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Many would say that Point and Click Adventure games are a thing of the past, and while they had their heyday in the 90s and a bit earlier, they have begun to make a major resurgence. Part of this new wave of PCA’s is Unforeseen Incidents which seeks to encapsulate those nostalgic feelings but with a modern aesthetic that’s very distinctive and unique. You are a handyman named Harper and you are going about your business when you find a suspicious and sickly woman who is on the run. Its your job to find out whats going on and to stay clear of the sickness going around town.
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In terms of mechanics, all PCA’s are essentially the same, even after decades of industry development. You mouse the cursor over the items on the screen and take them into your inventory, and keep doing this with literally anything you can find, so that you can use them later. Nothing can be treated as insignificant because you never know what you will need for later. There are some items that can be combined to solve a puzzle, but that again is something that we have seen many times before. With the actual controls no different for PCA’s the only real way to stand out is by the power of their story and the depth of their characters. Building a world is paramount in this type of game, and its clear that the devs have paid great attention to this.
The aesthetic of this art style is very different, but this also acts as a hook to distinguish itself from the pack. It’s a sketchy off kilter kind of look, with sharp edges, non-standard character designs, and lots of background items to keep you entertained. Its memorable, but since games are not art alone, they have to have gameplay to back that up. I found it easy to get started in the world, and it was made even easier due to the comedy aspect of the characters and the writing. Following the basic pattern of PCA’s, it’s starts easy with just basically clicking on anything and everything, but things progress when you have to convince people to tell you things, and to gather items for others to make the story progress. Most of the game requires only a little bit of out of box thinking, which is inherent to this type of game. However, later game puzzles come off as obtuse at best, and can be very frustrating, but this too would probably appeal to the people who play these kinds of games.
While it doesn’t break any new ground, Unforeseen Incidents is an homage of the highest caliber to the classic PCA’s of old. More than anything it has the setting, story, characters, and writing to keep you enthralled enough to get past the tough puzzles. The only real downside is that to an experienced player the game would be considered too short. At around 8-12 hours tops, veteran PCA game players would normally be through it too soon, but since there are achievements that require you to go back through the game and play it differently, there’s a nice replay value so if you’re a novice or a veteran, it’s a game to checkout.