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DARK FALL: THE JOURNAL (PC)
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Publisher: XXv Productions.
Developer: XXv Productions. Released: April 2002 (Europe). Genre: Adventure. Posted 13th June 2022. By Tom Clare © 2022 |
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The first decade of the 21st Century would prove a challenging one for PC gaming. Prior to the advent of Steam’s revolutionary digital marketplace, the popularity of traditional computer games had been in steady decline, its retail shelf space visibly retreating. Significant reliance would fall on Half-Life 2, World of Warcraft and a conveyor belt of The Sims entries to offset a widespread diminution in physical sales. For adventure games in particular, this spelt trouble. The genre would rely heavily on small teams and dedicated individuals engaging in labour-of-love development, to see the light of day. This was the case with Jonathan Boakes and Dark Fall. Two and a half years of work would culminate in the release of the game through his own XXv Productions label, before publishers took notice and helped release the game further afield in 2003.
Mechanically, Dark Fall follows closely Myst’s first-person adventure, point ‘n’ click hybrid. Where the two diverge greatly is in the tone of their settings, as Dark Fall eschews relaxing, blue-skied utopian wonderment for an altogether more unsettling, horror-tinged vibe. Whilst The Journal appears visually dated and will seem a little sedately paced for some tastes, it scores significant points with its impressive attention to detail, strong writing and a story that quietly draws in its player.
Mechanically, Dark Fall follows closely Myst’s first-person adventure, point ‘n’ click hybrid. Where the two diverge greatly is in the tone of their settings, as Dark Fall eschews relaxing, blue-skied utopian wonderment for an altogether more unsettling, horror-tinged vibe. Whilst The Journal appears visually dated and will seem a little sedately paced for some tastes, it scores significant points with its impressive attention to detail, strong writing and a story that quietly draws in its player.
You'll find Pete's notes early on and it's clear not everything's as it seems at the Station Hotel
Set during the early 2000s, the player assumes the role of an unnamed lead protagonist investigating a disused hotel-cum-train station that his brother, Pete, had been surveying. Along with a couple of ghost hunters, Pete has abruptly vanished, echoing a similar set of circumstances that had befallen a group who stayed at the hotel in the 1940s. Soon, it becomes apparent that there are supernatural goings-on and it’s your job to piece things together through decades-old accounts and the breadcrumb trail laid out by more recent investigations.
The hotel’s forties veneer has been preserved, as though frozen in time. This proves fittingly analogous to Dark Fall’s frame-by-frame adventuring: serving as a pristine portal to the early-mid nineties, where it would have fit alongside Myst as an entirely comparable title. Whilst the arrow-clicking navigation may seem quaint out of its time, Dark Fall produces several noteworthy touches.
The hotel’s forties veneer has been preserved, as though frozen in time. This proves fittingly analogous to Dark Fall’s frame-by-frame adventuring: serving as a pristine portal to the early-mid nineties, where it would have fit alongside Myst as an entirely comparable title. Whilst the arrow-clicking navigation may seem quaint out of its time, Dark Fall produces several noteworthy touches.
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Firstly, there’s the aforementioned detail. Whilst it’s not an attractive game by the yardstick of 2002, the setting is nevertheless evocative. There’s a raft of period-appropriate posters, telephone booths, writing desks and station signs to pore over. Diaries and notes are written with care to ensure an authentic window into the past. Peripheral elements like the wallpaper designs and the lamp shades help make the setting feel as though it could have been lifted from the pages of an Agatha Christie novel.
Another of its successes comes from giving appreciable weight to the personalities involved in the disappearances sixty years previous. Newspaper clippings and eloquently written diary entries paint a vivid picture of the complex lives and interlinking relationships of those who stayed at the Station Hotel. Better still, you’ll receive snippets of ghostly dialogue when focusing on items of importance or emotional resonance. This is important because eventually, it becomes clear that the player must solve puzzles relating to a dozen code signs given to the various inhabitants of the hotel, which must be deciphered and combined to have a chance of stopping the dark presence.
