Developer: Sudd City Interactive
Disclaimer: I received this game for free from the developer.
Somehow it's July already and I can't even tell it's summer because I'm indoors all day? Anyway, I'm glad to be able to review a game that's come out fairly recently, and looks to possibly have more titles in the future. Sudd City Adventures is a point-and-click adventure game about superheroes living regular lives and having everyday problems.
You start the adventure as Silvia, an FBI agent who regularly works and is friends with with Sudd City's superheroes. Instead of solving a big important case, she ends up having to investigate a lost special ring. Silvia was only trying to go pick up her kids from her friend's house, but ends up having to deal with everyone's silly and everyday problems. From the menu, you can look through Silvia's phone, which gives you the most insight into this world and its characters. Although I really liked how her phone was full of mini character profiles to inform you about everyone, I also found it a little overwhelming to have to sit there and read each profile. I ended up skimming them and then proceeded to check out her text messages to them to learn more.
As you explore the large house, you get to talk with each of the characters, who will give you an alibi as to where they were when the ring went missing. Their relationship to one another is pretty clear, as they all seem to be either close friends or in a relationships. It's made clear that many of these characters are superheroes, but I'm not sure I understand why a couple of them are some sort of half-dragon, half-human species? They refer to being dragons but I'm not sure if this a race within the world that's well-established, as it wasn't explained. I appreciate most of the character connections being explained, but I think the game presents you with a lot of disconnected in-world lore. It makes it seems like there's a lot of backstory to these characters that you should know and understand, despite this being the first game in a possible series.
I appreciate the hand-drawn art in Sudd City Adventures, especially in the environments which often have interesting little details. However, I found the character art less interesting than the environment art. I do think this game did a really good job of having very unique characters that stood out from one another, though. Also, each area and moment had its own music that fit pretty well.
Although I enjoyed the light-hearted nature of Sudd City Adventures, sometimes the humor worked for me and sometimes it just didn't. At best, it was silly and wholesome, and at worst, it was really childish cartoon-like ribbing between the characters. The writing was just decent, but I think better writing is what could most improve a game such as this. A comedy storyline doesn't necessarily mean the writing has to be messy and sporadic.
Sudd City Adventures means well and has interesting character concepts, but the feeling it left me with was just sort of a shrug. I had an okay time playing it, and I would've kept playing it even if it was longer, but I didn't really feel like I accomplished much. I should remind readers that I don't tend to be super into visual novel type of games, which this was. Therefore, my opinion might be a bit more harsh. Within this genre, though, I would say Sudd City Adventures was one of the more silly and wholesome titles, and worth checking out if this is your type of game.
Sudd City Adventures is available on PC
Played on: PC
Finished: 6/17/2020
Playtime: 1 hr
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