The 13th Doll: a Fan Game of the 7th Guest

Thomas Anclat – January 04, 2022

IT's been more than 25 years since The 7th Guest starting time debuted, and spell its age is evident to modern eyes now, it's hard to amplify how great an bear on it made at the metre. Subsequent adventure staples like full apparent motion video, pre-rendered 3D graphics and CD-ROM entrepot were little more than than pipe dreams before Trilobyte's first-individual horror mystifier made them standard; No less than Gates proclaimed it "the new standard in interactive entertainment." Gaming would never be the same again.

The 7th Edgar Albert Guest was so revolutionary that information technology's comfy to overlook just how enjoyable a game it was in its own right, and how effective it was Eastern Samoa a piece of storytelling. All of its technical innovations were done in service of a macabre and amazingly poignant tale most desperate people discovering the high cost of second chances, and the majority of its puzzles remain entertaining even today. It's a ignominy, then, that visitors to Old Man Stauf's house have had lone one lackluster scarcely-a-subsequence (The 11th Hour) to satisfy their desire for a return journey since the '90s. Original developer Rob Landeros twice unsuccessful to crowdfund a third installment under the Re-basket-shaped Trilobyte banner, but when those were unsuccessful it seemed likely that we'd decussate Stauf's verge for the last clock.

Enter indie studio apartment Classical Greek Door. Having worked for close to a decade along an unofficial sequel called The 13th Skirt, they were accidentally contacted by Trilobyte in 2022 and offered a license to sell the game commercially if they could secure financing. They did, and now ultimately this fan-made instalment is complete and the mansion doors stand open erstwhile more. The end result is an admirable first cause by a novice studio that was clearly a labour of love for all involved, and despite some rough edges and a dependence on knowledge of the foremost game's events to be explicable (The 11th Hour, thankfully, goes generally unmentioned), it serves American Samoa a largely enjoyable homage to a classical of the puzzle-adventure genre.

(Heavy spoilers for The 7th Guest follow, as information technology's almost impossible to describe this game without them.)

The 7th Guest ended with Tad Gorman, the child who'd been lured to Stauf's mansion to serve as a ritual killing, escaping the demonic toymaker's clutches and ostensibly consigning him to damnation. The 13th Doll begins approximately ten eld later with Tad a forbearing in a mental ward, where he relives his traumatic experiences in the haunted house and agonizes finished the trapped souls of Stauf's previous victims whom he couldn't save. (This is the showtime of many convoluted story points: the opening narration states that Tad managed to free the souls of the unusual children, while the stay of the game says he didn't.)

Dr. Marcus Richmond, the asylum's idealistic new managing director, is advised by his departing predecessor to abandon any notion of curing the young man, as Tad appears beyond all help. Richmond, however, refuses to give risen along a enduring, and atomic number 2 suggests an unconventional method of exposure therapy: he and Shade will travel to the star sign together so that Shade can see there's nothing there to reverence. This goes more or less as smoothly as you'd look, as no rather have they left the refuge yard than Shade steals the Dr.'s car and sets knocked out to finish what he started a decade earlier, going Richmond to follow posterior in an effort to bring down him back. (How Tad learned to drive when he's worn-out his entire adult life in an asylum isn't addressed.)

From here you're given a select of whose story you want to continue, Tad's or Dr. Richmond's, and you'll follow your chosen character through to the end. As Shade you'll constitute guided by the mysterious Woman in White, a ghostly figure who tells you to free Stauf's victims past aggregation the titular chick and performing a ritual in the tower above the Attic. As Richmond it's Stauf himself directive you, insisting that the stories of his wickedness are vicious lies and promising you fame and success if only you'll help him whole "the Political machine," which was to atomic number 4 his greatest oeuvre. Puzzles, objectives and taradiddle onward motion are entirely different across the two halves: or s rooms are only available to Tad, while others yawning for Richmond alone, and as no puzzle repeats between characters you'll need 2 playthroughs to suffer the full experience. All told it took me about 20 hours to good both parts of the game.

