Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened was: a Twink being angry about leech-stuffed corpses.

    Screenshot from Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened. Sherlock looks off-right from the camera, with the caption Dr. Watson, how does a trip to Switzerland sound to you? He has reddish bruises around his eyes and a five-o-clock shadow to indicate he's having a rough time of it.
    Screenshot of Sherlock looking rough in Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened

    After the first session of this game I was talking to my friend about it and it turned out that we were both stopping ourselves from calling Sherlock an Angry Twink from the outset. After much contemplation (sixty, ninety seconds tops) I decided to stop censoring myself and go all in starting with the second session in the game:

    Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened is about a Cranky Twink and his Supportive Sugar Daddy. There. I said it. That is literally all you need to know about this game. If you don’t enjoy that dynamic, you won’t enjoy this game. If you find this dynamic hilarious when set in a Victorian England, subjugated to Tentacle Threats, scenario? You will fucking adore this stupid, stupid game.

    Screenshot from Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened. Watson in his brown bowler hat and damp from the London Air brown coat faces the camera, saying "I am sure you have another explanation prepared, Mr. Holmes, but I think I shall cling to the occasional superstition all the same." Talk pedantic to me daddy, oooh.
    Screenshot of Watson being an Angry Sugar Daddy in Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened

    The puzzles in this one were pretty mild. I didn’t bother trying to solve the safe code one, just looked it up because Life is Short and So Am I. Everything else can be brute forced with a cudgel of sheer annoyance. At one point the solution is “raccoons stole his fingers”, which is exactly the kind of Hard-Hitting Puzzle Themes we need in this day and age. But also, you figure out the raccoons well before they let you solve the puzzle, so you just get even more pissy that you know where the finger is but it won’t let you go find it until you crawl through their system to “unlock” the solution.

    Sherlock could have run a little faster to speed the progression in the game, I think my finger cramped a bit mashing down the Right Trigger to keep him moving. In the final chapter the camera kept bugging out weird but it fixed itself quick enough to just make me go “whoa what” and then I could keep sleuthing, looking for blood smears and wee chants of Ia! Ia!

    Screenshot from Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened. Sherlock is covered in dirt and blood, hair a mess and eyes open in a shell-shocked way, while the camera distorts around him. Sugar Daddy Watson is partially off-camera but you see his torso and arm to the side, where he's touching Sherlock on the back to steady and/or console him. It's tough being mentally wrecked by Eldritch Rituals, but they'll get through it.
    Screenshot of Sherlock having a super rough time in Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened

    I finished this game in four sessions, got 100% cheevos on steam with it. Took me eleven hours in total. So it’s a nice sized game for what it is, typical Frogwares fare, and I’ll say “yes, play it” on the caveat that, again, Sherlock is sulky and bratty the entire time while Watson is for the most part his benevolent Sugar Daddy. There is little else in this game to take away from their interplay– barring some spooky-themed scenarios this isn’t really a good game to call Horror, it’s not horrifying, it’s just moist and horrible in a distant, screeching way– so you need to be Into This Relationship to get through the game I think.

    YouTube Playlist: found here, hooray.

    Screenshot from Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened. Shot of a mansion in 1800s New Orleans, framed with lush foliage and the back of a classical-greek-style statue in the center. I think it's supposed to be some kind of oracle or someone, but I didn't look too close in-game because I was focused on trying to find raccoons before the game wanted me to.
    Screenshot from Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened.

    FUTURE STREAMING: We’re working on Resident Evil Requiem as our mandatory Horror game, but it’s not Moist enough to be considered Moist Horror so far. Just regular bog-standard horror. Complete with Vulgar Baby Man! The on-going youtube playlist is here, but of course I won’t be doing a patreon post about the game until it’s finished.

    For non-horror, I’ll probably do another poll in a few days to figure it out. Our next one-off is going to be Maize, however, which I’ve played before but remember being fun and worth busting out for a three and a half hour stream.

    Did not get around to Arcanum this week because I was so sleepy, and also Resi9 was released which distracted me. Hope to fit in the start of that somewhere on my alternating “non-zombie” days, but we’ll see.

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