Reader reviews for The Samaritan Paradox

That is my experience with this game. This game spoke to me and then it jammed a pencil into my shoulder.

I expected a conspiracy thriller. The title’s formula suggests as much. That made me a bit hesitant; these types of stories wade through pretty murky waters, crawling with hungry political bottom feeders.

It’s a sub-genre that easily crosses over into creepy territory, is what I mean.

Oddly enough, this game manages to steer clear of anything really problematic, at least.. in the political thriller part of the plot. The personal story is essentially a deliberate lack of trigger warning; that decency would spoil the big reveal. Here’s a spoiler alert: it’s about parental sexual abuse and it’s handled in a way that’s equally abject as oblivious.

That is what does this game in. It looks the part. It works like a charm. It’s not structurally bad: the puzzles might not be for everyone, but they were right up my alley. I really thought we were getting somewhere, TSP, I was mostly digging your vibe. Until it came to an abrupt end.

So where does that leave us?

Ratings and recommendations are odd, kind of useful and fascinating. How do we attempt some sort of objectivity, or quantify an ethereal and inherently subjective experience? If a game has mediocre graphics, but amazing gameplay, or great puzzles, but juvenile humour, how do you weigh these things against each other? Is it just adding and subtracting, ending up with a grade that determines the position of the thumb?

There is a lot about this game that is good. If the letdown was just a flaw, the game would probably end up with a passing grade. That makes it hard. It would be easier if this game, in it’s entirety, would be at least half as bad as the experience i had.

But I can’t recommend this. If you don’t get why, don’t tell me about it.

The story… I found a bit depressing… I enjoyed the fantasy setting and I thought the final ending to the fantasy setting worked very well and was cute… and it does complement the actual ending well. I guess it felt a little flat because I didn’t really feel that involved in or connected to the characters. They were a bit two dimensional, especially in the real world… I think if they had more personality and we had more opportunity for idle chit-chat demonstrating unique, quirky personalities… that’s what this game needed.

It is a kinda nice tribute to Broken Sword… although the story is kept more simple and plausible. But the parallel stories and twists and turns keep it plenty exciting.