Customer Reviews:
  Inversely compelling October 18, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've never before played a game that becomes *less* compelling as it goes on. Angel of Death (or Secrets of the Ark for the more sensitive US market) is a dismal journey of mediocrity, descending from a reasonably compelling start to an utterly pointless damp-squib of a "climax". It contains no secrets, and pretty much no death. In fact it contains little of the Broken Sword legacy either. Sure, the Templars are mentioned, and there's a glut of info about them to absorb, but their importance diminishes pretty immediately. Nico appears, and is mighty annoyed at George's new flame Anna Maria, but she soon diminishes to nothing at all. AM herself is the exception to this rule, since she starts as a non-character and remains so, just becoming more confusing as the plot grinds on. Why George doesn't shoot her on sight is a complete mystery.
So basically, its the scriptwriter that's mainly at fault here. There's a few other problems, sure, like the the dull design (there's not one remotely beautiful location, and that's usually a strength of these games even when all else is lacking), the pretty dismal control system, and the pointless scattering of obstacles (usually pointless boxes) which makes the latter so much more infuriating. Perhaps most bizarrely, there's none of the humour that should make the franchise worthwhile, except for a couple of scenes/characters (the gay(?) priest Father Mark, and the glorious scene with Sister Serena, both of which seem like they come from a different game entirely). If only that could have been sustained, this would have been a great game indeed. For Broken Sword fans, its tolerable. The main problem is, it just doesn't go anywhere with all its big ideas.
And the Angel of Death? Well that's a big 'weapon' that Moses apparently used to persuade the Pharaoh to let his people go. Except that's only explained in the manual, and makes no sense whatsoever, and then in the game's plot becomes a weapon to kill all non-Christians. That should be at the heart of the plot, and could actually have some political and theosophical relevance, but they never manage to say so explicitly, since the implications of that would actually be interesting, and therefore controversial, and therefore (to THQ's mind) non-commercial. Ah well.
Not as good as the first 3 July 7, 2008
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
I've played,and loved,the first three games,the first two on the PC and the third on the PS2(and PC),anybody who didn't like the last one because of the stealth bits is not gonna like this one!
Basically you can control George in either,or both,of two ways,pointing and clicking on part of the screen or an object or using the 'arrow'keys like the last game,however the constantly panning/revolving camera makes the second option almost unsuable especially when you need to do something fast(melting ice problem),the mouse wheel decides what speed(walk or run) you move at but after a conversation or cutscene it defaults to walk,so if you need to move fast you have to do some frantic mouse 'wheeling' to get going.
The stealth sections are infuriating at best as having to use the mouse to control George,remember-the keyboard controls are useless,means you often run into wrong bit if you don't click on precisely the right area.
Even if you can put up with the technical flaws,dodgy controls,fidgety camera,imprecise hot-spots on areas/objects it is at it's heart still 'broken'
This has some of the most annoying bits associated with these games,you have to leave a few areas and do something elsewhere and come back later to continue when instinct says you've probably missed something and wander round aimlessly,remember the goat in the first one?,there's something similar in this one(Elvis),some of the puzzles just plainly don't make sense or the answers,usually on a document,are low-res and impossible to decipher,the biggest gripe however are the hacking sections,they're awful and,to me, unneccesarily time consuming,the PDA also defaults back to the beginning when you leave it instead of where you were last looking,it's amazing my mouse wheel still works!!
Overall it's just sloppy,the controls were obviously made for a gamepad in mind,I couldn't find a way to use one,the story isn't very interesting,it's a bit po-faced next to the others and Nico(voiced by someone else)seems to be an unwanted extra rather than a main character
I have to agree with the other reviewer,you need a very good graphics card to get it looking any good,I was running it on mostly low settings and it still slowed down occasionally,it isn't actually much better looking than the last one but has some graphical effects that wouldn't be missed and jar with the style of this and previous games(the wafer machine looks like it came from Half Life 2)
I hope there's a fifth game but it seriously need an overhaul,this feels almost like an obligation rather than a game that they wanted to do.
Be aware! June 15, 2008
7 out of 8 found this review helpful
I bought this game because I have played all the others and they were fabulous!!! But be careful, to play the game you need a Radeon 9700 graphics card or NVIDIA GeForce 6200 or more. I made the mistake of buying the game and not checking my graphics card (I'd never had to before) to find that I didn't have either of the above cards so I can't play the game. It's a shame because the game looks so fun and thought provoking. So please check out what graphics card your pc/notebook has before buying.
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