In this analysis, writer Tom Cross takes a close look at Jordan Mechner's The Last Express and its attitude to storytelling, discovering how it crafts a sense of time and why it works so well.
Tom Cross: "If we want to explore the possibilities for branching, reactive, fluid narratives, we obviously need to explore possible ways to realize this goal. We can talk all we want about the potential for deep, almost procedurally generated stories, or emergent narratives, but it's also important to examine the material we already have before us, be they video games or other.
The problem with video games, as I've mentioned previously, is that they so clearly start and end unto themselves. They do not take place in a world, they do not provide views onto separate lives. Even the ones that aim to do so fail in their ways. Grand Theft Auto creates a city that moves and lives around you, but in your absence, in your presence, during your inactive moments, it refuses to change."
DotEmu are a publisher gamers should pay special attention to. They are similar to Piko Interactive in the way they rescue classics and bring them to modern platforms. They primarily are known for doing this with the Android and iPhone platforms while Piko sticks with physical cartridge platforms and Steam.
Continue Play's Brian Kale takes a retrospective look at Smoking Car Productions' innovative real-time adventure The Last Express.
"It may not have earned the audience it deserved at the time, but 16 years on The Last Express is appreciated by many for its pioneering ideas and unique style. Jordan Mechner set out to create a brand new sort of adventure game, and the result was something so ahead of its time that only now is it being fully appreciated. The Last Express is unique among the genre – pioneering, adventurous in both artstyle and design, and utterly compelling from beginning to end.
Simply put, The Last Express is a masterpiece."
The Last Express, the nice adventure game developed by DotEmu, is now available for a reduced price on the App Store.