Another of its successes comes from giving appreciable weight to the personalities involved in the disappearances sixty years previous. Newspaper clippings and eloquently written diary entries paint a vivid picture of the complex lives and interlinking relationships of those who stayed at the Station Hotel. Better still, you’ll receive snippets of ghostly dialogue when focusing on items of importance or emotional resonance. This is important because eventually, it becomes clear that the player must solve puzzles relating to a dozen code signs given to the various inhabitants of the hotel, which must be deciphered and combined to have a chance of stopping the dark presence.
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It isn’t a terrifying experience and there’s no edge-of-your-seat, eyes-on-stalks stuff like Silent Hill 2. It does a convincing job of creating a ghost story ambience, not overplaying its hand. Sometimes, it’s little, unsettling touches. Lights sputtering or a single, sharp violin note. A shifting of the light, a fragment of the past as a train passes in the background, or a maid heard singing in the kitchens. Collectively, it amounts to an appreciable atmosphere.
There are plenty of decent puzzles, though some inevitably prove a little awkward. A box requiring a numeric sequence to coincide with the positions of a star constellation is one such example. The device in question uses a mixture of buttons and rotating cylinders and it isn’t clear that they operate in the same way, with single-press activations. Elsewhere, arranging the positions of four crosses on a table is a hassle, even with visual clues, because it demands unerring accuracy. Locating the key to the ghost hunters’ room cracks things open, helping join the dots and granting the player plenty of useful information. The trouble is, finding this key is tricky as there are rooms spread over four floors: it could easily take hours to find it.
There are plenty of decent puzzles, though some inevitably prove a little awkward. A box requiring a numeric sequence to coincide with the positions of a star constellation is one such example. The device in question uses a mixture of buttons and rotating cylinders and it isn’t clear that they operate in the same way, with single-press activations. Elsewhere, arranging the positions of four crosses on a table is a hassle, even with visual clues, because it demands unerring accuracy. Locating the key to the ghost hunters’ room cracks things open, helping join the dots and granting the player plenty of useful information. The trouble is, finding this key is tricky as there are rooms spread over four floors: it could easily take hours to find it.
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Dark Fall does however offer the player a couple of little olive branches. Firstly, the spirit of Timothy Pike, an eleven-year-old who went missing during the original event, gives snippets of guidance should you seek him on a bridge intersecting the two platforms. Elsewhere, a spectrometer is handy for flagging up nearby spiritual activity, something that occasionally yields hints and information. There’s also an occasional sprinkling of white light around an area of significance. This may not grant the information needed to solve a puzzle, but it does at least give the player an idea of where a key area might be.
If you’re after an engrossing, cerebral adventure played at a relaxed pace, Dark Fall: The Journal ticks a lot of the right boxes. If you can overlook a slightly dated interface and modest visuals, there’s a strong story conveyed amidst a well-gauged atmosphere. Considering its truly independent development process, aspects such as writing and voicing are excellent. Though it carries with it some of the troubles associated with the genre such as occasional, obscure puzzle logic, it’s a ghost story that’s well worth staying up for.
If you’re after an engrossing, cerebral adventure played at a relaxed pace, Dark Fall: The Journal ticks a lot of the right boxes. If you can overlook a slightly dated interface and modest visuals, there’s a strong story conveyed amidst a well-gauged atmosphere. Considering its truly independent development process, aspects such as writing and voicing are excellent. Though it carries with it some of the troubles associated with the genre such as occasional, obscure puzzle logic, it’s a ghost story that’s well worth staying up for.
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VERDICT
"If you can overlook a slightly dated interface and modest visuals, there’s a strong story conveyed amidst a well-gauged atmosphere. The puzzle logic is sometimes obscure, but it's a ghost story that's worth staying up for." OVERALL: 7/10 |