Well, he IS played by Nicki Rapp. Morgan LeFlay was a pharaoh in Ancient Egypt, who knew?!
Oftentimes in animation and video games, the parts of young adolescent boys are actually played by girls. For example, Bart Simpson. It's because when you have men try to recreate that high-pitched youthful voice, you get abominations like the screechy caterwauling of the Poppers. :eek:
While i know you'll all think im kidding. Id like to point out there is a bug (see hint's forum about my issue). Which while i know im the only one who gets it and i don't get WHY i have this issues, is still a bug. Other then that. yea.
We only started playing it but what i liked is the whole atmosphere whilst Sam (great voice acting, moody music and just nice cutscenes) is driving from suspect to suspect, the museum hallway with the dinosaur and the diarama.
What i didn't like was the tourist and Skunkape, i'm generally not fond of the gorillas.
Did anyone else notice max standing in the back of the room in the final cutscene before he was revived? (Like Max's brainless body was lying there, and you could see him standing up in the background as well)
I liked it better than 302 and this time I actually laughed loudly at some points.
Ah, and I loved PW8 this time (In 302 I found him rather meh and forgettable)
I only wished certain animation played only once in part 3. I found it incredibly annoying to wait for it to finish to get control of Sam every time you got to that location.
Did anyone else think that Sal sounded slightly like Patrick Warburton (Brock Samson, Kronk) with a hint of Jon Benjamin (Coach McGuirk)?
Yes, I totally thought the same thing. (I actually thought for a moment it Warburton.) Honestly, if that wasn't intentional I'd be incredibly surprised. It was pretty perfect for Sal though.
I really really really liked the episode!
The puzzles (the monster and the city for example) were plain amazing, and I really enjoyed working them out.
The whole design of the episode just blew me up!
I have just 2 problems:
1. Sammun-mak is a boy... There aren't enough girls in this series!
2. Too many double-spaces in the subtitles.
You should use CTRL+F in Office and replace of double spaces with one space before releasing the subtitles or something.
rhinoplasty (when I tried to get Sal to the minion, I searched so long for a way to make the gorilla attack the city till I noticed the map in the office)
, and the
less prominent use of future vision
gave the game more balance than 301.
I was kind of disappointed when I noticed
that the noir atmosphere mostly ended after entering the museum
.
All in all I can't wait for 304 to come out after this nightmarish end ...
I loved this episode, the story is really starting to come together. The
interrogation
puzzle and
noir
dialogs in the beginning were great, but I'm glad that didn't go on too long. Sammun-mak, Paperweight, and Skunkape were all terrific, but I found nothing particularly memorable about Sal. The puzzles were really creative, a little on the easy side for me, but a couple solutions did turn out differently, more complex, than I first expected. I was glad to see much more of the irreverent Sam and Max humor as in past seasons than there was in the first 2 episodes of this season.
The game ran smooth as silk on my iMac at setting 9, whereas I had at least one area each in 301 and 302 that lagged. But I found more glitches in this game than any previous TT title I've played. Like the problem with Max on the street -- here's a screenshot in which you can clearly see both
credit-card Max and cloud Max
. Also, hotspots sometimes didn't match up with the corner text, as in this screenshot -- the green hand is over the
Sweet prancing Peter Frampton talking backwards into a double-sided microphone! While I won't say "best episode ever" this time, (I just didn't find the writing as funny on this one... I'm not saying it WASN'T funny, just that the one-liners seemed to peter out after the noir sequence) it was easily the most cinematic, and still extremely enjoyable.
Speaking of the noir sequence, that was epic! I loved seeing Sam truly enraged. He was almost intimidating... well, as intimidating as a banjo-playing canine shamus *can* be.
I just wanted to say that as much as I loved "They Stole Max's Brain" I still felt it was very flawed and disjointed, especially towards the end. (And judeging from the reviews I've read/watched so far I'm not the only one who thinks this) So I'm just going to get my complaints out of the way now:
"Noir Sam", aka the major source of hype for this episode, was underused in my opinion. I felt that there could have been more great things done with the interrogation dialoge, but alas we never got them. However, I had a great time at the "Museum of Mostly Natural History" so there's a bonus.
