Razor Chuckles

I watched this with our VHS copy a dozen times in the mid-80's as a teenager, and just finished watching it again for the first time in over 30 years. It still holds up remarkably well, and the story (based on the novel) is intricately woven without being too byzantine. I also love the soundtrack (James Horner!), and Brian Dennehy makes every movie better.

Picked this up on a Steam sale for a great price so I'd have something different to play this weekend, and it was perfect for a change of pace. It's primarily a stealth game with a few puzzles, all set in a dark, depressing plague-ridden Medieval France. The story takes a while to develop, but it's solid and enjoyable. The characters are well-voiced (and you can choose English, French or German audio with English subtitles for more immersion). A Plague Tale in many ways reminded me of the old Thief games from the 90's, but with exceptional graphics and smarter AI. There's also a touch of Tomb Raider here as well. It's refreshing to have a protagonist as a girl of about 15 who isn't sexualized or possessing ungodly combat prowess. The majority of the game she is trying to avoid detection as well as solving a few puzzles, though she is able to take out some enemies from a distance with her sling. The game is very linear, but that's fine with me because it's all about the environment and the story. I never found any situation so difficult that I couldn't progress after a couple of tries (until the very end, but it's a fun ending so I won't spoil it). Overall I would give it a 7/10, which in my opinion is a very respectable score. The only negatives I found are that the movement can be a bit clunky and a couple of times I found myself not knowing exactly what my objective was or where I was supposed to go - but those are minor. I completed the game in about 12-15 hours, and it has 16 unique chapters plus a very short epilogue after the credits. As much as I enjoyed the dark environment and theme, and some very unique stealth situations and puzzles, I'm not sure the game has a lot of replayability. But that's fine, since games like this are meant to be experienced, not repeated over and over.