Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templar (PlayStation)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 2.5 stars OK
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 5.8 (2.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Moira Muldoon
• Reviewed on: 05/06/1998
• Updated on: 03/07/2008
• Released on: 01/31/1998
• Originally published on GameSpot: Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templar (PlayStation) Review

Weaving a tale of murder, mystery, mayhem, and medieval history, Revolution Software has ported its popular PC title Circle of Blood to the PlayStation. The terrific storyline has been kept intact, with all its shadowy nuances of the occult and unexpected humor, but the game just isn't as fun to play as it was on the PC.

You're George Stobbart, hapless American tourist in Paris drawn into a far-reaching world-domination plot by a bomb exploding in the quiet cafe where you're drinking coffee. You're called to be an unlikely and somewhat awkward hero as you cross the globe - from Spain to Syria to France to Ireland - in search of the truth and the reason behind a seemingly unconnected series of murders. The storyline is solid, laden with historical myth and mystery (the Knights Templar, central to the game, were known to exist in early medieval times, but no one knows what happened to them, if they still exist, where their treasure went, and so on). The story also introduces a handful of well-developed characters, including your accomplice, the sophisticated Parisian Nicole Collard, as well as the psychic police inspector Rosso and pub-lurking exaggerator Liam MacGuire.

Puzzles fit well into the fabric of the game. Most are relevant and usually are solvable with a reasonable portion of wit and a slow mouse (stumpers can often be solved if you crawl the cursor over the screen very, very slowly and find that small object). Only one or two felt illogical or random, which in an adventure game with more than 25 puzzles or so, seems a reasonable ratio.

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