The "Egypt" part of the game however was very poor in comparison. On the one hand rynoplasty (sp?) was well used in some parts (ie the museum), but that one puzzle that repeated itself was very unsatisfactory. Also it's kindof sad that fighting Skunkape was more "challenging" then fighting Sammun-Mak himself. Also I felt that this episode felt empty in terms of Sam & Max interactions themselves. Sam seemed to play off of Sammun-Mak more then he did Max, that and him being brainwashed in the second half made him a very boring character to play as.
Now onto the stuff I liked: I'm stuck between choosing Sammun-Mak or Sal as my new favorite character in this episode (which is odd since they're such complete opposites) but I would have to say that Sammun-Mak stole the show, even after the second half of the game. And as for the my favorite parts they would have to have been
Skunkape and Papierwaite breaking up with each other, (funniest moment in the series in my opinion) Sam beating up Skunkape, and Sammun-Mak in general.
Wow, that was a long post. Still those are my thoughts. Hopefully episode four will end up being a lot more fun.
PS: Did anyone else notice this at the end of the game
Sammun-Mak's brain is on the brain screw when reality goes back to normal, but look in the background later: the screw is there but Sammun-Mak's brain is gone!! :eek: Btw, Sammun-Mak IS a guy...right?
Well, yes, but not all children sound Nikki Rapp-feminine.
To me it sounded very much like a posh whiny kid / Pharaoh, male or female. Biologically speaking, there's no difference in vocal chords at that age. That's why adult female actresses are often employed to play such parts in animation (as someone already pointed out, this is standard in cartoons such as the Simpsons).
Telltale did it again. This episode is my favorite out of all the Telltale games. Things I loved:
- Sal. Everything, his look, his voice, his personality. He's just a great character, and I hope we haven't seen the last of him.
- How New York feels like an actual city, giving this season a mucher better sense of being in a real, living, breathing world. This is also what makes me most excited about future Telltale games. Environments in older Telltale games tended to feel like they existed mainly for the player's sake. Which, of course, they do, but I don't want to know that. But the way it's handled here makes me remember the way I felt about the world in Grim Fandango. Yes, I really just gave you guys that compliment. You deserved it.
- Noir Sam. I've seen some people saying that they thought the Noir section was too short, but it was rather cool that we got to see so many sides of Sam in one episode. No 'version' of Sam overstayed it's welcome. From angry Sam who goes around hitting people in the face to slightly cross Sam who's investigating a Museum at night to 'hypnotised' Sam in an alternate universe where the world is ruled by an ancient egytian psychic boy. And the weird thing is that it all made sense in the context of the story. I just love how much happened. It felt like I was playing 'Monkeys Violating the Heavenly Temple' or 'Fair Wind to Java' at times.
I could go on and on, but let's just say that I loved every second of this episode. I can't stress enough how good Telltale is getting at storytelling, timing and building beautiful, believable worlds.
I haven't found anyone commenting on him right now, but I'm sure someone must be discussing this somewhere, and probably guessing the same thing I'm guessing, but (as I said in my comment on the MixnMojo-review) Mr. Norrington is totally
Mack Salmon
. At one point I thought it might be
The Narrator
, but
the voice actors don't match. Mr Norrington doesn't have the same voice actor as Mack Salmon in the cartoon series, but they do sound a bit alike. (The guy who's voicing Mr Norrington voiced the Ferry Man in Rise of the Pirate God).
So, yeah, can't wait for next month. I've been a Telltale fan for a long time, and it really is one of those rare companies where the games just keep getting better.
Ok, just finished the episode and I must say this is the BEST episode of the season so far, probably the best Sam & Max episode I've played and POSSIBLY even the best game that Telltale has ever made!
