Gemini Rue

[easychord]

Adventure Gamer's Review - 4 stars

Pros: Remarkable storytelling with a brilliant third act; plenty of impressive animation; proceeds without constraints of unnecessary puzzles; a perfect length.

Cons: Music is too sparse; backgrounds can be very bland; some spotty voice acting; sure to be considered too easy by many.

I disagree on the VO. It is completely fine quality wise for an indie.

Dammit, why do the remnants of the adventure game community have to hate puzzles so much. I would have bought this game from the demo if it had any hints of having challenging puzzles. Despite the crappy game engine and voice acting that I couldn't work out how to fully turn off.

 

[Reject_666_6]

Dammit, why do the remnants of the adventure game community have to hate puzzles so much. I would have bought this game from the demo if it had any hints of having challenging puzzles. Despite the crappy game engine and voice acting that I couldn't work out how to fully turn off.

Because puzzles are often very hard to believably integrate into stories, doubly so for challenging puzzles.

That being said, the adventure game community is mostly storyfags nowadays anyway, so don't think too much of popular opinion.

 

[easychord]

Because puzzles are often very hard to believably integrate into stories, doubly so for challenging puzzles.

That being said, the adventure game community is mostly storyfags nowadays anyway, so don't think too much of popular opinion.

In my unpopular opinion, if he can't work difficult puzzles into a sodding detective story then he fails even as a storyfag.

 

[Radisshu]

I was going to make a thread about this, and of course there is one already. I love the visuals, the dystopian sci fi stuff is beautiful.

 

[Eyeball]

So, I finished this game. Pretty good game, especially for an indie, although nothing earth-shattering. Was hoping for it to be a whole lot longer.

The ending I got was fairly unsatisfying, however - didn't seem happy at all. Is there a way you can get a happier/worse ending in this game?

 

[asper]

There is only one ending in the game.

 

[MapMan]

Spoiler

there are two choices at the end but both lead to the same thing. Shame.

 

[Yaar Podshipnik]

I've bought and played Gemini Rue this weekend. Here's a quick review (as spoiler-free as possible):

The game is sci-fi themed, although in a low-key way. You start the game on a run-down mining colony that might as well be slums of some Earth city. The only real mention of currently unachievable technology are weather towers and your spaceship in orbit. There are no blasters, aliens or teleportation.

In terms of gameplay there is the undying classic of get items then use them in correct way stuff. Interviewing (and sometimes collar-grabbing) different people is also on the list you will have to do to reach your goals. The protagonist also has a nice comm device that can be used to call different people and store valuable information that can be looked up in public terminals.

The one annoying thing about gameplay is gunfight mechanic. From time to time you have to duck behind some cover and shoot baddies that pop up from behind their cover. I do believe that such thing is called "popamole" in here. Thankfully, those fights are infrequent and can be made pretty easy from game menu.

The fights do add an element of resource management, namely ammo conservation. There is a limited number of bullets and you have to sometimes use your gun outside of combat to solve some quests. You really have to suck at playing if you ever run out of bullets though.

There are some purely logical, Myst-like puzzles to solve too.

The graphics are retro-styled - something like Space Quest 4 or Beneath a Steel Sky (or other Wadjet Eye games). Character animations are pretty nice though, and don't take too long (plus you can skip walking animation in most parts of the game). The backgrounds are mostly grimdark bleak and noir-style.

Sound effects are ok, although I didn't like the voice-over at all. It annoyed me right from the start (although it isn't bad) so I turned it off.

The plot starts as a cliche of finding the protagonist's missing brother. There is, of course, a twist, revealed much later in the game.

Another interesting thing about plot is that you get to control not one but two characters, each showing initially unrelated story. They both have similar skills but have to act with totally different resources and settings. This provides nice gameplay variety.

There are several points in the plot that could provide some diverging gameplay options. So far I have completed the game only once so I have no idea whether there are actually consequences to those choices. It does feel like there are though.

Overall, I enjoyed the game a lot. Puzzles are logical, visuals are nice, sound can be turned off, plot is interesting. It took me approx. 7 hours to finish, according to steam timer.

The game can be bought from Wadjet Eye site (same dudes that published/made The Shiva and Blackwell series), or from steam. Price is 6.79EUR atm, with 7.99EUR being the normal price.

tl;dr - recommended!

 

[villain of the story]

Stylish and moody, very enjoyable game. It wiped the sour taste a number of recent adventure games left in my mouth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foZp9ToB ... r_embedded

We also have an LP of this here:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=65698

 

[Coyote]

Sound effects are ok, although I didn't like the voice-over at all. It annoyed me right from the start (although it isn't bad) so I turned it off.

