Review:Broken Sword Shadow of the Templars Director’s Cut (Wii)

Quite possibly the game with the longest title this year. Broken Sword is a port of the original PC version with a few new added scenes and Wii specific puzzles.
The game is a classic point and click adventure game with some of the best dialouge and characters in the genre to date.
The star of the game is George Stobbart an American on holiday in Paris. His holiday is soon interrupted by a clown with an accordian bomb.
The clown blows up the cafe George was sitting outside of and thats how the story begins or at least it was until this Director’s Cut.
Now the game starts with the lead female Nicole Callard going to do an interview. This is one of the major problems for fans of the original version. The start of Broken Sword is pretty iconic but now the flow and grandure of that is ruined by this new start with Nico.

There isn’t anything wrong with these new bits per se but the general point is you can tell they are just tacked on. The plot elements in the new Nico storyline don’t really flow into the originals narrative and it makes it feel really rather disjointed. Of course new comers to the franchise might not notice as much as the fans. The other main point of this side narrative is to introduce Wii specific puzzles. To be honest these puzzles are really bad. The Wii mote right now just cant handle what the game wants you to do. It takes a lot of patience to get through them and what doesnt help is the fact that the on screen cursor seems to freeze for a good ten seconds when trying to stop an action in these exclusive puzzles.
The other problem is, much like the new story additions these all feel tacked on and really bring the pace of the game down. I feel as if they re-released this on the PC with these new puzzles taken out then the game would be much better.

Another curiosity is the decision to remove some of the dialogue from the game or just replace it with new lines. Again something someone new wouldn’t notice but I do feel like it damages the game in a way as the new dialogue isn’t that good. Still most of the original witty dialogue remains so it isn’t all bad.

Included in this version is a hints system added into the menu. This is a great addition as some of the new puzzles are tiresome to the point of just wanting to know the answer. It really is a great addition and other point and click games should take notice and put it in there games. There is also a diary which can be helpful if you haven’t played in awhile and forgot what you were doing.

All in all Broken Sword remains an absolute classic however the new content just doesn’t feel up to standard and it is pretty much tacked on.
I do recommend finding the original PC or even the Playstation port over this Director’s Cut.
Still a great story and amazing characters make this a must play regardless of the version that is bought.

Score
4/5