Deponia Doomsday is the newest part of the Deponia series by Daedalic Entertainment. Rather than a continuation, this point-and-click adventure is a paralellic to the series. And here I want to put a little disclaimer: I actually haven’t played the Deponia series before Doomsday. I didn’t let that stop me from enjoying the game for one second.
Story
The story begins at the end of Goodbye Deponia following the apocalypse. You meet the main character, Rufus, after his sacrifice to save Deponia. However, Elysium has crashed on the planet and he is the only remaining Deponian. After thwarting monsters, Rufus manages to set off a bomb where, following the explosion, he wakes up believing the previous events, his horrible mustache, and the destruction were all a dream.
After meeting McChronicle, a time scientist, Rufus discovers time travelers had left their time machine parked in his neighborhood. You continue through Deponia Doomsday trying to change Rufus’s past, present, and future to avoid the apocalypse Rufus foresaw.
The story is enjoyable, even if you know the plotline, as you try to change Rufus’s future. The best part of the game was the amazing dialogue as it’s rich, funny, and quirky.
Graphics
Continuing with the theme of the Deponia franchise, Doomsday’s artistic design is the same as the previous games. They’re colorful, imaginative, and clever. Each zone has a lot going on graphics wise, adding even more depth to the puzzles. And the cut scenes were gorgeous and detailed. It would have been nice to have a bit more animation with the characters, especially when they talked while outside of cut scenes. That’s part of the game’s charm though.
Audio
Absolutely astounding voice acting for this point-and-click game. I was entranced from the second the introduction began. The soundtrack is also very enjoyable. I did have issues with the audio early on though with default settings. I had a hard time hearing some of the voices over background noises and music.
Gameplay
Deponia Doomsday is a straight forward game as far as gameplay. It has a point-a-click play style that is simple and easy to learn. You continue through the game picking up items and talking to various characters to solve puzzles. Some of the puzzles are rather difficult and might take some trial and error to figure out. I really enjoyed the idea of combining items to create more advanced items to solve some of the puzzles. There were a few that took me a while, but as I said, I didn’t quite know what to expect when I first went into this game so others may not have as much trouble as I did.
Verdict
Overall, even though I had no prior experience with Deponia, I found Deponia Doomsday to be an enjoyable adventure. The puzzles really make you think and plan ahead, but also force you to think backwards to something you might have missed.
I definitely recommend Deponia Doomsday, even if you haven’t played the series. It’s pretty easy to catch up. I personally am looking forward to going back and starting the story from the beginning!
*Reviewer finished and/or played the game to such an extent to give an informed opinion on the game and its content