Just like last time, here's the pro's and a few cons:
PRO'S:
- Masterpiece Audio once again, wonderful compositions and best voice acting in a Telltale game yet. David Nowlin is really shining as a voice actor this season, and William Katsen is just as awesome as ever. Excellent casting choices, was a treat to hear Nikki Rapp again (loved her in Tales) and even Majus! Gotta say, when Papierwaite was in the office talking to Norrington(?), I thought it was Earl Boen! I didn't catch who voiced him, but if a second season of Tales comes up and Earl is unavailable as Demon LeChuck, use him!
- The classic Sam and Max humour returned, laughed more this episode than any others this season.
- Really liking how the story is beginning to come together.
- Nice visuals once again, in particular noticed the colour overlays this time, which really added to the overall tone and feeling.
- Angry Sam was just awesome, it was a really interesting puzzle.
- Really really enjoyed the puzzles in this episode, I felt clever whilst solving them and enjoyed trial and error, and deciding when to use Max's powers. I really enjoyed using the Rhinoplasty this episode, many of the puzzles revolving around that were very well designed and were fun to play.
- Just saw Mike Stemlee wrote this one. Really?!! This is the best work he's ever done!! (For the record, I like Stemlee's work, I just find him to be a little weaker at the comedy stuff, and this episode made me laugh more than any other episode this season so...)
CONS
- Maybe a LITTLE bit short and easy, but then again I'd rather it be easy than hard, I hate looking up hints on the internet when I'm trying to enjoy a game. I only had to look up a hint on the gambling part, and that was the spoiler-free version.
- Bit of a weak cliffhanger, but if the next episode is as good as this one, I'll ignore it.
Really struggling to find faults with this episode. The main thing that distracted me from rating the last one higher was how buggy and glitchy it was at times, not to mention a few dead ends (none encountered by me, but I've been hearing). This game however, seemed bug-free, though I noticed a glitch when I clicked on Stinky's door after
Grandpa stinky had been taken
, and found him standing outside the truck with a box overlapping his legs. But whatever, it was a one time thing, and this game easily puts itself into the 9-10/10 range for me!
Congratulations guys, if the rest of the season is as good as this, I think it's safe to say this'll be your best series yet!
P.S - I noticed a few Day of the Tentacle references in the game:
For example, looking at the banner (I believe), Sam says something like "I think that's Bitchin', and Pharaoh Max says "Fascinating". Hoagie and Laverne's default "look at" commands.
Also, examine the tentacles coming out of the ground in front of the office a few times and sam will say "It's too bad these aren't green. I hear those are the friendly kind!".
Subtle hints for a future project? Not forgetting that it was rumoured about a year ago...
I encountered one or two glitches, but those were not "killing" ones, unlike the one in the second episode. Both are encountered on the second half of the game,
and near the office. In first one, after transforming into a cloud and turning back, even if the brain was in the jar the transformed cloud was there, half-stuck in sideways. Clicking on it was giving the usual responses. Second happened after having Grandpa Stinky exiled. Even after he's gone he was there, but he was making that 'during production' pose where one's arms are making 180 degrees angle to each other and such.
I had a few, too. Sam kept holding his gun pointed downward, but with his hand and arm pointing forward. It ended up looking like he shot
the zeppelin
with his hand alone, Heavy Weapons Guy-style. Also, I also had a problem near the office after
transforming Max into a cloud
, but mine was that there was a
"Credit Card Max"
laying on the ground outside the office. I could talk to him, and the
I really liked how it started. It would have been interesting to see how
Sam gets through an entire episode without his little buddy for once (and solving puzzles using nothing but advice from Flint Paper.) I was really hoping that we'd at least have three different situations where Sam goes interrogating people in a blind rage.
Sadly, in a bizarre twist, I felt all the steam was let out of the episode as soon as
we found Max. Sam settled down and all the build-up from the intro was lost. Then, just as I'm getting into the groove of solving puzzles in a museum, the mid-point twist took me into a whole other episode. Cool idea, but also very irritating since I didn't feel finished with the museum yet. The story-pacing was much too fast this time around.
I do like Sal. We definitely need more Sal. Him and Agent Superball should hang out sometime.
