Baphomet's Curse: The Sleeping Dragon

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Baphomet's Curse: The Sleeping Dragon
Original title Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon
Studio United KingdomUnited Kingdom Revolution software
Publisher EuropeEurope THQ Marvelous Interactive 1C Company The Adventure Company
JapanJapan
RussiaRussia
North AmericaNorth America
Senior Developer Charles Cecil , Steve Ince
composer Ben McCullough
Erstveröffent-
lichung
2003
platform PlayStation 2 , Windows , Xbox
Game engine RenderWare
genre Adventure
Game mode Single player
control Keyboard , mouse , gamepad
system advantages
preconditions
medium CD-ROM , DVD-ROM , download
language German, English, French, Italian, Spanish
Age rating
USK released from 6
PEGI recommended for ages 12+

Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon , and Broken Sword 3 (English title:. Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon ) is a Adventure - Video Game of the British developer Revolution Software for PlayStation 2 , Xbox and Windows . It is the third installment in the Baphomets Curse series and was published by THQ in October 2003, six years after its predecessor, Baphomets Curse 2 . Compared to its predecessors, the graphic presentation has been converted to 3D and the indirect point-and-click control has been replaced by direct control of the characters.

action

The US patent attorney George Stobbart is traveling to the Congo at the request of a client . On the way, his plane gets caught in a storm and crashes. After George managed to get himself and the pilot to safety from the crash site on the edge of a ravine, he finally found his client murdered in his research facility. At the same time as George's stay in Africa, the French journalist Nico Collard is contacted by a hacker in Paris who has deciphered the Voynich manuscript and claims to have found information about the end of the world in it. But when Nico tries to find him in his apartment, she finds him murdered. As it turns out, both crimes are directly related, and George and Nico meet again. Both find out that the Knights Templar , believed to have been defeated, still exists and is responsible for the murders. To fight the machinations of the order, the couple travel to various locations in Paris, Prague , Glastonbury and Egypt .

Gameplay

The main characters of the game, George Stobbart and Nicole Collard, are controlled by the player in turns. In contrast to the previous games, the characters in this part are controlled directly through the three-dimensional game world with the help of the keyboard (PC) or the gamepad (game console), but the basic game principle remained unchanged. The game is set up in a scenic way, the player observes the action from a third person perspective with changing, but given camera positions. The main focus is on solving puzzles. These are mostly genre-specific dialog, object and combination puzzles. When the character approaches an object or a person with whom it can interact, symbols for possible interactions are displayed. A corresponding action is triggered by pressing a button.

Compared to its predecessors, climbing tasks and a large number of sliding puzzles are new, in which, similar to Sokoban, boxes must be actively brought into suitable positions by the player in order to be able to reach previously inaccessible passages by climbing over the newly positioned boxes. There are also stealth passages in which the player has to move his figure to the next scene unnoticed by other game figures and monitoring devices. In some places, the game also relies on action elements, in which the player has to act under time pressure ( quick-time events ). Also unlike in the predecessors, the player no longer threatens death in the game. If he cannot master a scene in time, the figure is set back to the beginning of the puzzle section and can repeat it an unlimited number of times until he successfully masters the scene. The same applies to the sliding puzzles, in which the boxes are returned to their starting position by briefly leaving the scene.

development

With Baphomet's curse: The sleeping dragon , Revolution Software turned away from the point-and-click control of the previous titles. Revolution boss and lead designer Charles Cecil cited the reason “ The point-and-click adventure is dead. ”(German:“ The point-and-click adventure is dead ”). Instead, the developer relied on new game mechanics, skill inserts such as stealth passages and smaller physics puzzles in the form of box pushing. There are also smaller action items. The aim of the new game mechanics was to put the player under pressure.

The game's soundtrack was composed by Ben McCullough , who also served as audio director.

Speaker list

The synchronization was carried out by Toneworx GmbH. Directed by Antje Roosch .

role German speaker English speaker
George Stobbart Alexander Schottky Rolf Saxon
Nicole Collard Franziska Pigulla Sarah Crook
André Lobineau Pius Maria Cüppers Jay Benedict
Cholmondely Achim Schülke
Vernon Bliér Frank Thomé Bob Golding

reception

Rating mirror
German-speaking area
publication Rating
4players 83%
GameStar 73%
PC Games 79%
International
Edge 9 of 10
Eurogamer.net 6 of 10
GameSpot 8.1 out of 10 (Win)
7.7 (Xbox)
IGN 8.4 of 10
Meta-ratings
GameRankings 82.71% (Win)
77.15% (Xbox)
62.00% (PS2)
Metacritic 82 of 100 (Win)
77 (Xbox)

The game received mostly positive reviews ( Metacritic : 82 out of 100 (Windows) / 77 (Xbox)) A frequent point of criticism was the large number of box slide puzzles. Developer Charles Cecil gave this point of criticism in retrospect. There was also criticism of the puzzle design; the puzzles were found to be too easy in their entirety. On the other hand, the cinematic staging and the German and English synchronization were praised.

“Compliments to the story writers around Charles Cecil: The story of Baphomet's curse is exciting and makes the characters grow so dear to you that you are excited to the end. Thanks to the ingenious staging with cinematic camera work, humorous scenes and pointed dialogues [...], you get a real film feeling. [...] Due to the weak puzzles, however, the fun is over far too quickly; far too soon the credits flickered across my screen. Without time-consuming tinkering and cut scenes in which you suddenly have to press the right button at the right time, it would probably have been even faster. "

- David Bergmann : PC Games

"Baphomets Fluch is a refreshingly different adventure, very pleasant to play and with its cinematic approach points in the right direction!"

- Jörg Luibl : 4Players

"Good adventure with annoying box puzzles."

- Gamestar

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. a b c d e David Bergmann: Baphomet's curse 3 . In: PC Games . Computec Media Group . December 8, 2003. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  2. http://www.ign.com/articles/2002/08/29/ects-2002-broken-sword-the-sleeping-dragon-3
  3. a b Adventure-Treff.de: Interviews: Charles Cecil. Retrieved August 11, 2018 .
  4. a b c d Jörg Luibl: Test: Baphomet's curse: The sleeping dragon . In: 4Players . freenet AG . November 19, 2003. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  5. a b c http://www.gamestar.de/spiele/baphomets-fluch-der-schlafende-drache/wertung/43237.html
  6. Broken Sword 3: The Sleeping Dragon review ( English ) In: Edge . Future, plc . December 1, 2003. Archived from the original on April 2, 2013. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  7. Kristan Reed: Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon Review ( English ) In: Eurogamer.net . Gamer Network . November 18, 2003. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  8. Scott Osborne: Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon Review ( English ) In: Gamespot . CNET . November 25, 2003. Archived from the original on September 12, 2013. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  9. Scott Osborne: Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon Review ( English ) In: Gamespot . CNET . December 15, 2003. Archived from the original on June 26, 2013. Retrieved on September 6, 2013.
  10. a b c Staci Krause: Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon Review ( English ) In: IGN . November 25, 2003. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  11. GameRankings : Average rating of the Windows version , based on 35 articles. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  12. GameRankings : Average rating of the Xbox version , based on 33 articles. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  13. GameRankings : Average rating of the PS2 version , based on 7 articles. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  14. a b Metacritic : Average rating of the Windows version , based on 32 articles. Retrieved September 6, 2013.
  15. a b Metacritic : Average rating of the Windows version , based on 24 articles. Retrieved September 6, 2013.