Sam and Max; Episode 1 The Penal Zone 8/10
Used to love playing the Sam and Max games on PC in the 90’s. It was like most games of its time (created by the same people who brought the world monkey island apparently) Monkey island, Indiana jones where similar point and click adventure/puzzle games. The Penal Zone is a good way to start off the 3rd main instalment of the Sam and Max title. Likeable characters, good puzzles although at times there are some parts that leave you completely stumped, there’s no logical way how one thing leads you to talk to X character from 2 hours ago, its loose links that eventually work, overall I’m pleased with the story and well, it was enough to get me hooked to buy the rest of the series and I NEVER usually buy anything for £9.99 on the Ps Store. So to me, in itself that speaks volumes.
Sam and Max; Episode 2 The Story of Sammun-Mak 6/10
Based in Egypt, its story is even harder to follow. In a odd way it helps you link one character to another through the fact that you can only progress so far on the 4 reels of game before having to change as your capped at certain points until you can get the information or object from another reel to progress in the 1st one, it’s the least favourite of them all so far because the trophies are 5x harder to get as they aren’t really the sort that you can go back and get, some of them you have to have X person in Y area before Z happens, and in the other trophy the same X person has to be in area B which is why C happens. It really complexes matters.
InFAMOUS 9/10
Enjoyed this game a lot, I’d like to take a second to point out that I completed this game inbetween the Sam and Max marathon, I’d already been playing it since the PS store returned and the welcome package was released, I was pacing myself but the story caught me and I was unable to stop playing till the end lol. Trophies aren’t exactly tough, it just takes patience to get them, the storyline itself I spoilt for myself before the end, I worked out who Kessler was and why things happened to trish. In the second game I’d love to have more of Kessler’s powers, they where interesting attacks, even though his 3 “laser” bursts made him tired which is strange when you learn the end storyline. (weird because I’d have thought they wouldn’t make him tired at all) I’ll be sure to pick up the second game, but not now… patience is indeed a virtue, even moreso when you’ve spent £250 this weekend and can’t really find that spare £35 on a single game lol.
Sam and Max; Episode 3 – They Stole Max’s Brain! 8.5/10
I liked this one the best so far, trophies are ridiculously easy but that doesn’t mean the game itself is easy by a long shot. It just takes it even further back than the 1st game when in terms of keeping to the original S&M games. The characters are even more likeable and built upon, I like the whole feel of this game as it takes Sam back to a clichéd P.I very nice to see him being a proper detective/P.I beating the truth out of people and not afraid to shoot lol. The plot twist in this one was very good and leads very nicely onto the 4th episode, the link between episode 1 and 2 was much better than this one but this doesn’t spoil it too much.
Sam and Max; Episode 4; Beyond the Alley Of The Dolls. 8/10
Gah now this ones the similar loose links of the first episode, at one stage it literally screws your chances of getting a trophy, 4 dials and each dial has 3 numbers (1, 2, 3) you have to guess the correct combination in under 6 tries for the trophy. Annoying but I got there in the end (missed this trophy as its really a game of luck) once you’re past this part the rest of the game is plain sailing. The storyline starts off looking like some sort of zombie game haha ends up looking like some warped evil chuckie doll joke. The bridge between this episode and the final is similar to episode 2 into 3, because you lose Max again. I haven’t played the final yet but I’m not particularly happy about losing my favourite character of the two.