Well, 301 and 302 raised the bar pretty high. I would have hoped 303 would get even over that, but sadly enough, it failed. While being a nice addition to the series, it's in my opinion, undoubtetly the worst episode of the third season so far. But let's start from the top.
It's a grim start...
Exausted coming home at 5AM, I would download and give S&M303 a small whirl before going on bed. What harm does watching the intro do to see if it works?
Apparently a lot since I couldn't save for quite some time. And being a completionist, just wanking the investigations wouldn't really work for me. This section of the game make painfully clear dialogue puzzles do not work properly in Sam&Max. More on the "want to hear anything" than want to solve it point though, since you can do that by randomly messing about. Which kind of defies the point of a puzzle, or actually the whole intention of TTG this season! But, even worse than solving them is lengthening them. You're going to hear a few lines so many times and they get annoying, even when skipping them as they begin. Then there are instances you solve them without wanting them. For example the "Noir" option was just funny banter all the times. So I always picked it first. Then it suddenly became the solution to one of these puzzles, and I was left unhearing 80% of the additional content because that was the end and I couldn't return there. The only option you got then, due to the lack of saving, by replaying the entire game from the start. The extreme futility of puzzle-solving like this took away from the great dialogues and sphere set in this part of the game. It was a pity what could have been a great start was wrecked it's neck in such a way. Other minor issues surfaced too, like getting a hint with the hint system switched off, something that repeated itself later in the game too. I switched it off for a reason TTG! Another interesting thing to note was how much smoother this game ran on level 9 compared to The Tomb and The Penal Zone. Sadly enough that seemed to go along with lacking AA (always on program controlled), occassionally flickering textures (especially the jacket of Sam) and some flickering shadows (most prominent with Girl Stinky in act III).
Fortunately, things started looking brighter when arriving at the museum. The question is... where they?
Revenge of the annoying voices
Since Sam ignores all setpieces, there is not much to do but go up, meeting up with Skunkape and Papierwaite, which isn't a surprise if you've been listening to the dialogue in the first part. Here's where the game returns to the Sam&Max as you knew it, even if Max is still missing his brain.
Some funny dialogue as Max later, and a clear goal apparent, Sam meets the best addition to the series this episode gives, Sal.
I would have a hard time imagining somewhat who could not love this character with his "buddy" mentality. And yes, that's even when threatning to incinerate Max.
In order to save Max we come to the worst character of the episode too. Which, given the major role he(?) plays is a major pain. The Pharaoh Sammun-Mak got the most annoying voice since the Soda Poppers, even being worse than Baby Amelia in 302. No small feat. Aren't you running out of annoying voices yet TTG? View my surprise when I learned this abomination was actually voiced by Morgan from ToMI. What possibly went wrong there?
It's a relief when he(?) goes to play a larger part in the plot we hear him(?) less often though.
With the Pharaoh at our side, another weakness of this episode becomes soon apparent. Weak puzzles. Here it becomes a shame the series actually went away from inventory puzzles, since while there are a quite a number of hotspots in the 3 museum decors, the amount of interactive pieces for Max's items is considerable less, and they need to be used in puzzles instead of the other ones (with the exception of one involving a hearing piece).
With just 3 screens as options even when mucking about it should be hard not to continue the game...
A sudden twist
After solving a few puzzles we leave the impressive looking, but way too small and unutilised museum set to go back to the street. An alternative street. While we get more puzzles and room here, they aren't quite as interesting as the museum, so it's a shame this is bigger than that over there. Also, the amount of pieces Max can interact with get even smaller. Did there exist some rhinoplasty combo's in the museum you didn't need to finish the game, EACH of the items Max can turn in here is eventually needed to finish the plot.
And, well, no inventory puzzles *at all* anymore either, adding to the easyness of the episode.
Needless to say the only way you think "how do I solve this?" is if you haven't visited all 4 locations (as then you might think about giving a creditcard to a rat, while the solution becomes obvious if you visit the palace afterwards). After you did, and looked at all hotspots, everything probably clicks into place. If you need to, since there is actually a bug that allows you to skip this entire section of the game.