I'm curious what you didn't like about it. I thought the voice-acting was quite good, and I don't even mean "for an indie game"; it fit the characters well, there was little/no over-acting, and I never got the sense (as often occurs in games) that the actors were just reading off a script with no context. And this is from someone who generally feels that voice-acting is unnecessary in games and should be done right or not done at all, since it often detracts from the game otherwise.

Another interesting thing about plot is that you get to control not one but two characters, each showing initially unrelated story. They both have similar skills but have to act with totally different resources and settings. This provides nice gameplay variety.

Yeah, I liked this. Nice to be able to take a break from solving one set of puzzles by switching over to the other character.

There are several points in the plot that could provide some diverging gameplay options. So far I have completed the game only once so I have no idea whether there are actually consequences to those choices. It does feel like there are though.

Spoiler

There aren't, AFAIK.

Overall, I enjoyed the game a lot. Puzzles are logical, visuals are nice, sound can be turned off, plot is interesting. It took me approx. 7 hours to finish, according to steam timer.

Agreed. I would add that the puzzles are quite easy, so you might not enjoy it if you're the type who only enjoys adventure games for hard puzzles, but I liked it nonetheless for its atmosphere and style.

 

[Yaar Podshipnik]

Well, voice is kind of annoying for me most of the time, regardless of how well it is done. Main reason is that I read much faster than the lines are usually read. It's annoying to have to wait for the actor to finish reading before proceeding further.

In more "cinematic" games that do not require too much thinking (e.g. Bioware/Bethesda stuff) I usually turn off the subtitles and just listen to voice. On indie games I prefer text as it sometimes makes understanding easier, especially for games developed by non-native speakers.

 

[Eyeball]

Good game. It would have been better, in my opinion, if they'd stuck to the street-level Blade Runnery type of gameplay. The prison part just wasn't as interesting to me. I'd much rather have had more detective work, much of it based on looking up phone numbers, addresses and the like, than a fairly straightforward jail-break scenario.

 

[thesoup]

I finished this game yesterday. Took me a little less than 7 hours, according to steam.
Glad I took OP's recommendation and got the game. It was fun, most notably because of the story which was well written and intriguing. I'll keep an eye on the guy who made this game. Hope he gets a career in the industry.

 

[Dexter]

Played it, liked it. Especially the story and the setting made the game. Reminded me of the Blade Runner and Beneath a Steel Sky games and I was kinda confused for some time if it is supposed to be set in the "Battlestar Galactica" universe with so many terms employed from there.

I agree that the "fighting mechanic" was one of the weak points of the game, luckily it doesn't come up very often. All puzzles seemed rather logical and easily solvable except some of the optional "Achievement" ones, where the game resorts to Pixel-Hunting.

 

[Ninja Destroyer]

The atmosphere is amazing. Constant raining, broken street lamps, hobos and junkies on the streets... The influence of Blade Runner is obvoius, everything is painted in tinted colours. They remind me somehow also the noir movies. As an adventure games GR isn't extremely demanding. Logical thinking player can quickly deal with riddles. As in the Sierra adventure games we die, time limited events. The arcade element isn't very good, but at least the fights are limited to the reasonable size. The story is captivating, and although in the end I managed to connect A to B, it does not change the fact that deserves a special mention. All the characters have recorded voices that do not sound amateur. They fit into each of them and gave an additional personality. In addition, during the conversation, we see their portraits, reminding me a bit of the ones that I've seen in Strife. Joshua Nuernberger like a one-man band added animations to them. And, of course, sound engineer and musician - Nathan Allen Pinard. Soundtrack at the beginning starts like Vangelis. Then it becomes more and more diverse, changing completely the genres. Add to that all the ambient noise/background and get a really great game.

 

[commie]

Great game, not great adventure though. Lacked that length and turn of action that that would have made it truly epic, though of course that's understandable given the resources of the dev. What I really appreciated was that all the puzzles were logical enough that even I had little real trouble with them unlike in so many other adventure games which cause me to lose patience with the bullshit illogical random crap in other games that you need either a walkthrough or the fanatical perseverance to randomly try everything in every spot to progress.

Can't wait to see if this guy does more.

 

[asper]

Agreed, but realize that to even make this it cost him two years of almost full-time work...

 

[Berekän]

In addition, during the conversation, we see their portraits, reminding me a bit of the ones that I've seen in Strife.

I didn't like the use of portraits in this game. I feel like the artwork used for them didn't really fit the atmosphere of the rest of the game, too "comicy".

 

[Jaesun]

I liked the portraits personally.

