card Recommended system requirements : 1.6 GHz CPU 256 MB RAM 32 MB OpenGL-compatible video card 24x CD-ROM drive 5.1 surround sound card 450 MB free hard drive space. Format: WIN 2000XP Genre: ENTERTAINMENT UPC: 851612000502 Manufacturer No: 00050

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A haunting vacation you'll never forget..., September 8, 2007

By 

Sarah - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Scratches: Directors Cut (CD-ROM)

In the independently developed Scratches, you play as Michael Arthate, a British horror writer who's hard-pressed to finish his sophomore novel. In an attempt to seek inspiration, you arrange to stay at a dilapidated Victorian manner in the English countryside. The next three days will change your life forever. If I had to sum up Scratches in one word, it would be dark. Dark ambiance, dark motivations, dark secrets await you.

The game is set in the year 1976, and during the course of your investigations you'll revisit the shocking past of Blackwood Manor. Feverish dreams (or are they reality?) keep you from sleeping, and there are sounds that can't be explained away by creaky old houses. You are drawn deeper and deeper into the mystery of James Blackwood and his misfortunes. The only sound in the manor is the grandfather clock, the squeak of ancient stairs, and your lonely footsteps...until night falls.

The game's Argentinian creators Agustín Cordes and Alejandro Graziani are horror fanatics, and their devotion to their craft shows in loving homage to Lovecraft and Easter Eggs that poke fun at other adventure games. Scratches truly shines in creating a foreboding (dare I say downright evil??) atmosphere without gore. At times, the horrifying music by Cellar of Rats makes your hair stand on end when you realize that you're not alone. Every small nuance has been seen to, from the reflection of light in cut crystal to the trinkets that line the house. Blackwood Manor is almost an art museum, what with the numerous reproductions of famous paintings. Although the prerendered environments are lush and lifelike, the animations left a lot to be desired, but hey, this is an independent developer's first game, so I'm not going to fault them on that. Like many horror games, there are "standard" areas to explore, like a crypt, chapel, greenhouse, cellar and garage (after playing Scratches, you might avoid going into your basement for a while). You may also recognize a familiar name in the credits: Jonathan Boakes, famed creator of Dark Fall: The Journal and Dark Fall: Lights Out.

Although some reviewers complain that the first third of the game moves very slowly (you are mainly exploring the manor at this point), I found the pacing to be brilliant. Little clues gradually emerge as you scour the house looking for candles on your first night...stacks of old newspapers and faded scraps of paper start to raise questions. You're able to phone several outside sources for help as the game progresses: your friend Jerry, your secretary Barbara, and two other surprise guests that are directly involved in Blackwood Manor's shady past.

The puzzles are largely intuitive and inventory-driven (no combination locks or devilish slider puzzles, thank goodness). The inventory management is adequate, but you do acquire a bloated inventory by game's end, with no way to get rid of extra objects.

Scratches: Director's Cut features a patch, but I still found mouse performance to be severely laggy on an above-minimum-specs laptop, and a very frustrating lag on opening any doors that resulted in minute-long lockups every time I tried to enter or exit a room. Otherwise, I didn't run into any crashes or other bugs.

This is the Director's Cut, which features improved resolution on the prerendered graphics, an alternate ending, and an additional brief chapter called The Final Visit, where you visit Blackwood Manor in the present day shortly before it's to be demolished. If you don't already own Scratches, this is the version to get.

Fans of horror and adventure will enjoy Scratches. If you like Scratches, also check out indie Barrow Hill: Curse of the Ancient Circle. Nucleosys is to be commended on a job well done!

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars You Have to Know What You're Doing, September 4, 2007

By 

Christina "Internet Automaton" (Houston, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Scratches: Directors Cut (CD-ROM)

Don't let the person who gave this game one star sway you. The game will be very boring if you don't even try to solve one of the puzzles, which he obviously did. Yes, you can wander around the house for an hour and have nothing happen if you do just that; wander around the house doing nothing. And (to address another of his complaints) on a normal computer it will install in a few moments, just like any other computer game. My computer is a mediocre one from four years ago, nothing special at all, and I was able to install both discs in well under five minutes with no confusion at all.
If this is your first attempt with an adventure/puzzle game you might end up bored and frustrated as it might be a little too much for you. But don't let that stop you from trying! If you get stuck and feel yourself getting upset just go to Google and search for one of the many helpful Scratches walkthroughs and look up what you're supposed to be doing next. No harm in that and then you can move on to the next part of the game.
You eventually have to go to sleep (after you're done exploring) before anything creepy starts to happen, so that is probably why that other reviewer thought nothing ever happens.
Good game overall if you know what you're doing.

21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Made every game design mistake in the book, February 5, 2008

By 

N. Johnson "Baron Munchausen" (Albuquerque, NM) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Scratches: Directors Cut (CD-ROM)

Like other gamers, I really wanted to like this game. I love adventure games, especially the spooky kind, and the challenge and slow pace of them is something I relish. But this game made so many obnoxious design mistakes, I gave up halfway through and used a walkthrough just to see what would happen. Things that in my book are unforgiveable design sins:

1. Red herrings. It's very annoying to have the game point something out to you, especially something that looks like it should open, or move or otherwise function, and then never enable you to DO anything with it. If you're like me, you waste a ton of time revisiting it, trying in vain to make it do something.

2. Ignoring established game logic. Early on in a game, you figure out the logic of the game world - what sorts of things are interactive, which aren't, how you can move, etc. When a designer changes these rules late in the game, it creates confusion. This example is the annoying flip side of the above issue. I'm thinking here of a specific instance in the game wherein I tried to interact with something no less than 8 times with no result. (the player voiceover even said something along the lines of, "I don't EVER want to have anything to do with that!") Being totally stuck later on in the game, I looked for a hint and the hint was to - you guessed it - interact with the thing that up till then, had done nothing.

3. Ignoring common sense. All I can say here is "who the hell willingly climbs into a crematorium-sized furnace?" Or if a person is investigating a mystery and finds a trove of informational papers but is only allowed to read one of them, would s/he think it's possible to come back and read more later? (see game world logic)

4. Ignoring established player motivation: Having had the player character insist multiple times that he refused to leave the house until the mystery was solved, a puzzle solution shouldn't then be contingent upon him leaving.

5. And lastly...persnickety/redundant puzzle solutions. If you already have a rag in your inventory, you shouldn't have to find an equivalent but DIFFERENT rag to complete a puzzle.

The designers often seemed not to take the time to consider what they to might actually do in the situation and instead invented contrived circumstantial puzzles that were just irritating to figure out. All told, this game was an exercise in frustration and I was severely disappointed.