Barrow – A burial
mound. Typically used thousands of years ago to honor the great
men at the time. Some barrows are simply large
piles of dirt over a grave. Others contain rooms and chambers. Sometimes
the barrows were marked with
standing stones, or menhirs.

England has thousands
of barrows and standing stones (the most famous of which is Stone
Henge). The county of Cornwall is especially rich
with these artifacts from the past. In fact, they have a small town
named Barrow Hill which contains, you’ll never guess, a barrow
with standing stones.

Over the last several
years a team of archeologists have been studying Barrow Hill. So
Matt Clark and the team from Shadow Tor Studios went
out to join them. They took many pictures of the mound, stones, buildings,
textures, foliage, everything. Bringing it all back, they modeled
what they saw and made an adventure game (http://www.barrow-hill.co.uk/index2.htm)
about… a group of archaeologists studying the barrow and disturbing
something which should not have been disturbed.

The game is out now via web purchase and it is just wonderful. It
is a classic adventure game which gradually reveals a good story
while exploring a beautiful setting and solving rational puzzles.

Barrow Hill has a wonderful
creepy feel to it. Perhaps not as intense as Scratches or Fatal
Frame, but there is enough going on to remind
you that this isn’t just a moonlit walk to go picking gooseberries.

The story is a good one
and they played it out at just the right pace for me. While several
people get killed in it (people have to
die in a ghost story or no one would believe it), there is no gratuitous
violence. You simply come across their bloodless remains. There are
quite a few “BOO!” moments, but when my daughter finally
saw the monster she couldn’t stop laughing. A few good scares
with no problem sleeping afterwards.

The graphics are lovely. Most designers can render exquisite furniture,
but plants come off as artificial. Shadow Tor had just the opposite
effect. You can see from the screen shots just how beautiful the
foliage is. The plants and trees are perfect. Moss and lichen grow
on weather stained brick walls. It is the coffee cups and ketchup
bottles which need work.

What is truly amazing is when you look at their web site and see
photographs of the original buildings side by side with the rendered
game copy. It is just unbelievable.

The sound effects are
spot-on from the chirping of an authentic Cornish cricket to the
rustling in the bushes which doesn’t
quite line up with your movement. Are you being stalked?

Voice acting was good,
if a little stretched. Accents were believable and the actors knew
the context of their lines. But there was the
occasional scene where you had to listen to “What’s that? It’s
coming for me! Gasp! Oh no!…” over and over. It was good
to start with, but after the initial shock you just want to say “Fine,
get on with it.” Still, I wish most games had this little to
criticize.

Game play is the good
old fashioned 2D slide show. Usual complaints about not being to
look in every direction I would like are balanced
by the wonderful resolution that is used. Hot spots are of adequate
size. The only complaint is that some of them change with time. There
are some spots which indicate that you can use an object, no surprise
there. But there are other spots where the cursor is neutral – nothing
to do here. Then, when you come back later in the game, there are
new hot spots which weren’t there before.

During most of the game
it is fairly obvious what to do next. You find a key to a desk
so it is reasonable to go check out the desk.
But every now and then you have to go back to where you have already
been just to see if something changed. Fortunately, this doesn’t
happen often and the action is fairly continuous. Good pacing.

The puzzles are all reasonable.
They fit in perfectly with the story – Find
a way past the locked door, re-assemble the torn letter, etc. Most
are simple and easy, but there are major puzzles which require you
to assemble clues from various sources and pay attention. But as
I said, they are all reasonable.

Bottom line? I really
enjoyed this game and expect you will too. There is nothing in
this game that you can point to and say that
it was a breakthrough, but it is all consistent and consistently
good. It is thoroughly enjoyable and doesn’t turn south on
you half way through. Add all that to the fact that it’s an
independent developer and I would be remiss if I didn’t give
it an A-. This deserves a place on your shelf.

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

System Requirements:

• OS: Windows® 98/SE/ME/2000/XP
• CPU: Pentium® III 450 MHz or Better Processor
• RAM: 128 MB RAM (256
  MB Recommended)
• DVD-ROM
• Video: SVGA Graphics
  Card or better with 32-Bit Colour (32-Bit Colour at 800×600)
• Sound: DirectX® 9 Compatible Sound Card