Ever had one of those crunchy wafer cookies? You know—the rectangular ones with the criss-cross pattern. They’re mostly air inside, and not a ton of flavor. That’s Hector: Badge of Carnage Episode 2. Except the cookie tastes vaguely of England.
Game: Hector: Badge of Carnage Episode 2
Publisher: Telltale Games
Developer: Telltale Games and Straandlooper
Genre: Point-and-Click Adventure
Price: $6.99 ($19.99 for all three episodes)
Pros: Bite-sized gameplay, fits Telltale’s episodic style well.
Cons: Not funny, not fun.
Verdict: A poor mark on Telltale’s otherwise solid record.
Acquired via Developer Code
Enter the world of Detective Inspector Hector: an overweight, under-mannered, and out-spoken cop with a tendency to get into zany adventures. Hector is another in the long line of point-and-click adventures from Telltale Games. As the episode opens, Hector is trapped In a room with a box of pizza in his hand and a remote-control sniper rifle aimed at his head.
Unfortunately, with some help from the player, Hector finds his way out of that certain-death-scenario and continues through to the rest of the game.
The biggest problem with Hector is that it just isn’t funny. Point-and-click adventures only have a few strengths, and humor is one of the big ones. It’s not that Hector doesn’t try to be funny; it’s that it fails miserably most of the time. Normally, I “get” British humor. Normally I giggle at fart jokes. There’s something about Hector that’s just off a beat, though. I often found myself tempted to skip dialogue to get onto the next thing, and even gave in a couple times. In what I can only assume was a moment of desperation, Hector makes a direct reference to Monkey Island, the grandfather of humorous point-and-click games and an example of one that stands up well to multiple play-throughs.
Trouble is, Hector doesn’t stand up to more than one play-through. The puzzles are as blandly juvenile as the jokes, requiring the titular character to blow up a crap-filled toilet and persuade an overweight sex worker to compromise someone’s reputation. Anyone should be able to stumble through even though toughest puzzle without more than a hint. At worst, players might find themselves searching Google for obscure meat recipes–which is funnier than the rest of the game put together.
Flat jokes and boring puzzles. Superman without his yellow sun is just a man. Point and click adventures without the jokes and puzzles, is just a bunch of pointing and clicking. I can do that in my web browser.
GrE Grade: D
Popularity: unranked [?]
