Dracula: Origin

Title
Developer
Publisher
Genre
ESRB Rating
Demo Release Date
Full Release Date
Platforms
Official Website
Demo Download Size
Review Date

Dracula: Origin
Frogwares
DreamCatcher
Adventure
Teen
30th May 2008
28th May 2008 Buy Now
PC (Reviewed)
http://www.dracula-origin.com
606MB
5th June 2008

What did I think before playing?
I didn't know what kind of game this was going to be before booting and, having never heard of the title, assumed it was from a small developer and may be a little rough around the edges.

What is included?
The opening scenes from the game.

What did I think afterwards?
The game literally begins by displaying splash screens of the controls which I am hurriedly reading and trying to remember. You then come to a menu screen which contains a few buttons that don't do anything, (such as save and load.) Not the best start, but I begin the game. The scene is set as Van Helsing, our character, is reading aloud to himself about the weaknesses of Vampires. A knock comes at the door and we get a letter from our apprentice that we have to read. He had gone to Dracula's castle to kill him, but if we were reading this note then he probably died out there. Unfortunately, Dracula found out that the apprentice came from London and had a wife back home. There is also a newspaper article about a recent and local murder with all the tell-tale signs of a Vampire documented, (although of course the authorities have no idea of this.) VH decides to head to the apprentice's home to make sure his wife is safe. While there we have a conversation with the young lady. The dialog has subtitles along with spoken audio which is relatively well acted in 'cor blimey English from the late 1800's. Then we are into the gameplay, which turns out to be a point-and-click adventure. We have to read several more news papers with articles about other similar killings. We then have a map of London which we draw lines on between each of the murder sites to pin point where we think Dracula may be hiding. Unfortunately you are forced to read all of the articles and draw all of the lines exactly, (without being able to refer back to the papers since if you leave the map screen your scribbled lines disappear,) when it only really takes two. Anyway, I work out where Dracula is probably hiding so we head there.
A scene change and we are at the cemetery. This set of puzzle involves much more wandering around, talking to an undertaker, using some tools and working out a code for a padlock. By now I had been playing for about 40mins, (this guy walks slowly!) but had to cut it short to have a meeting so not sure how the demo ends, (and I couldn't save unfortunately.)

Would I buy the full game?
No. Too much reading, the character moves too slowly and the puzzles require you to be exact, with no way to skip anything if you work out the answer early or want to try a different approach to the one designed, (e.g. brute forcing the padlock code.)

Demo Pros
Sharp graphics, (produced via the Resident Evil method of 3D character models moving around fixed camera, prerendered backgrounds,) fairly well written dialog and interesting premise. This also seems to be a pretty long demo, although in reality it is only a handful of slow puzzles.

Demo Cons
Nothing much wrong with the demo as such. Starting out with key bindings is a little startling since you have no idea if you will be able to call them up again. I would have liked to have been able to save so I could have finished it later since an hour is quite a long commitment in time for a demo in one sitting.

Demo Rating 8 / 10

Thoughts after playing the full game?
If I play the full game I will put comments here about whether I feel the demo was representative of the final product and if I am happy with the purchase.

Sales Figures
If I can find sales information about a game after it has been released I'll add that here. It may be useful to track demos to sales performance.