Oh no. Not more dialogue puzzles!
And then the game ends like it started, with more dialogue puzzles. Which, as mentioned before aren't really puzzles at all. It was obvious more was planned here, since there are a few things about popsticles and moleman that were clearly intended to mean something but in the end do nothing at all in this final product.
And then the game's over. The cliffhanger is a surprise and leaves one waiting for 304, but it also left me with the bitter taste that in my opinion 303 so far is a blaze upon the excellency that season 3 was so far. Noir Sam, while great on paper and actually during several conversations may be, gets wringed it's neck by the sloppy way interrogation works in the game. Great lines because of using whacky items on the environment you can forget due to the lack of said items. Which probably also explains the rather lacking 'did you try' list so far made up on the forums. Doing whacky stuff with Max is also rather lacking in this episode. Let's hope this was one slip and 304 is great once again.
I left into the night, rain pouring down... 303 left unfulfilled. Was the sun going to shine again, or was this the demise of Sam and Max? Girls were left unforfilled now that Sam shaved once more, put up back his hat. The future looked certainly grim. But we had to go on. For Sam. For Max. For Justice.
During the interrogation puzzle, you can save when the dialog choices are showing, including the very first dialog with the molemen. When you load the save, it'll start with the cut scene of Sam arriving at that particular location.
I left into the night, rain pouring down... 303 left unfulfilled. Was the sun going to shine again, or was this the demise of Sam and Max? Girls were left unforfilled now that Sam shaved once more, put up back his hat. The future looked certainly grim. But we had to go on. For Sam. For Max. For Justice.
*cue crickets chirping, a brief pause... and Homer Simpson belching.*
But seriously, I can see why you say all of these things and understand where you're coming from on them. It does feel like an... either 'short' or 'easy' chapter (depending on how one looks at it.) As a part of the whole set though, I think it should fit fine, as there are a number of other classic adventure games out there with short and/or easy chapters.
I must honestly say that I wasn't expecting how 303 turned out, and I'm gravely disappointed that Sam ended up back in his hat and coat once more. Noir Sam should have lasted longer. And what happened to it for the hour where he took it off?
I finished downloading the game around noon, and played for about 3 1/2 hours. Me and my brother were working together and such, so we beat it in one sitting.
I was expecting the whole Max's-brain-is-missing scenario to last for at least 3/4ths of the game; it was actually over pretty quickly.
AND I WAS NOT EXPECTING
SAMMUN-MAK TO BE THE BAD GUY. The whole rewriting reality thing was totally unexpected.
But I'm happy with it, anyway, because I totally hated that whiny brat. I wanted to kill him so many times. I was scared that he was going to become the unwanted scrappy, like the Soda Poppers or The Geek.
And then he turned evil, so I was justified in fnally (literally) stabbing his brains out!
Yaaaaaay!
Raise your hands; who thinks that Sam has never been more awesome than when he
Comments
Oftentimes in animation and video games, the parts of young adolescent boys are actually played by girls. For example, Bart Simpson. It's because when you have men try to recreate that high-pitched youthful voice, you get abominations like the screechy caterwauling of the Poppers. :eek:
OH, he IS voiced by Majus, right? I wondered that during the playtime, yet I missed his name on credit roll.
He has the talent aight.
Another great episode!
Um, until your voice drops, girls and boys basically sound exactly the same. Unless they smoke of course :eek:
Well, yes, but not all children sound Nikki Rapp-feminine.
What i didn't like was the tourist and Skunkape, i'm generally not fond of the gorillas.
?
Ah, and I loved PW8 this time (In 302 I found him rather meh and forgettable)
I only wished certain animation played only once in part 3. I found it incredibly annoying to wait for it to finish to get control of Sam every time you got to that location.
The puzzles (the monster and the city for example) were plain amazing, and I really enjoyed working them out.
The whole design of the episode just blew me up!
