Hello, this is the Man of Chaos speaking!

Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened is now officially live past two days. As a fan of past Frogwares games, even tho I am getting into some older ones in recent times, I liked the games I have played.
It was one of the main things I have decided to back the game on kickstarter one year ago, or how long it was already, the time passes by so quickly.

Quick disclaimer: I have not played the original game, or the remaster of it. Wanted to finish this remake of a game and now I shall play older ones, since I wanted to play this one blind.

So, how did the game go?

It is not an open world, neither it is not that narrow as one would expect. Played the game with Premium edition which includes small sidecases, which I deemed interesting, even tho they are nothing that ground breaking, since it is not the main focus of the game. Also by completing those, you acquire costumes, which in one half of a game you can wear, on the other half you have clothes limited because of the plot reasons, on the other hand, when you get to those, you have a lot to choose from, for Sherlock and for Watson. I had fun and I believe you will have too.

For the main story, we have seven episodes, each getting you somewhere else with like two minor exceptions, which I will not speak of, as it might compromise the story a little bit. Nonetheless, they are nice locations to go through and I enjoyed every single one. As it is more linear style of game than previous Chapter One, there are those sidequests and the main plot, yet at some places it feels like there is not much, in another time it feels like there is a lot things at a spot.

When it comes to difficulty settings, I do not know how much of a difference there is, since I ran it on the hardest difficulty. Difficulty has its toggles and you can enable and disable things as much as you like. At some parts, I had to make a toggle two times because of a reconstuction of a crime that took place, and I had no idea what I have done wrong. On the hardest difficulty you will see that you have done something wrong, but if you lower the difficulty, you can see exactly which ones does not fit the narrative so you can move past the sequence, because mainly it gives information which you use into other informations to know what to do, or where to go next.

At some places I have run into a difficulty of finding some things which were there, and was looking for them for some time before I actually stumbled upon them. The game does offer you a radar saying what you can interactive with, but it seems to highlight things in an area where you stand or what you can interact near the spot, hard to tell how it works. Just be aware that some things can be missed, although you will get to it eventually since it might be a part of the crime scene where you need all elements anyway.

Connecting information to know where to go next or how to deal with an important situations? We have that as well, in another variant of mind palace! I had run into some things being a trial and error, because you never know, if you have already enough information for it to click or not, or when you know what you are looking for, it might take some other information to select than what you would think, even tho after making it the way the game wants, you kinda get it as well.

Story wise? Do not come looking for Chapter One or Crimes & Punishments, since its little of both. Mainly, it is a continuation of Chapter One, which was a reboot of Sherlock Holmes. This is what follows Chapter One. I had a lot of fun, mainly since I knew nothing of the previous games that this is based upon. Game has some horror aspects, mainly to the name of Lovecrafts. Those scenes are not there that often when thinking over the game, but they aren't there nor redundant or something that would hinder the game. At a part of the game I felt disgusted, because I do not take some things that easily, even tho there is nothing really appaling. Story in a lenght is like 9-10 hours, last (my nearly 11th hour) I hunted few achievments that I missed. On the other hand, I have loved the game, even when some would consider it short. The game takes you in shoes of Sherlock Holmes and Watson really well and I am grateful for it. Also the game has a lot of refferences and I loved to see them, if you played other Sherlock games, you might find them as well ^^

I regret nothing, liked the game from start to the end. The side cases, the places you went to visit, all the emotions, puzzles, all of it. You can go through the game as you like, since thanks to difficulty settings you can play at your own tempo, at your own terms.
I do recommend this game, as much as all those games I have played by Frogwares so far! I am looking for another release by Frogwares, already feeling stoked what comes next.

Approved by the Man of Chaos.