There must be something special about 2008.  So far we’ve seen an above average slew of games being released with many more still to go. This can only be good news for adventure gaming fans!

Frogwares is best known for their work on the Sherlock Holmes games – The Silver Earring, The Awakened, and Sherlock Holmes vs. Arsene Lupin. So when Dracula Origin landed on my desk with little fanfare I wasn’t too sure what to think about it since the Sherlock Holmes games seem to get more attention.

I must confess that I largely ignored Dracula Origin and instead focused my attention on Dracula 3 by Kheops. I loved the first two Dracula titles that were released by another developer and was looking forward to seeing what Kheops would do to extend the series – although Kheops is starting to suffer from a bit of a ‘been there, done that’ feeling to their games. The early stages were so intriguing that I found myself anticipating Dracula Origin by Frogwares over the Kheops game after getting to sample a preview.

Steeped in gothic flare, the game is visually stunning and is played in 3rd person similar to games like Tunguska, Syberia, etc.  The detail is simple gorgeous on the limited number of screens that I was able to play through. The colors were incredibly rich and vibrant which was a bit different for a horror themed game but a welcome change. Character animations, while a bit stiff, were still above average and believable.

I was a little thrown off by the controls but for different reasons than you would expect.  The game can be fully played with the mouse only, although there are a few keyboard shortcuts that will bring up other menus like your inventory if choose that route. Otherwise a right click will bring up those same screens.  The reason I was thrown off was because after looking at the controls section it listed W,A,S,D as movement keys, but the game doesn’t use them. Also listed is the control to run as well as crawl. I can only assume two possibilities here – either they took out keyboard controls for movement and haven’t removed them from the controls listing or at some point in the game they will come into play.

I was able to run this game with the settings maxed out on my computer which is nearing the 3 year old mark. With a host of options for displaying textures, shadows, to screen resolutions it should be pretty easy to run this game without requiring a high-end system.  Being able to have the game run at my LCD monitors native resolution (1280x1024) ensured that the graphics were very crisp and sharp.

In Dracula Origin you play the part of Professor van Helsing. The game begins with van Helsing tinkering in his study recording information about vampires and their weaknesses that will probably come in very handy later in the game. A knock at the door brings a letter from Jonathan Harker, which was sent from Dracula’s castle. He is concerned about his beloved Mina so you then decide to pay her a visit to check up on her. After reading some newspaper clippings you learn of several mysterious deaths around Victorian London and begin to suspect that a vampire is at work…and so the game begins.

From what I was able to play I found this to be a very enjoyable game. The puzzles were very well integrated into the environments and while I didn’t find them too difficult, they were not extremely easy either. There were plenty of clues for those who are observant. There was one slightly annoying point involving a date on a crypt. Although I had cleaned things up enough to read them, you still couldn’t progress until van Helsing could read it. In fairness to the developers, you can’t leave that screen until van Helsing has that “Aha!” moment, but expect to wear our your finger clicking away.  There is the expected triggering going on that is a necessary evil with story-driven games, but they made perfect sense – why would you break into some random crypt unless you had a reason to?

There is a bit of dialog here, but nothing over the top. Dialogs that have been used changed colors so you will know if you already asked that one or you can ask it again if you wish. The game has subtitles so if you are a fast reader you can click through them instead of waiting for your character or other characters to finish speaking. Another nice feature is that all dialogs are stored in your book after you talk with someone. This makes it easy to reread the dialog without having to go back to find the person and have the same conversation all over again.

As a testament to a good game teaser, I was given just enough to keep me wanting more. Many adventure games start with such a slow pace that it is difficult to decide on whether you will like it or not. In Dracula Origin however, the early indications are that this game looks to be bloody good fun and a tantalizing excursion into gothic horror.