After my first grip of Broken pieces during gamescom, I wanted to return to the fictional Brittany of Élise, to find out what had happened to the inhabitants of Saint-Exil. It is clear that the Steam synopsis does not lie: "Riddles and strange phenomena await you" is it written. On the other hand, the publisher was careful not to say that many questions will remain unanswered even once the end credits have passed.
Elise has special powers. Here she can cause a storm, which causes the tree to fall to cross the precipice
For those who missed the first grip published last month, a quick summary: Broken pieces puts us in the shoes of Élise, a young woman in her thirties who saw the inhabitants disappear the day when columns of water emerged from the sea. This same phenomenon caused curious shadows to appear which sometimes attack our protagonist... who has no choice but to defend himself by shooting at them. A bit curious and depressed, she goes in search of answers in the village of Saint-Exil, a village with a complex history, where a religious sect and other top secret scientific research are mixed.
If there's one thing you can't take away from Elseware Experience's game, it's its sprawling plot. As it progresses, we will see a lot of information intertwine that we will try somehow to associate to understand what is going on in the city of Saint-Exil (very pretty to discover/visit by somewhere else). In addition to the heroine's monologues, we will spend a lot of her time listening to cassettes, since the latter never separates from her walkman player. We will obtain many elements of answers through these audiologs to recover here and there in the adventure... it is moreover perhaps a point which can hinder, because listening to the K7s is optional, and you have to go through the not really well done menu to listen to them. Except that without listening to them, we miss a lot of script elements that help to understand why the city is depopulated and what is happening there.
Reaching the lighthouse is one of the first objectives of the game... Élise writes down each objective in her notebook
In addition to the exploration which takes a place of choice in the adventure, the game will offer many puzzles to solve, some being environmental, others mainly appealing to our logic. Most of the puzzles are inspirational and will keep you thinking for a while. Nothing insurmountable however, Élise always having a good idea to pass on to the player if we struggle a little too long.
The other part, however, much more debatable, is the fighting. When I was told at gamescom that the game was in final version, I understood that we should not wait for the game on this segment, rightly so! It seems that the studio has figured it out by itself by offering 2 styles of play, an "Original" mode with normal fights, which limits ammunition and gives enemies a little resistance by making them a bit more aggressive. The other, "Reduced fights", which turns fighting into a mere pretext. I for my part opted for this mode after 2 hours, wondering what the fights brought to the work as they are imprecise. To explain the principle a little, when a fight is declared, an "arena" is drawn on the zone in which one evolves, and one sees the shadows appear. The range of movements is therefore quite limited: we aim, we shoot, we reload and we dodge enemy attacks with the help of a key. If one could excuse the rigidity of a resident evil at the dawn of the 3rd millennium, it's a little more difficult to justify this in 2022. Why not take over the fixed camera system, especially since it works overall well, thanks to the possibility of alternating between two angles of view , but the shooting system, we would have gladly done without it!
Curious messages are inscribed in several places in Saint-Exil.
Regarding the technique of the title, not much to report. The game runs at 4K / 60FPS on my bike without flinching (but it is rather fast) and the loading is rather fast too. Some audio problems are to be reported but the patches follow one another to correct them. The VF is correct, and I appreciate the fact that it is present on a low budget game. We will also note the presence of certain music that I personally liked!
Imperfect, Broken pieces it certainly is. Blame it on a few curious choices in the way of telling his story, or on his overall failed fights. On the other hand, Elise is a very interesting protagonist, and the quest for truth intrigued me enough for me to want to see the end of the game. We are faced with an "old-fashioned" adventure game that will seduce for sure nostalgics of the genre. For the youngest, on the other hand, they may be a little hermetic to the proposal.
Broken Pieces is available on PC since September 9th. It will be released on Playstation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series on October 31, 2022.
