There are points where it stumbles but they can mostly be forgiven.
Moebius offers an immensely engaging story, great characters, and a neat mechanic. On the rare occasion I got stuck in a puzzle, it would frustrate me primarily because that meant I couldn’t yet get to the next part of the story.Īdventure fans who have been waiting for this game should feel secure in purchasing it immediately. The way the story intertwines between everyone is intriguing and urged me to continue playing despite sleep, work, and other tasks. Malachi has a dry wit that endears us to him and the other characters have wonderfully distinct personalities as well. Eventually you get over it and stop noticing (at least I did) but it was an unfortunate note to start off on.Īll of that is fine and good, but what of the story? Moebius was anticipated for a reason and it should stand proudly as another great tale by Jane Jensen. Malachi shambles weirdly around, stopping and going with no regard for actual human movement. Mostly, that’s thanks to the incredibly off animations on display. Unfortunately, the character models do betray their gorgeous setting somewhat. Colors are bright or dulled as need be and bring locations to life. In this specific instance, areas appear hand drawn and are expertly designed. Yes, the storyline revolves around it, but you are still “taught” a lot directly through the identification puzzles.Īs has always been the case, any game involving Jane Jensen has stunning backdrops. Moebius attempts the same goals although I feel it doesn’t do so with quite as much tact. One of the most exciting aspects of Gabriel Knight for me was always the amount of history intertwined in the storyline. It’s not all based in “literal” history either as names like Medea make an appearance. In doing so, you get a huge dose of information about these people and their contributions to society, whether positive or negative. After gathering clues about their lives, you sort through a list of pre-determined historical names to see which is the best match. Where Moebius diverges from the crowd is in asking you to identify characters as people from the past. Inventory is kept in check to keep it from getting unwieldy, and there’s always the option to look at hints if you get stuck. From a third person perspective you click on objects to look and interact with them. Most of the game plays as a standard point and click adventure. Even if you’re not a history buff you’ll leave Moebius with a great deal of new information thanks to an interesting puzzle system.
Both Malachi and the player are initially in the dark, but agree to the request. They want to use his power to match living people with the historical figures their biographies most mirror. This changes once Malachi gets wrapped up in a very unusual murder and subsequent investigation.Ī mysterious government agency takes him in and asks him to comply with very strange requests. Because of his talent, his antiques business is quite successful, but there’s not much else to his life. For reasons unknown, he has incredible powers of deduction that allow him to “see” things not apparent to normal people. Malachi Rector is an antiques dealer with more than just a keen eye for detail. Moebius: Empire Rising has launched and it does not disappoint. I backed the project because of my longstanding love for her work and waited impatiently. Money was raised for Moebius and Mystery Game X (which was later revealed as a Gabriel Knight remake). In 2012, beloved game designer Jane Jensen started a Kickstarter campaign for her own development studio named Pinkerton Road.
Platform: PC – Direct, GamersGate, GOG*, Steam