 

[Dexter]

Btw. can you maybe merge the two threads? xD
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/gemini-rue.54340/

 

[Infinitron]

So, I finally played this. MRY is right, it's really not that great. In particular, I think the entire build-up and introduction to the setting was weak. And of course the puzzles weren't anything to write home about.

This is a game that's based entirely on the strength of its (pretty well done) finale. It's like the anti-Primordia, heh.

 

[bertram_tung]

i think this is a great little adventure game.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

I'm not normally into Adventure Games, so I'm no connoisseur of the genre. Still, I played Gemini Rue after finishing Lure of the Temptress and Beneath a Steel Sky, and I thought it was better than those two. I'm ambivalent about the twist ending, but I liked the pacing, mood, setting and voice acting a lot.

Also I only got stuck once and needed walkthrough help at a part which required me to walk down a ramp towards the end of the game, when I thought the top of said ramp was just another piece of floor. I don't know if that means the game was too easy. For me it was refreshing that the solutions were intuitive and I didn't have to defy normal logic to get past parts.

 

[MRY]

MRY is right, it's really not that great.

I must have not articulated myself well. I didn't mean to say that Gemini Rue is "really not that great." I haven't played the game enough to have a view one way or another, and I think the widespread enthusiasm for the game shows that it clearly worked very well on a lot of levels for a lot of players. My problem with the game, which ultimately made me give up, was that if I am going to be required to play a bad-ass, trench-coat-wearing, gun-toting, grizzled ex-mercenary with a name like Azriel Odin (whose partner is named Kain!), then the least you can do is let me actually play him as a bad-ass. And "kick" doesn't do it; if you give me a gun and a bad rap and put a supercilious doorman in my way, I expect to be able to intimidate him if not outright attack him. If you make me a sharp-shooting desperado and have bad guys pounding on the door outside the apartment I'm hiding in, I should be able to take cover and open fire, not just either (1) run like a coward or (2) stand around and get shot to death. The packaging of the character has to be fitted the verbset, or vice versa. For me, at least, you can't just transpose a Space Marine into Monkey Island, superficially change all the characters and items to fit the WH40k universe, and expect it to work.* (That's a gross exaggeration of what Gemini Rue is, but -- for the part I played -- I think it has a germ of truth.)

I'm pretty sure that my complaint is largely idiosyncratic. I'm probably somewhat less enthusiastic about the kind of power-fantasy that Gemini Rue's character represents than the average player, and somewhat more demanding of character-verbset consistency than the average player. I can see how Azriel Odin would be a fun character for someone to play, probably even for me to play 20 years ago.

(* This is, incidentally, why I think Lord of the Clans would've been such a disaster. As I think I mentioned in another thread, it's a big problem when the roided-out orc protagonist recoiled in terror from a rat.)

 

[Name]

MRY is right, it's really not that great.

I must have not articulated myself well. I didn't mean to say that Gemini Rue is "really not that great." I haven't played the game enough to have a view one way or another, and I think the widespread enthusiasm for the game shows that it clearly worked very well on a lot of levels for a lot of players. My problem with the game, which ultimately made me give up, was that if I am going to be required to play a bad-ass, trench-coat-wearing, gun-toting, grizzled ex-mercenary with a name like Azriel Odin (whose partner is named Kain!), then the least you can do is let me actually play him as a bad-ass. And "kick" doesn't do it; if you give me a gun and a bad rap and put a supercilious doorman in my way, I expect to be able to intimidate him if not outright attack him. If you make me a sharp-shooting desperado and have bad guys pounding on the door outside the apartment I'm hiding in, I should be able to take cover and open fire, not just either (1) run like a coward or (2) stand around and get shot to death. The packaging of the character has to be fitted the verbset, or vice versa. For me, at least, you can't just transpose a Space Marine into Monkey Island, superficially change all the characters and items to fit the WH40k universe, and expect it to work.* (That's a gross exaggeration of what Gemini Rue is, but -- for the part I played -- I think it has a germ of truth.)

I'm pretty sure that my complaint is largely idiosyncratic. I'm probably somewhat less enthusiastic about the kind of power-fantasy that Gemini Rue's character represents than the average player, and somewhat more demanding of character-verbset consistency than the average player. I can see how Azriel Odin would be a fun character for someone to play, probably even for me to play 20 years ago.

(* This is, incidentally, why I think Lord of the Clans would've been such a disaster. As I think I mentioned in another thread, it's a big problem when the roided-out orc protagonist recoiled in terror from a rat.)

Good news! You are not exactly playing as a bad-ass, trench-coat-wearing, gun-toting, grizzled ex-merc named Azreil Odin.