Of Light and Darkness: The Prophecy

I love this game. I discovered Of Light and Darkness though a top=ten game list on Youtube, outside of that and one silent play through, there was nothing else. I wan enamored by what I saw of the game's hints of story and the excellent artwork, so I purchased it as soon as I could off of Ebay (a good purchase being as how my copy came with the box, manual, fold-out map, the Prima strategy guide, and other bits). It soon managed to find a special place in my heart, despite it's faults. Speaking of faults, let's get those out of the way: The narrative in-game makes some sense, but to get a full grasp of the story you NEED to read the fluff in the manual. This game is definitely heavier on the Puzzle elements than the Adventure elements. To be precise, there is 1 core puzzle mechanic and about 5 side mechanics, and the game revolves entirely around them. The game is short. Your first play through will take you longer than the others because of the amount of note taking that you'll be doing (and you will want to keep those notes, unless you just decide to break down and use a walkthrough). Now with those out of the way, we can move on to the stuff that made this game worth the purchase: James Woods! Mechanics that put the pressure on and encourage you to make use of every tool that you have available to you in order to quickly and efficiently solve the puzzles. Art design and locations that are not only impressive for the age of this game, but remain memorable even after you've finished playing. Because it's a puzzle game, and because you can set up your own challenges, Of Light and Darkness does encourage some replay for those who enjoy it. A narrative that is both expertly written and delivered through the animations and voice actors (albeit a little difficult to follow if you aren't paying attention). This game is worth your time and effort. Describing it is difficult and off-putting, but that doesn't start to diminish the quality of this piece.

Learned about this game quite late. It was known as an expensive experiment of Interplay, that costed the company a bit too much. Was it worth it? Story Vague, pretentious, poorly written, confusing and completely forgettable. The voice acting is good, but there's so much a good voice actor can do, when the text is lacking. Oh, and this game has the most baffling and detached ending ever. Gameplay This is not a puzzle-adventure game - you walk back and forth and mess around with spheres of different color, drag mementos from one place to another, "fight off" ghosts and banish them only to have them back in the next chapter. Oh, and quite early in the game you also have a timer to get it done. One of those games in your library, that you know you'll never play is more fun than this. Visual aesthetics Artistically it's not really as good as it is advertised. Of course, probably, there will be people who might find it amazing, but I personally wasn't impressed in the slightest, and that's from a guy who has a weak spot for late 90's pre-rendered 3D graphics. And boy, didn't it age well... Final word If you're thinking you just stumbled upon a lost gem, it's not a gem, it's a fake, a colored glass shard magically infused with the condensed arrogance of it's creators.

The game pits you as a character at the end of the world. You have been tasked with creating a new path for the world by venturing through a fairground-like dream world and excorcisng the spirits of some of the worst beings of all time. The interface is by node based point and click with panoramic rotation (a la the later Zork games). You spend each of the levels running away from stalking spirits while collecting the items that bind them to the realm and then exorcising them in the sin that relates to them. Rather than being a point and click game, the interactions with the world are more action based than puzzle. Each level has a timer counting down tothe end and the spirits can freely roam around and appear randomly. This adds an urgency to the gameplay but can be quite annoying when you want to take in the wonderful surrealistic artwork that the game designers have used. You can expel the spirits momentarily by blasting them with bursts of white light which, while rewarding, becomes an annoyance as this is a commodity that is also ties in with the games puzzles. Using your light, forces you to go around the level and pick it up again. With the spirits appearing randomly, it sometimes feels like a bit of a cheap shot when you're short on time. Regardless of this, the game designers really spent their timeon realising the world. The art direction is fantastic in every sense of the word. This, when pared with some great voice acting and a manual that the writers had obviously spent some time and thought on, does a great job at immersing you into the game. I spent a good amount of my early teen years playing through this, and i willbe most definitely riding the nostalgia train again. The game is a surrealistic and fun, if flawed experience.

It is not a great game, but it is a fun game, I played it, took notes on what item to use on what specter and where. The music was nice at the time, but when I hear it now it is clear there is some nostalgia influenced there. as far as the game goes i is a nice little adventure with super pretty art, and a rather nice storyline