I have just 2 problems:
1. Sammun-mak is a boy... There aren't enough girls in this series!
2. Too many double-spaces in the subtitles.
You should use CTRL+F in Office and replace of double spaces with one space before releasing the subtitles or something.
Hope it helps.
Thanks for another great episode!
Okay, I've played the game till right after I get
There were really great puzzles involving
I was kind of disappointed when I noticed
All in all I can't wait for 304 to come out after this nightmarish end ...
The game ran smooth as silk on my iMac at setting 9, whereas I had at least one area each in 301 and 302 that lagged. But I found more glitches in this game than any previous TT title I've played. Like the problem with Max on the street -- here's a screenshot in which you can clearly see both
Looking forward to episode 4! Oh, and please give Max a rag to clean the
I got a question. Choosing
Can't say for sure. Did you
Certainly.
"Norrington"
is an anagram of
"Narrator"!
All they did was rearranged the letters...and added some...and removed some others...
Spookey, huh?
Speaking of the noir sequence, that was epic! I loved seeing Sam truly enraged. He was almost intimidating... well, as intimidating as a banjo-playing canine shamus *can* be.
"Noir Sam", aka the major source of hype for this episode, was underused in my opinion. I felt that there could have been more great things done with the interrogation dialoge, but alas we never got them. However, I had a great time at the "Museum of Mostly Natural History" so there's a bonus.
Wow, that was a long post. Still those are my thoughts. Hopefully episode four will end up being a lot more fun.
PS: Did anyone else notice this at the end of the game
Source
To me it sounded very much like a posh whiny kid / Pharaoh, male or female. Biologically speaking, there's no difference in vocal chords at that age. That's why adult female actresses are often employed to play such parts in animation (as someone already pointed out, this is standard in cartoons such as the Simpsons).
- Sal. Everything, his look, his voice, his personality. He's just a great character, and I hope we haven't seen the last of him.
- How New York feels like an actual city, giving this season a mucher better sense of being in a real, living, breathing world. This is also what makes me most excited about future Telltale games. Environments in older Telltale games tended to feel like they existed mainly for the player's sake. Which, of course, they do, but I don't want to know that. But the way it's handled here makes me remember the way I felt about the world in Grim Fandango. Yes, I really just gave you guys that compliment. You deserved it.
- Noir Sam. I've seen some people saying that they thought the Noir section was too short, but it was rather cool that we got to see so many sides of Sam in one episode. No 'version' of Sam overstayed it's welcome. From angry Sam who goes around hitting people in the face to slightly cross Sam who's investigating a Museum at night to 'hypnotised' Sam in an alternate universe where the world is ruled by an ancient egytian psychic boy. And the weird thing is that it all made sense in the context of the story. I just love how much happened. It felt like I was playing 'Monkeys Violating the Heavenly Temple' or 'Fair Wind to Java' at times.
I could go on and on, but let's just say that I loved every second of this episode. I can't stress enough how good Telltale is getting at storytelling, timing and building beautiful, believable worlds.
I haven't found anyone commenting on him right now, but I'm sure someone must be discussing this somewhere, and probably guessing the same thing I'm guessing, but (as I said in my comment on the MixnMojo-review) Mr. Norrington is totally
So, yeah, can't wait for next month. I've been a Telltale fan for a long time, and it really is one of those rare companies where the games just keep getting better.
Just like last time, here's the pro's and a few cons:
PRO'S:
- Masterpiece Audio once again, wonderful compositions and best voice acting in a Telltale game yet. David Nowlin is really shining as a voice actor this season, and William Katsen is just as awesome as ever. Excellent casting choices, was a treat to hear Nikki Rapp again (loved her in Tales) and even Majus! Gotta say, when Papierwaite was in the office talking to Norrington(?), I thought it was Earl Boen! I didn't catch who voiced him, but if a second season of Tales comes up and Earl is unavailable as Demon LeChuck, use him!
- The classic Sam and Max humour returned, laughed more this episode than any others this season.
- Really liking how the story is beginning to come together.
