Relics of the Lost Age

This game was very interesting. I am actually really impressed out how it handles complex geopolitical issues. (I’m going to over-exaggerate somewhat but this is the impression I got):

It’s hard to confront topics like racism, the Israeli-Palestine conflict, colonialism, and other issues in games. People can get upset, it can come off as manipulative or stolen valor, it can be appropriation, it can be done wrong.

This game doesn’t worry about that at all. It’s like, “What if we put Hitler and Martin Luther King Jr in a room and give you a machine gun and you can just blow away anyone you want to? Or, form a polycule? What if it shows the Chinese as Triad gangsters that smuggle goods and also as murderous oppressors of the Tibetans, but also the most murderous individual Chinese oppressor had a serial killer alternate personality that you thought was super hot and you wanted to kiss? What if you plundered Jewish antiquities in Palestine to avenge a dead Jewish woman while making out with a hot Arab man who is part of a swingers couple?” Well, the first one was a metaphor but the other two are real. I don’t know if this is excellent representation or horrible representation, but it gets the job done.

The game centers around the recovery of 6 artifacts in the 1930s, with you as the swashbuckling archaeologist who recovers them along with reams of potential paramours. Each one features its own mini-games like ancient riddles, dangerous traps, a small-town murder mystery, tower defense minigame, etc. Every chapter is action-packed.

I thought the writing was good and the plot was good, and the characters interesting. For some reason, though, I found it a lot of work to get through. At no point did I think it was bad or low quality, it just felt like each chapter was really meaty, more like a million word game than a 400K word game. I think having just 6 chapters total + epilogue might be part of it, as well as a lot of branching that comes back together quickly (like conversations where you have to lawnmower through most items before moving on).

I’m interested in the second game. I wonder where things will go next. I think my kill count in this game is one of the highest I’ve ever had; I have no idea how I wasn’t arrested in America after gunning down ten or more people during a standard police investigation.