The 7th Guest was jammed wall-to-wall with puzzles, and while most were pleasantly thought-provoking there were a hardly a (like the infamous microscope) that pushed high against the limits of fairness. For the most part The 13th Doll actually improves on this aspect, with a serial publication of well-constructed challenges that quits the best of what the original had to declare oneself while avoiding the worst. Several puzzles build off of ones that were present in The 7th Guest without always spirit recycled or overly derivative. In a some cases a puzzle's objective was unclear and I necessary the built-in hint system to tell me what my goal was, and I still don't quite buy the rationale behind the solution to one denotative get, but most of the fourth dimension your role will give you decent selective information to get you started.

As in the original game, your ethereal resister (Stauf for Tad, the Woman in White for Richmond) taunts you every bit you play, but the charm quickly wears off As in that respect's only a handful of lines for them to cycle through advertising nauseam. A a few even actively detract from the experience, like when I was repeatedly told in this 1930s period bit that I had "street smarts: Benni Street smarts!" Still, the puzzles themselves are a joy, and on their own they make me excited to see what the developers do in the future.

Gameplay is unsubdivided and much like The 7th Guest's, albeit with free range of motion in fully-rendered 3D rather than the original's pre-rendered semi-slideshow presentation. The manor house loses some of its eery atmosphere when you're able to travel IT as you please—time period lighting increases visibleness but lessens the sense of dread—only it's been recreated quite faithfully. Spooky paintings and photos line the walls, seemingly innocuous pieces of scene jump to unexpected life when you click them, and you never know when an otherworldly vision might materialize around the next corner. It's all visually well-realized, but I still institute myself missing the feeling of crawling unease I sometimes got piece playing The 7th Edgar Guest. As fun as it arse constitute, The 13th Doll is ne'er very scary.

Movement is via WASD with the mouse used for interactions, and the pointer is linguistic context-sensitive, dynamic according to what it hovers all over: a beckoning skeleton hand for a door you can undefended, a pair of chattering teeth for an object you can fudge, a drama mask to establish that a short scene can be accessed, and a skull with a rhythmical brain for when you've found a puzzle. (In a nice touch, these icons are exactly the same as in The 7th Client.) Unlike utmost time you do have an inventory here, but it's only for storing hidden collectibles and the parts of whichever MacGuffin your character needs to foregather; you'll never need it to lick a puzzle.

As a fan continuation to a 26-year-old game, The 13th Doll understands that its primary audience is made upwardly of citizenry (like me) World Health Organization look back lovingly happening the original, and those players ought to get a kick out of the many, many references and tips of the lid to The 7th Invitee. These range from the subtle, much every bit a puzzle involving game pieces that resemble the original seven guests, to the overt, as when the in-game map name calling rooms after their premature occupants (the Knox Room, the Dutton Room, etc.). Callbacks to puzzle solutions from the previous gage crop up in upset places without feeling forced, and atomic number 79 coins depicting "memories" from before are scattered round the mansion for you to optionally find and collect.

All this means that The 13th Doll will be more difficult to treasure if you've ne'er been unclothed to its predecessor or don't remember it well. While you can play the game from start to finish without learned a matter about The 7th Guest, information technology doesn't go out of its way to take in you up. Tad's quest, for example, hinges on freeing the stolen souls of the children Stauf captured in his quest after immortality, but none of that is made explicit Here—all you know is that Shade is solicitous active "the others" that He "left behind." The meaning is clear enough to those who know the account already, but newcomers won't get a clear picture of the children's affiance or the extent of Stauf's misdeeds and motivations. Muddying the waters further are Stauf's frequent lies to Dr. Richmond most his own history that aren't clearly marked American Samoa such to observers, so that players without preceding cognition of where he came from might perceive the contradictions crossways storylines as inconsistencies or secret plan holes.

United of the most memorable aspects of The 7th Guest was its soundtrack by George "The Fat Human race" Sanger, which at the same time brought the game to vivid life and lent information technology an incomparable line of foreboding. My most pressing question going into The 13th Doll—flatbottom more so than how the puzzles Beaver State story would turn out—was how Attic Door would follow such an iconic rack up. Sanger's have compositions for The 11th Hour paled in comparing to his figure out on the first game, so it seemed supposed that an amateur developer could do best than the man himself. What a pleasant surprise, then, to find that composer Chris Bormend has actually managed the seemingly impossible and created an original soundtrack that's every bit as lively, dynamic and powerful as Sanger's new. The 7th Guest is a pellucid inspiration, but aside from an beginning homage to that game's classical title track, Bormend's work never tries to imitate operating room play remove of its forebear. The result is a score that feels of a piece with its predecessor spell still maintaining its own distinct identity.

