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0 Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town by Italian devs Imaginarylab and publishers VLG is a point and click adventure game that beautifully blends together a fantasy pirate-themed world with the modernism of today.
Initially available on PC today (11th of August), and later coming to all consoles, I was lucky enough to play through the complete version of the game that delves a lot further into the story than the demo.
Don’t worry there won’t be any spoilers me hearties!
Gameplay
You play as teenager Willy Morgan as he uncovers the story surrounding his famous archaeologist Father’s mysterious disappearance ten years ago, all thanks to a well-timed letter dropping through the letterbox.
What ensues is a very alluring plotline that takes you to Bone Town, a quaint pirate village set in the past, where you must talk to the various inhabitants to learn more about your Father and slowly piece together what happened.
Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town is open-world to a degree, allowing you to roam freely around the village setting as much as you want, exploring each location to your heart’s desire. One thing I did enjoy was that once you have discovered a place of interest you can use the map in your inventory to jump from location to location without having to slowly walk back through each of the screens.
As with all point and click games, the bread and butter is in the interaction and puzzle-solving aspects. Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Island certainly delivers here with the dialogue exchange, offering a choice of comical responses when talking to other characters, something that will be fully voiced in the final version of the game. There is definitely aspects of Monkey Island going on here. With the puzzle-solving, I found much of it to be fairly straight forward, either that or I have matured a lot since playing Simon the Sorcerer around my mate’s house back in the summer of ’94. Each item that you collect during the story is needed in some shape or form to help satisfy another character’s requirements and it is a question of listening carefully for that hint to drop during conversation and acting accordingly. That said there were a few devilish puzzles that did make you think for a bit!
One of the fun features of point and click games is running your mouse all over the screen to try and see what you can interact with. In the past, there have been countless times that I have missed objects as they have been so small only to, later on, discover that minuscule pixel that has prevented you from moving on. In Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town they have a button in the top left of the screen that shows you what you can interact with…I wasn’t too keen on that as to me that takes some of the skill away. It is your choice if you want to use it or not.
Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town sure had a touch of Lucas Art in the cartoon artistry as well as the atmosphere which kept it very nostalgic and enjoyable. I was rooted to my chair to keep going at the story which took me all around Bone Town in my quest.
Graphics
I have to say, the graphics on Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town looked really good in the preview, playing perfectly well in full HD quality. The Pc that I was playing on at the time wasn’t that high quality either. The unique graphic style of this fancy quirky pirate village carved a very magical atmosphere. The 3D look and feel of the game worked well, with each location having it’s own unique vibe. The cutscenes, as you may have seen from the demo, are well rendered and stay true to the environments that you discover and aid the storyline as you progress, keeping you certainly on your toes!
Audio
The original soundtrack by Ascari serves to set the atmosphere for each location that you discover. From olde world sea shanty anthems in the village, funky bass lines in the music shop to eerie goings-on in the crypt, the ambience is beautifully set and draws you in further as you explore. Each of the characters that you meet are fully voiced thanks to some fantastic voice acting, helping you understand their persona straight away. Do you trust them or not? what are their intentions? Either way, Willy’s fun and determined nature certainly played out well, even if he told me off for trying to be an arsonist several times!
Longevity
Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town took me around 4 and a half hours to complete, this time will vary depending on how quickly you understand what is required of you. Sometimes there was a little bit of searching to be done, other times the penny clicked straight away. There were not any collectables to find, so it is a case of once you have finished the game you have the pride of knowing that you achieved all there was to do!
Conclusion
My love of point and click games has been rekindled thanks to Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town. I found the gameplay to be very captivating in how the story was built up and it unlocked a determination in me to keep going until I had solved the mystery. There were a few easter eggs dotted about for both point and click and Marvel fans. I won’t lie, the Day of the Tentacle poster on Willy’s bedroom door did make me smile.
If you enjoy mystery games or even if you last ever properly played a point and click game when you were 13 years old, this will certainly tick your boxes. Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town gets the Thumb Culture Gold award!
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
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