- Nice visuals once again, in particular noticed the colour overlays this time, which really added to the overall tone and feeling.
- Angry Sam was just awesome, it was a really interesting puzzle.
- Really really enjoyed the puzzles in this episode, I felt clever whilst solving them and enjoyed trial and error, and deciding when to use Max's powers. I really enjoyed using the Rhinoplasty this episode, many of the puzzles revolving around that were very well designed and were fun to play.
- Just saw Mike Stemlee wrote this one. Really?!! This is the best work he's ever done!! (For the record, I like Stemlee's work, I just find him to be a little weaker at the comedy stuff, and this episode made me laugh more than any other episode this season so...)
CONS
- Maybe a LITTLE bit short and easy, but then again I'd rather it be easy than hard, I hate looking up hints on the internet when I'm trying to enjoy a game. I only had to look up a hint on the gambling part, and that was the spoiler-free version.
- Bit of a weak cliffhanger, but if the next episode is as good as this one, I'll ignore it.
Really struggling to find faults with this episode. The main thing that distracted me from rating the last one higher was how buggy and glitchy it was at times, not to mention a few dead ends (none encountered by me, but I've been hearing). This game however, seemed bug-free, though I noticed a glitch when I clicked on Stinky's door after
Congratulations guys, if the rest of the season is as good as this, I think it's safe to say this'll be your best series yet!
P.S - I noticed a few Day of the Tentacle references in the game:
For example, looking at the banner (I believe), Sam says something like "I think that's Bitchin', and Pharaoh Max says "Fascinating". Hoagie and Laverne's default "look at" commands.
Also, examine the tentacles coming out of the ground in front of the office a few times and sam will say "It's too bad these aren't green. I hear those are the friendly kind!".
Subtle hints for a future project?
I had a few, too. Sam kept holding his gun pointed downward, but with his hand and arm pointing forward. It ended up looking like he shot
Sadly, in a bizarre twist, I felt all the steam was let out of the episode as soon as
I do like Sal. We definitely need more Sal. Him and Agent Superball should hang out sometime.
WARNING! MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT!
It's a grim start...
Exausted coming home at 5AM, I would download and give S&M303 a small whirl before going on bed. What harm does watching the intro do to see if it works?
Apparently a lot since I couldn't save for quite some time. And being a completionist, just wanking the investigations wouldn't really work for me. This section of the game make painfully clear dialogue puzzles do not work properly in Sam&Max. More on the "want to hear anything" than want to solve it point though, since you can do that by randomly messing about. Which kind of defies the point of a puzzle, or actually the whole intention of TTG this season! But, even worse than solving them is lengthening them. You're going to hear a few lines so many times and they get annoying, even when skipping them as they begin. Then there are instances you solve them without wanting them. For example the "Noir" option was just funny banter all the times. So I always picked it first. Then it suddenly became the solution to one of these puzzles, and I was left unhearing 80% of the additional content because that was the end and I couldn't return there. The only option you got then, due to the lack of saving, by replaying the entire game from the start. The extreme futility of puzzle-solving like this took away from the great dialogues and sphere set in this part of the game. It was a pity what could have been a great start was wrecked it's neck in such a way. Other minor issues surfaced too, like getting a hint with the hint system switched off, something that repeated itself later in the game too. I switched it off for a reason TTG! Another interesting thing to note was how much smoother this game ran on level 9 compared to The Tomb and The Penal Zone. Sadly enough that seemed to go along with lacking AA (always on program controlled), occassionally flickering textures (especially the jacket of Sam) and some flickering shadows (most prominent with Girl Stinky in act III).
Fortunately, things started looking brighter when arriving at the museum. The question is... where they?
Revenge of the annoying voices
Since Sam ignores all setpieces, there is not much to do but go up, meeting up with Skunkape and Papierwaite, which isn't a surprise if you've been listening to the dialogue in the first part. Here's where the game returns to the Sam&Max as you knew it, even if Max is still missing his brain.
Some funny dialogue as Max later, and a clear goal apparent, Sam meets the best addition to the series this episode gives, Sal.