Where the game unfortunately stumbles is in presenting its story. Frequent cutscenes dish up great helpings of exposition, both in the manakin of dialogue between characters and instructions from your spiritual guide, just they come so oftentimes that it's sometimes laborious to support give chase of what's going on and why. One of Capital of Virginia's coworkers is introduced archaean happening and seemingly set up as a potential love interest, overshadowing the much more important backstory she delivers about Tad, Stauf and the house in the process, just aside from one or deuce mentions later o on she's missing from the rest of the game. Numerous unreal visions pop up for both player characters that tease details about their pasts, just so little is made of these that it's prosperous to forget who hallucinated what. Similarly, Stauf and the Woman in White provide conflicting versions of their plans, motivations and connections to each unusual, but since you can only when get half the story at a time, you're liable to forget the fine details between revelations.

Despite all the numerous plot threads in turn, many elements of the story excite feeling underdeveloped. What makes the titular skirt thus important? Why does Tad immediately trust the Woman in White, WHO (equally far as we know) helium has never met before she came to him in the psychiatric hospital? If Stauf could start building his auto—non confront in the first game—despite being dead for a X, wherefore does atomic number 2 need Capital of Virginia's avail to consummate it? And wherefore is Dr. Richmond, a rational man who goes to great lengths to disabuse Shade of a belief in the supernatural, so agile to abandon his role as Tad's health professional when a dead man's disembodied voice promises to grant him a indirect request? The gimpy never addresses any of these questions, rather seeming to regale the answers atomic number 3 self-evident, but if they are I personally never figured them out.

You mightiness expect a game with so many drawn-outer cinematics end-to-end its runtime to take its time crossing the finishing line likewise, but surprisingly all of its five possible endings—two for Richmond, three for Tad—is shockingly short. Which ending you get is determined by the choices you make at a few set points in each character's story, but as none of the climactic cutscenes lasts more than than 30 seconds, there's little sense of weight to your choices, especially since (apart from a difference in standpoint) cardinal of the endings are basically identical.

At nearly points the self-coloured production values make it easy to forget that The 13th Doll is a fan-powered production, simply the performing on display for most of the characters serves as a frequent hapless reminder. FMV games aren't usually known for their top-shelf acting, only with the exception of the returning Henry Martyn Robert Hirschboeck, World Health Organization's pitch-pluperfect in his tierce pleasure trip as Stauf and WHO seems to be having the time of his life-time, the cast of The 13th Skirt just don't occur crosswise as fully fledged performers. Both of the leads often neglect to enunciate their lines so that dialogue is delivered in a breathless rush, and actors playacting roles from the 1930s and earlier speak with the diction and cadence of modern twentysomethings. In much of her speech, the Woman in White sounds just plain bored. Concerted with the already difficult-to-parse level, it becomes hard to invest emotionally in what's going happening.

It's significant that the phrase "A Fan Game of The 7th Guest" is displayed so prominently happening the game's title shield. This immediately communicates the type of audience The 13th Doll is trying to appeal to, while also serving as an raised-front disclaimer that some elements of the production tend toward the recreational side of things. Even so, it would be wrong to dismiss this atomic number 3 "just" a fan game: the puzzles are as good as anything you'll find in an A-list title, and overmuch of the live is skilfully designed and unforgettably executed.

What's almost impressive nigh The 13th Doll, though, might just be that it exists at all. Challenging lover sequel announcements were a dime a 12 in the early '00s, with most vanishing quietly back into the aether before long; that Territory Door not only stuck with theirs over the course of 15 years but successfully brought IT to life as a full, commercially-viable release is a remarkable achievement. While it doesn't quite rise to the level of the classic horror puzzler that inspired it, The 13th Doll is a fairly enjoyable tribute that ought to delight those who spent the past two decades wanting more Stauf. Smooth the most demanding will give to admit it's better than The 11th Hour.

(This review is brought to you in piece by the patience of my mother, who solved The 7th Guest's "slyly, spryly, assignation" puzzle for me when I was 11. Love you, Mama!)

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