Hotel Dusk: Room 215
© Nintendo
Platform: DS
ESRB: T
Genre: Adventure
Players: 1
Online: No
Developer: Cing
Publisher: Nintendo
Suggested Retail: $34.99
Graphics: B
Sound: C
Gameplay: B-
Replay: C-
Fun Factor: B
Buy it now!
"Hotel Dusk: Room 215"
By: CAPTAIN GORDON EDWARDDate: Friday, February 09, 2007
Welcome back to the late days of the 1970’s, where a film noir seems to reign supreme at the front lines of any video media. Classic characters were established, comic or otherwise, while mystery was around every corner. Here we meet Kyle Hyde in this interactive novel, whom is an ex-cop that has been kicked off of the force, now forced to become a freelance private eye / door to door salesman. The current target is Hotel Dusk, an eerie hotel on a desolate road where Kyle has been asked to spend the night by his boss. During this one night stay he begins to unravel a thirty-year-old mystery involving lies, betrayal, and even murder. Not only that, but it also includes the back-story on why he was forced to leave the force.
For those not in the know, the game is heavily text based, using it at every corner to try and advance the story. The storyline progresses through two main paths: the automated scripts, and general questions that Kyle Hyde stores for specific people. During any given conversation, you continue reading normally, though occasionally you can press them or interrupt them to find out a bit more about the situation, posing a branching question path with different answers. Finally after this section is all wrapped up, if you have any specific questions for them, you can pose them. At this screen as well, you can also present articles of evidence to try and loosen their lips. This keeps the storyline fairly straight forward, but at times you may get stuck if you try and investigate everything, and then try and remember who said what.
Hotel Dusk takes the approach, similar to a point and click adventure. You have the opportunity to use the stylus to click on most of the environment around you, learning trivial information. You have the option to do the same with the people as well, going through a shopping list of text, trying to sift through it all for the important little bits to advance the storyline. More importantly there are plenty of interactive items that you will need to pick up and use with others to progress the storyline. An example of this early on is when your suitcase key breaks, you attempt to pick the lock. For this you need a piece of wire, and thus your attention is drawn towards a paperclip, though even with this attempt you fail. Another example involves needing to put a puzzle together by moving the pieces around, rotating them, and putting them in the correct spot. There are always plenty of pieces of the environment that you can interact with, even if you get sarcastic responses from the main character.
Graphically the game is presented half in 3D, and the other half in 2D. This game will also force you to play the game sideways, much like you would do in Brain Age. On one screen can control your character’s movements with a stylus, and the other is to view where you are in a 3D world. On the touch screen you will see a map of the area, and you may either use the stylus to navigate, or the d-pad, depending on whatever is most convenient for you. On the other screen everything is displayed as if you were watching it from the main character’s eyes, which helps you immerse yourself into their world. In this 3D world, there are still 2D elements, like any other character you run into. These are shown off as black and white illustrations, and while other games use static pictures, these dynamically change frequently, which is a huge plus in my books. Music wise the game is taking notes from the era, which means it is a little restrained, but that helps the ambiance of mystery.
In the end, this game is less about sitting down and playing for a few moments, and more like playing for a long time. You will need to remember who you are talking to, and all of their stories, so that really does not fit into the roll of “small portion served” games, which is something that most hand held games cater to. The storyline is intriguing, and has you coming back for more, but at the same time it has problems hooking you upright to keep you wanting to go on. At times, like many games, it feels more like a chore than playing, which goes against what games should really be about. I personally enjoyed the game, but I need to rank the game how most other people would enjoy it. I will mention that if you like Phoenix Wright or Trace Memory, you will love this game. Wrapping up, Captain Gordon gives Hotel Dusk: Room 215 a C+.
Questions? Comments? Suggestions? CaptainGordonEdward@Gmail.com
