Love Chronicles: The Sword and the Rose

Wow. After being delighted by what I assume is the 1st in the series (The Spell Collector) I had high expectations for this one. Too high. WAY too high. All the quirky charm and clever twist on the usual 'click on the shinies to start an arbitrary HO scene has been removed here, replaced by exactly the same thing as everyone else is/was doing. The interesting and colourful graphics have gone, replaced by bland, dark, grimey unforgettableness. Animations and FX are poor compared to the first. The more-or-less interesting plot has gone. (The story is so dull, and the main character's dialog so painfully obvious that it really is a chore to progress at times. ("The bridge is raised. I need to find a way to lower it." "I need to find a way to open this box." "I'll need a key to get past this [obviously locked] door." Thanks, Sherlock. This is about as colourful or useful as the commentary gets.) The charm of having other characters you meet along the way has gone. The clever expanding inventory system has gone. In fact it has been replaced by something even worse than other generic HO games. Every time you attempt to use and item and fail, that item is put at the end of the list. So the inventory order is constantly changing about. A minor irritation compared the the others; but still another pointless, thoughtless step backwards. The puzzles are either easy and uninspired, or pretty hard and uninspired. But that's not 'pretty hard' as in fun and rewarding, but rather a kind of 'difficultly through tedium.' Most of the puzzles I skipped I'm sure I could have sorted out, given the time and a bit of thought or trial and error. But I just really couldn't be bothered. I do hope the series picks up again, or I'm going to regret buying the complete bundle. But the point is, after the 1st game I'd have bought the rest anyway based on the merits of that game. It's just very very disappointing that this installment seems to have completely thrown out all that made The Spell Collector a more interesting and enjoyable game. [Edit: By the end things got a bit better, and I actually enjoyed the bonus content more. Rating still stands, though.]

It's not a bad game, but I cannot really recommend it, as I found it quite bland. The puzzles are OK, but neither the story, nor the visuals have captured me. There are much better and much more complex games of this kind (even from the same publisher). Note that despite the title (Love Chronicles) there is no romance in it.

Second of the Love Chronicles series, the Sword and the Rose starts with you, the Prince crashlanding on another island kingdom, this one shrouded in ice. Ice that can be melted by use of a magical rose. And there is a beast running about. The plot is decent, the games exciting, and the characters vibrant... enough when you meet them. Buy the bundle, as all four games are great.

This is [I]Love Chronicles[/I] #2, a significant departure from the first entry in the series. This is in the more familiar hidden-object game formula, with separate hidden-object scenes, puzzle mini-games, and a point-and-click adventure. There's not much to the story but the gameplay is good and quite challenging indeed, a major step up in difficulty from the first game, which was quite casual. Despite the big change this game stands on its own as a nice experience for fans of the genre.

great variety