Hector: Badge of Carnage

(EDIT: 1/30/2013 - Changed Star Rating to reflect removal of half stars from the new Giant Bomb Site. Revise down to 3 stars from 3.5)

Tellgame game's Hector: Badge of Carnage Trilogy of Episodes is a pretty straight forward Point and Click old school adventure game (s). Badge of Carnage consists of Three Episodes , each roughly taking 2-5 hours to complete, which as of 2012 can be purchased as a package.

It draws pretty heavily on the Monkey Island humorous formula of old, meaning there are oddball characters and even odder puzzles. However the Hector game is very very British with pretty adult British Black humor. Enough so, that many American players may almost feel like they are a playing a foreign language game.

Story

The heart of any Point and Click adventure game is its' story. And it's here that Hector will either be a love it or hate experience for players.

The basic Plot of Badge of Carnage is that Hector, a slobbish unpleasant Bristish detective who lives in a Prison Cell,is called into negotiate with Hostage taker (after better options are dispatched by said mad man's sniper rifle). Ultimately it's up to Hector to run errands to "improve" the ruined Midlands city of Clappers Wreake to satiate the mad man in Episode 1: We Negotiate with Terrorists.

In Episode 2: Senseless Acts of Justice, Hector must try to identify and hunt down the mad man and in Episode 3: Beyond Reasonable Doom He must finally stop the mad man's evil plot.

The characters are distinct and portrayed vividly. Each with a noticeable characterization quirk as is standard Adventure game fare and central to uncovering what you need to to proceed. Hector himself is a foul unkempt pessimistic lout. Hector's partner Lambert serves as occasional playable character and a hint source. You'll also encounter such characters as a wheelchair bound Porn Magnate, a drum playing busker,a trio wasted youth wannabes, a blind pervert, a couple streetwalkers and a Playboy celebrity Pro Soccer Player. Did I mention this game is for adults? The humor and themes are definitely at least R rated.

What gives Hector its' unique feel for better or worse is its' intense use of British slang and references to British culture in its' suburban British setting. And this will likely be the biggest stumbling block for American players. Your enjoyment of Hector will largely depend on how well you like the humor, a fact which may be tested if you don't understand what they are saying. More than a few gags are likely to fly over your head if you aren't versed in the lingo.

The gags themselves are pretty well executed (and surprisingly vulgar in places), although the British Black humor in places comes across as more mean than funny even for a guy like myself who enjoys that kind of stuff. It's pretty obvious the game writers have an intense dislike for British youth in particular. The story does not do a good job of ever making Hector remotely likable, and his inexplicable persistence of doing his job above the call of duty comes across as implausible given that he clearly likes basically nobody.

The story's plot twists also are pretty predictable, but the sheer amount of semi-amusing dialogue makes up for it as it makes getting to where it's going interesting. There a couple characters who seem pretty important that are basically completely oddly undeveloped (perhaps laying groundwork for a sequel?), which leaves the story feeling uncompleted and also makes you wonder why they were included at all.

Nonetheless on the whole the story is enough to have kept me mildly amused and engaged. There is more good than bad here.

Gameplay & Controls

When it comes to controls Hector plays straight up as a Point and Click adventure Game of Yore. The controls are simple yet very intuitive. Most players will pick them up extremely quickly. Oddly enough the second and third act have much better tutorials (included in them than the first episode.)

Clicking on items on the screen once (that show up in the red description swath on inventory bar at the bottom screen) cause Hector commentate on the selected item. Clicking on an item twice will cause Hector to pick it up or use it (or tak to a NPC). Clicking on an item in your inventory and then selecting another one in your inventory will combine them if possible. Clicking on an item in your inventory and selecting an item in the play screen will let you use the object on the environment. Clicking on the edge of the screen allows you to move another screen.

As standard as Point and Click controls gets.

What is unusual is the save system. There is no way to manually save, ever, to my knowledge. The game does it for you automatically with no prompting. The game fortunately is hyper forgiving with check pointing for those who need to take a break, so you can do so without fear.

The heart of any P&C game is the interact-able dialogue and puzzles. Most devs have to walk a very fine line when it comes to puzzles, if they are not obvious or too many steps a P&C game can get extremely frustrating (less of an issue sin today's Gamefaqs world), make 'em too easy and the pacing between story and game can get messed up.

Hector errors on the side of being way too easy with the puzzles. Perhaps an artifact of the episodic nature of the release, as Hector carries over nothing from episode to episode (which makes it a little difficult to make elaborate puzzles) and revisits very few locations. Adventure game vets will have little to no challenge here, as most puzzles will be immediately obvious and accomplished in one or two steps. Rarely will your inventory have more than 4 items at a time and even more rare will you ever acquire the items out of sequence from when you need them, making even the guess and checker have little trouble. What puzzles there are however are wacky and amusing in a Potty humor British sort of way (there is frequent references to Britain's slacker loser youth sub-culture). E.g. At one point you'll need to take a Gun and Beauty Boutique owner to dinner.

If the puzzles weren't easy enough already, and Lambert's hints not obvious enough, the game also has a bottom on your HUD that will straight up give you the answer (while berating you) to any puzzle. Pretty much to the only way you won't finish this game is if you don't try.

The dialogue options for the various NPCs are pretty robust, while also being versatile enough that you could skip much of it if you want . They do have a good amount of convo if you enjoy that kind of thing with some amusing puns and one liners, which presumably if you play adventure games you do. Much of the voice acting work however leaves a fair amount to be desired. There's a couple characters in particular who all sound like they are voiced by the same actor and sound basically alike. You'll encounter more than a few lines that would have been much more funny with better quality voice acting.

Graphics & Sound

As mentioned above much of the voice acting is pedestrian at best and occasionally sounds like it has been extremely compressed.

The other sounds are serviceable and what music there is, is decent but not memorable.

The Graphics on the other hand is an area where this game does really well. Hector looks pretty nice, it feels as if your are playing in a cartoon. The Animated motion is fluid and responsive. Clappers Wreake feels alive and amusingly expressive. Rarely did I notice graphical hiccups or glitches.

Replay Value/Length

The game will take you 5-10 hours to complete depending on how fast you solve puzzles and how much dialogue you like listening to. Most of the value of the game as with most games of this type is in the interactive dialogue.

As far as replay value, basically zero. There are no secrets or achievements and no new game +.

The only reason to replay is if you want to experience the story again or explore some dialogue options you didn't take before.

Verdict

Hector: Badge of Carnage may not be the best Adventure game I've ever played but it's a decent time. It's very easy and it looks good. The humor and characters are going to be real hit and miss based on how much you like British Black Humor. At current prices (as of right now ~20 bucks) it's a decent value for the price.

Adventure genre fans will likely be glad to just have a decent game to play, but non fans won't miss much skipping this title.