Du Lac and Fey: Dance Of Death XSX Review 2/10 "Half-Arsed?" 🔎 @SalixGames #IndieGames #GameDev

The Collins English dictionary describes "half-arsed" as:

"ADJECTIVE

slang

incompetent; inept; badly organized"

And that's the main takeaway from this game. Let's get the praise part of this review out of the way. Don't worry, it won't take long. 

Du Lac and Fey: Dance Of Death has some nice writing and some really good voice acting. There. I told you it would be quick.  

Now onto the less good. You know when you see something you love - maybe a prized heirloom like a vase or similar - sliding off a table in slow motion as it smashes on the floor? 

That's the speed of movement in this game. Characters move like the Titanic did when faced with an iceberg: far too slowly, and in the wrong direction. It's the sort of character movement that I was convinced that all of humanity agreed we wouldn't put in a video game after the early Resident Evil games. The controller is a misnomer here, it's more of an object that offers mere suggestions that can and often are ignored by the characters on screen. 

The art style is... Well, dated is probably the wrong word but it'll do for now. The character models remind me of the videos done by the Taiwanese firm Next Animation Studio, who famously lampooned news stories with some slightly questionable CGI interpretations, back in the 2010s. If you aren't familiar, trust me when I say that this isn't praise. Backgrounds are mainly in soft focus, with an odd selection of 3D and 2D NPCs scattered around. The 2D models remind me of the old Paddington TV show. It's a bit jarring walking behind them. Slowly. Of course, assuming you don't walk into them. Which you will do. A lot. 

At the start of the game is the sort of tutorial that we're all used to. You know, the one where conveniently placed bits of scenery get in your character's way and you have to learn to jump, crouch etc. In this game, you're told that the left stick controls movement, which it does. But that's about it, other than the hint that X switches between characters (except when it doesn't). Everything else is guesswork. 

There's no option in the settings to see the controller mapping, so you take an educated guess that when the icon appears to examine something, you press A. This first section is set in Norway and is subtitled for those who aren't fluent in Norwegian. Sadly, this is spoiled by the fact that the achievement you unlock at the start covers the subtitles, so you miss out on a chunk of the conversation. A great start. 

This is a murder mystery, so it's good that you're introduced to a corpse to examine very early on. Icons appear over each possible point of interest, which after some experimenting, I discovered were switched between with the right stick, and selected with A. The confusion continues a little while later in the game when we have a notebook to examine. Again, trial and error teach us that the right stick moves between items that you can examine, and the trigger buttons change pages. The right stick allows you to scroll through the text explanation that appears at the bottom of the screen, but it's also still bound to the examination icons on the page. So you're simultaneously scrolling text AND changing the object you're examining. 

There's no option to exit the book, so eventually, you realise that you must examine everything on the pages in order to complete this bit. If you hover over something you've already examined, the icon briefly appears and then disappears, leaving you no indication of where your cursor is. I assumed it had taken the day off, along with my sense of enjoyment and will to live. 

There's rudimentary combat, which takes the form of a bar with a target section in it. When the slider is on the right spot, you press a button. But this isn't explained, and again, I had to take a punt on the correct button being A and took a couple of hits before I got there. It's not at all satisfying, but then this is a point-and-click mystery, so I'll let that one slide. 

Moving from Norway, our detectives arrive in 1888 London where you are about to embark on their investigation of a string of murders... they immediately disappeared into the background. 

Once I'd found them again, attempting to traverse the scene prompted both characters to bugger off behind a bit of scenery, presumably to have a ciggy and a bit of a cry about being conscripted into this thing in the first place. 

Because of the aforementioned glacial walking speed and the characters' inability to respond to basic directions, it took a little while to get them back in view again. After 5 minutes spent (very) slowly ambling around this scene looking for things to interact with, rather like a drunk who's just been spun around 50 times, I was about ready to enact my own real-life murder spree. 

Once I'd had a cup of tea and calmed down, I found an NPC to talk to. After working out that the left stick selects dialogue (rather than the more obvious d-pad), I was dismayed to find that I needed to talk to a different NPC to be able to leave the area. Eventually, I found him, talked to him, and managed to move on and a while later, I met the third playable character. 

Again, the voice acting here was great, but further awful game mechanics beat any enjoyment out of me and after a baffling section on potion making, followed by yet more frustrating attempts to move around and select things (whereupon I exhausted my already extensive lexicon of foul language, and even invented some new swear words), I knew the end was nigh for me and this game. 

The issues were too numerous for me to overcome - I could overlook the graphics or the basic approach to combat. But all the great writing, voice acting, and admittedly impressive attention to historically-correct detail in the world can't outweigh the immense frustration of bumping into absolutely everything on the screen at 2mph and going in and out of the same room 50 times because the game can't tell the difference between you selecting the exit or the character you want to talk to.