I would have a hard time imagining somewhat who could not love this character with his "buddy" mentality. And yes, that's even when threatning to incinerate Max.
In order to save Max we come to the worst character of the episode too. Which, given the major role he(?) plays is a major pain. The Pharaoh Sammun-Mak got the most annoying voice since the Soda Poppers, even being worse than Baby Amelia in 302. No small feat. Aren't you running out of annoying voices yet TTG? View my surprise when I learned this abomination was actually voiced by Morgan from ToMI. What possibly went wrong there?
It's a relief when he(?) goes to play a larger part in the plot we hear him(?) less often though.
With the Pharaoh at our side, another weakness of this episode becomes soon apparent. Weak puzzles. Here it becomes a shame the series actually went away from inventory puzzles, since while there are a quite a number of hotspots in the 3 museum decors, the amount of interactive pieces for Max's items is considerable less, and they need to be used in puzzles instead of the other ones (with the exception of one involving a hearing piece).
With just 3 screens as options even when mucking about it should be hard not to continue the game...
A sudden twist
After solving a few puzzles we leave the impressive looking, but way too small and unutilised museum set to go back to the street. An alternative street. While we get more puzzles and room here, they aren't quite as interesting as the museum, so it's a shame this is bigger than that over there. Also, the amount of pieces Max can interact with get even smaller. Did there exist some rhinoplasty combo's in the museum you didn't need to finish the game, EACH of the items Max can turn in here is eventually needed to finish the plot.
And, well, no inventory puzzles *at all* anymore either, adding to the easyness of the episode.
Needless to say the only way you think "how do I solve this?" is if you haven't visited all 4 locations (as then you might think about giving a creditcard to a rat, while the solution becomes obvious if you visit the palace afterwards). After you did, and looked at all hotspots, everything probably clicks into place. If you need to, since there is actually a bug that allows you to skip this entire section of the game.
Oh no. Not more dialogue puzzles!
And then the game ends like it started, with more dialogue puzzles. Which, as mentioned before aren't really puzzles at all. It was obvious more was planned here, since there are a few things about popsticles and moleman that were clearly intended to mean something but in the end do nothing at all in this final product.
And then the game's over. The cliffhanger is a surprise and leaves one waiting for 304, but it also left me with the bitter taste that in my opinion 303 so far is a blaze upon the excellency that season 3 was so far. Noir Sam, while great on paper and actually during several conversations may be, gets wringed it's neck by the sloppy way interrogation works in the game. Great lines because of using whacky items on the environment you can forget due to the lack of said items. Which probably also explains the rather lacking 'did you try' list so far made up on the forums. Doing whacky stuff with Max is also rather lacking in this episode. Let's hope this was one slip and 304 is great once again.
I left into the night, rain pouring down... 303 left unfulfilled. Was the sun going to shine again, or was this the demise of Sam and Max? Girls were left unforfilled now that Sam shaved once more, put up back his hat. The future looked certainly grim. But we had to go on. For Sam. For Max. For Justice.
Never noticed that because you have to hit escape twice for some reason to make the menu appear?
*cue crickets chirping, a brief pause... and Homer Simpson belching.*
But seriously, I can see why you say all of these things and understand where you're coming from on them. It does feel like an... either 'short' or 'easy' chapter (depending on how one looks at it.) As a part of the whole set though, I think it should fit fine, as there are a number of other classic adventure games out there with short and/or easy chapters.
I finished downloading the game around noon, and played for about 3 1/2 hours. Me and my brother were working together and such, so we beat it in one sitting.
I was expecting the whole Max's-brain-is-missing scenario to last for at least 3/4ths of the game; it was actually over pretty quickly.
AND I WAS NOT EXPECTING
But I'm happy with it, anyway, because I totally hated that whiny brat. I wanted to kill him so many times. I was scared that he was going to become the unwanted scrappy, like the Soda Poppers or The Geek.
Raise your hands; who thinks that Sam has never been more awesome than when he
I can't wait to play it !!
*Raises hand*