This post is by guest blogger Amanda.
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Categories: Review
Tags: adventure, pc
Hope you ate before you arrived.
Barrow Hill (PC) is a creepy, incredibly atmospheric point-and-click mystery game. The story begins when your car breaks down in the small Cornwall town of Barrow Hill. Walking down the road to a motel, you find mysterious piles of ash, an abandoned car, and a hysterical employee who has locked himself in the office and refuses to come out. Poking around a bit, you discover that Barrow Hill is famous for its ancient circle of standing stones. You’ll explore the abandoned motel rooms of mad archaeologists and find “Stop the Dig” pamphlets and picket signs left behind by protesters.
If you’re counting on calling for help, don’t get your hopes up.I have played quite a few point-and-clickers and I have to say this is one of the most intuitive ones I’ve found. I usually have to refer to walkthroughs far more frequently than I’d like because a game developer thinks I will miraculously know to wave a fragment of bone underneath the nose of a stuffed deer head hanging on the wall, or something like that. I only had to refer to a BH walkthrough a handful of times, and after I did I usually thought, “Oh, I could have figured that out on my own if I wasn’t being lazy.”
Four in a row coming up for you here on BHR.I love the gadgets in Barrow Hill. Everybody loves gadgets. Finding batteries for the gadgets, putting them together, and using them to uncover pieces of the puzzle–very cool. I also love the real-life touches, such as the door that won’t open because it’s blocked by a cart (I must have tried to open that damn door fifteen times), the random working spray bottle full of water, and the plates of cookies and cakes you can examine and even bite into. These little touches make the fairly static, empty Barrow Hill seem quite real. The excellent voice acting of Emma Harry, playing a local DJ, is another unifying thread in the game. If things get too creepy, you can always turn on the radio and listen to the soothing sounds of “Fabulous 15.3, BHR.” At least until Emma takes off her headphones and becomes part of the mystery herself.
A creepy room with creepy stuff in it.Playing Barrow Hill is like reading a good mystery. It’s immersive, well-paced and satisfying from beginning to end. The CD-ROM game will be available in North America in September, distributed by Got Game Entertainment. Until then, you can order it on DVD from Lighthouse Interactive.