Introduction

First, how many of you
out there took one look at the “Anime” genre
and thought, “Oh, Japanese porn!” Well, as a public service,
let me provide a quick introduction to Japanese cartoon terminology.

Anime – A Japanese
style of cartoon drawing characterized by large European eyes and
small triangles for noses. Anime was first
introduced to America with Speed Racer and Kimba
the White Lion.
Modern examples would include Dragonball Z and Pokemon.

Manga – According
to The Urban Dictionary, manga is a style of Japanese story
telling which may or may not include
graphics. Manga, in Japanese, means “flowing words” or “undisciplined
words”.

Hentai – Japanese for “pervert.” Literally “strange
desires.” Hentai is porn characterized by women with impossibly
large breasts being ravished by tentacle monsters.

So the white
chamber is
a flowing story told through Japanese style cartoon animation.
Notice that the white chamber is NOT
hentai. There is no sex or nudity in the game. It is, however,
quite horrific with
lots of blood and body parts.

Now that we have that out of the way, let’s look at the game.

Story

From the web site: “A
young girl wakes to find herself inside a strange glowing coffin,
in a dark room. Who is she? What is this
place? Why is she here? As she explores the warped environment she
finds herself trapped within, she must search for answers, all of
which will lead her closer and closer to the white chamber and the
truth it holds.”

A classic story, and told well.

The Japanese also tend to be into violence and occultism in their
stories. We see the violence everywhere and the mysticism is hinted
at. If you have a weak stomach, this game is not for you.

Another
characteristic of Japanese Manga games is that they ask innocuous
questions and, based on the player’s answer, will give
you different endings. the white chamber does
this as well and provides four different endings based on the player’s
responses.

The story flows well and each time you solve a puzzle you are rewarded
with either a revelation or another mystery.

The story is also very
consistent. There were no distracting plot holes and it was possible
to read between the lines. I remember thinking, “You
know, the way she is acting almost implies…” and sure enough,
I was right.

The story was completely satisfying and I give it an A.

Puzzles

The puzzles are all of
the Inventory variety. They were all logical – a
locked door needs a key, not some bizarre contraption. Although sometimes
you had to be very clever to figure out how to get the key to the
door.

The level of difficulty was easy to medium, perfect for me and I
was able to finish the whole game in two days without a walkthrough.

The only wrinkle was the
classic “Wow, I can’t believe I can
actually hold all this inventory.” But that is forgivable.

Hardened adventurers might find the puzzles a bit easy, but the
average gamer should love them. I give them a B+.

Navigation

Third person perspective
point and click using the WME engine from DEAD:CODE. The cursors
were
large and well distinguished. There was no pixel hunting.

A simple right-click gives you the choice of Examine or Manipulate/Take.

You can see from the screen shots how even the cursor was brought
into the Anime theme.

I could find nothing wrong with the system and so give it an A for
nailing it.

Graphics

All
hand drawn, classic Anime. There are even several cut scene animations
which were entirely hand drawn. Even if you don’t like the style,
you must agree that the artist fully achieved his desired effect
and should get an A for nailing it.

Sound

No background music. No
voice acting. Only ambient sounds, but very effective. Your feet
clank as if you were walking with metal boots
on a metal floor – no way to hide from whatever is stalking
you. Metal groans. Steam hisses. This place just isn’t safe.

Sound gets a very nervous A.

Addictability

Very good. There was always just one more thing to do and I wanted
to do it. I never felt frustrated from not being able to solve a
puzzle or not knowing what to do next.

Again, they managed to nail it for an A.

Conclusion

It awed me that Studio Trophis was able to capture the Anime style
so well.
It awed me that they were able to capture the essence of Horror so well.
It awed me that this was done by only three people; Richard Perrin, Paul Johnson
and Zakir Rahman.
It awed me that they are giving the game away as freeware.

This was one awesome game.

I have only two regrets.
First, that the game ended. But that is a good thing as it means
it left me wanting more. And second, that
the next project from Studio Trophis will not be an adventure game,
but an RPG. <sigh>

Get this game.

Final Grade: A
(find out more about our
grading system)

System Requirements:

At this point in time, Studio Trophis has not established any minimal
system requirements. But I suspect they should be modest. There are
no requirements for 3D accelerated graphics cards.