The Wild West meets Star Trek today as we’re a man on a mission looking for answers in the depth of space in the point and click adventure mystery Warp Frontier
Warp Frontier comes from developer Brawsome based in Australia. We play as intergalactic Cop Captain Cassini, or Vince to his friends. As a member of the Rust Police Dept, Vince travels around and does cop things, but we don’t have time for that nonsense in an adventure game right? So straight from the off, we’re veered towards something altogether more sinister than simply ticketing someone for loitering.
Our small ship is hit by a projectile and after some quick DIY, discover a mysterious artefact hidden inside the ship that attacked us that contains the conscience of another person. Who is this person? How is this possible and why was our ship hit? These are one of over 900 questions the game asks and mostly answers. To go into more detail about the plot will probably spoil parts and I don’t want to as it’s a really gripping game.
When he’s not embroiled in a secret society looking for mystery locations, Vince is also a dad trying to iron over the cracks of his failing relationships. Think of it as Neighbours crossed with Firefly with a sprinkle of Clint Eastwood. Historically it doesn’t seem to be a million miles in the future, rather just a few hundred, as the ship, station and equipment we use are all fairly rudimentary. The story is backlit by the events of a recent war that’s reduced humanity significantly. It’s the secrets of this war that we’re initially starting to discover as corruption and horror seep out slowly.
Vince is a gruff and pragmatic chap who manages to hold an intimidating amount of inventory items and even in the face of impending doom, just takes it all in his stride. How very…Australian. We’re kept company by our good buddy MAC, a hovering spherical droid who’s full of useful info about the world. He’s a very obedient robot and can be used for all sorts of menial tasks like keeping doors open and pushing buttons we can’t reach.
Pockets of friends and acquaintances emerge but it never feels like we have somewhere to lay our hat down and call home. What is at home is our partner Trish who never seems pleased to see us, and often shouts whether its face to face or down the phone. There’s a couple of kids too who we seem to have but never show affection to. If anything, our space ship that we ride in solo apart from MAC seems to be our only safe haven.
Sparks fly sometimes with the police secretary and we’re not shy to flirt with other women too, even if they’ve just conked us over the head with a rifle. These moments though are few and far between because Warp Frontier plays it pretty serious. There are a lot of bloody deaths to deal with and decisions we make ultimately change the game. There are a couple of different endings so reliability value is high. I’d only managed to collect half of the 60 or so steam achievements once I’d completed it and will definitely be heading back to see where else the story could take me.
Gameplay wise, it has the style of a classic point and click, yet there are some fresh and welcome changes of note. The most obvious one is the way we interact with, and look at our surroundings. In a normal case we’d click on something then the protagonist would say ‘yes that thing is lovely’ or whatever, but here, all we do is hover over it and we get to know Vince’s thoughts in text form. If we click on it, nothing happens as we don’t need it. These hotspots are shown with a small diamond when hovered over, but the things we can click on are shown with the hand icon. These can be items we pick up, buttons we can push or anything that Vince needs, in order to complete a puzzle. What’s also handy is if we hover over our self, Vince will tell us in text form only, what the objective is right now, which ultimately can help guide us in the right direction. If ever we can’t remember what to do, there’s always MAC on hand with a status update. And if that isn’t enough, the hints here are some of the best I’ve seen. I’m not one to use hints if I can avoid it, but there’s literally a hint button on screen at all times, and so if we do need a gentle push, it gives us one if we click on it. The more we click on the hint button, the more obvious of a hint it gives, until finally, it’ll plainly spell it out for us.
Vince can hold a lot of stuff in his deceptively spacious space suit. Already from the start we have half a dozen items and it only increases. You’ll mostly be using your knife and the pair of glue guns for a lot of puzzles, but several mechanical instruments are needed also. It can get a bit over complicated in this respect, especially when we try to use MAC in a puzzle. Just be sure to always scroll through to see exactly what you have at any one time as more than once I found I had a few things I didn’t even know I had that sorted me out.
As an adventure game it’s real strength is in the story, but the puzzles it posed are also top draw. We do have to fly all over the place to discover the answers to some, and sometimes its trial and error, but sometimes it’s that sneaky line that someone said a while back that tips you off. It’s very good at laying down threads for you to pick up later.
Our ship is where we spend the majority of our time and the front view, seen in 1st person, is where some decisions have to be made, from where to travel to, who to contact, what atmosphere needs to be like inside the ship and what type of ammunition to use. It took a while to figure this out but once I had, it was an easy to remember. I didn’t however enjoy setting down the ship somewhere and constantly forgetting to lower the cargo bay door to walk out, only to go in the back of the ship, swear to myself, then head to the cockpit to lower it. There was also one puzzle involving the lining of planets that I just didn’t get and tried it numerous times, ending up fluking it. But again, the hint button was there, and for that puzzle I went all the way to the last hint when it said ‘Are you really wanting me to just give you the answer?’ Which I thought was well played and made me persevere.
So the story is engrossing and puzzles are strong, but what about the art style. I think here is where it may divide people. The backgrounds, foregrounds and locations, I think, are really nice. We’re in space, there’s space things around. It looks good, there’s a sense of time, but the character design and movement is a little off. I didn’t notice this for the design of Vince himself, but a lot of secondary characters looked like a mix of photos that’d been stitched together then animated. It was jarring, especially when we first meet our family. The two kids and Trish just look weird. Visually some of the characters work, and some don’t. Also the walk cycle of Vince is a bit stiff and took me out of the experience a bit.
The voice work is terrific from a mostly Australian voice cast. Vince has a strong gruff voice that’s leaden with history, and MAC has a plain, to the point tone.
There isn’t too much music throughout, as the majority is soundtracked by the sounds of space, which is either low rumbles of engines, hissing of steam or generally, space. On occasion of music it’s used in the scene such as from a radio rather than incidental. There are a few small sections that build up the tension with music, and the fact it’s used so sparsely is an added quality. For the most part, its the sound design that keeps us company. One thing I should mention too is that there are about a dozen save spots, which had me sorted, using all of them as I do.
I felt like I knew Vince. He seemed real. His difficult relationship, his eagerness to hope for something better than he has, and when he is thrust into a difficult situation, to take it on the chin, was endearing, and with not a cheeky-chappy in sight, no jokes or silliness here, he was welcome in my company. Apart from a few cranky character models, my main gripe is that the game builds and builds to a great crescendo to then…just stops. The ending rushes at you with such speed I wasn’t even sure it WAS the end, only realising as the credits rolled. After 8 or so hours I felt like I needed more answers, or rather, had the answers laid out in a way that wasn’t akin to shouting everything all at once in my face.
Warp Frontier dangles so many threads throughout that it can be difficult to see where we’re going, but once those threads are woven together, it’s an exciting mystery adventure with a complicated protagonist, one who I could travel with again.
Thanks to Brawsome for the review copy of the game. Get yourself a copy HERE. It’s available for PC and Switch
If you want to find out about new adventure games, first be sure to come and join my Point & Click Adventurers Facebook Group.
Michael