Summit of the Wolf

Gorgeous, heart-wrenching and totally engrossing dark fantasy from the brilliant minds of Christopher and Elle Brendel! The latest in the interconnected Storycentric games universe follows 12 year old Ophelia, who finds herself in a fantastical world that is as terrifying as it is wondrous. Guided by a white wolf and a mysterious goddess, she embarks on a quest for a pool of wisdom, learning friendship, courage and determination along the way, but is she ready to face the true quest? This game features great puzzle-solving, haunting music, breathtaking artwork and a mind-bending story that is both tragic and spiritually uplifting. Important even. VERY dark. Occasionally frustrating. But highly recommended for everyone but especially if you've gone through bad things in life. I feel like this game could actually help in some ways. or if you like anything fantasy related you will love this! Follow the white wolf to the purchase button!

As usual, Christopher has done a fantastic job! The backing story was dark, but compelling. The characters were well voiced. You definitely develop a bond for Ophelia, Roluk and Ilea. I suppose my only complaint is that there was not a little bit more to the backing story as well as the journey to he Summit Of The Wolf after leaving Scarwood Keep. Other than that, kudos to Christopher for creating another great game! I cannot wait to play the next one!

This is the fifth game in a (planned) long series of story-centric games, all happening in the same world. The games are all perfectly playable on their own, but recognizing some of the references and character cameos adds an incredible amount to the enjoyment. There is an overarching plot starting to emerge, and I am so far convinced that there is also one very basic thematic connection between all of them, but I won't spoil that. The five games have very different stories, but all of them have a dark to very dark mood. The current one, Summit of the Wolf stands apart from the others. The first four games were pure fiction, while this one is based on a true story – it's almost like using the power of fairy tales for the therapeutic retelling of someone's (or, unfortunately, many people's) real-life experience. Perhaps because of that, this game has much more direct symbolism (hello, [spoiler]shriveled Burrower[/spoiler]. Also don't be fooled by the fairy-tale setting, this adult-only game gets very dark very fast. As for the gameplay, it's like a point-and-click slideshow of scenes, with mild, but fun, inventory puzzles. The very few times I got stuck were because I missed some clickable part of the environment (a hotspot highlighting function would have been appreciated). The puzzles are easy, but never mundanely trivial. Also, because it's basically a fairy tale, which is inherently linear, this game really feels a bit more running on rails than the other four. I have to mention the main developer, who is very active in the Steam discussions. He goes out his way to answer questions, help solving issues and does all of it in a very friendly way. I really can't say how much I appreciate that, it's a huge plus for all his games. My recommendation is if you are interested in a traumatic true story told in a fairy tale, buy this one, you will not be disappointed. If you are looking for a great detective story, or plan to enter this universe and play all the games, buy Stonewall Penitentiary first, and then buy and play all other games in chronological order, finishing with Summit of the Wolf.

game with good story.

I suppose this one is kind of one step forward two steps back from the previous entry in the series, Stonewall Penitentiary. One of the things that edged that game up into the recommend category for me was that I thought the villain's backstory was a bit interesting. I'll try to discuss it without spoilers here (i'll even not use pronouns since the suspects include men and women in that game), the villain had been responsible for someone's death, but had been forgiven for it and since that time the villain had been consumed by an overwhelming guilt over event. To an extent, the villain perhaps might have thought that the punishment they were inflicting on the other characters was to their benefit. So, that they could be punished for their crimes. (Maybe. There were some lines found in the villain's dialogue that suggested that was maybe that was just a justification for the villain's actions and that really the villain just wanted to torture people. But maybe both things can be true. The villain is insane and has disordered thinking. That is all part of what make the villain interesting.) In Summit of the Wolf, we're back to villains like in this writer's games before Stonewall Penitentiary, where they are simply evil. No attempt has been made to get into their heads whatsoever. And presumably these people are sane. At the very least, the father is a "Professor of Psychology at an Elementary School" (whatever that could possibly mean. Those must be some pretty advanced kids.) So, he must be fairly intelligent and be aware of his actions. Surely, he would have some justifications for himself to excuse his appetites. The mother we learn even less about. And then there is the ways this story is a sequel to The Filmmaker and Shady Brook. The other games had only slight connections to each other that felt more like product placement than anything that affected the plot. In this one, you actually control the character from the Filmmaker and she spends a portion of this story investigating the characters from Shady Brook. I think it's a good idea (the one step forward). But on the one hand, there's no particular reason this nurse should be the character from the Filmmaker because her experiences in that story don't seem to influence her actions in this one whatsoever, and the stuff to do with Shady Brook has the unfortunate effect of diluting the well-crafted ending to that game. [spoiler] It now feels like the main character sacrificed himself just so that the girl could just die later by the same hands. Pretty bleak moral there. [/spoiler] But it seems that maybe it's all to set up a later game. And perhaps my mind might change depending on what happens there. Still, kind of bleak nonetheless. I talked about some things I didn't like but there are thing the writer's gotten a lot better at. The characters except for the villains feel the most fleshed out. Whether they are in the fantasy world or the hospital, they are intriguing, much like in Stonewall. The art has improved a lot. Maybe that's a two edged sword, because it has gotten good enough now that we might be tempted to compare it to games with better art still, whereas before we were likely to just overlook it. But I like that the hospital and the fantasy world are in different styles, and I like the few animated scenes like the flyovers of the new areas when you reach them and for scenes that require a bit more action than slideshows allow. Finally, I like the way the fantasy story was constructed. Even though it didn't feel like a real place (as it shouldn't considering it was a dream) I liked that the different chapters felt interconnected by the end. I liked, for instance, discovering what had become of the scepter after the story had stopped caring about it. It was very nicely put together. But yeah, I wouldn't really recommend it as a whole. Despite it's mature content, it doesn't really have a point of view on all that that I could discern beyond terrible things happen to innocent people, so I'm not really sure I'd really suggest someone dwell on that by playing the game. I might feel differently based on the sequels though. It looks like maybe there's plans to have two different ones following each main character? I'd be happy to see where it's all going, and then reconsider this. Let's just hope these girls' story don't end like [spoiler] Kate Ekan's [/spoiler]

[h1]A EXTENDED REVIEW ([b]ENG/GER[/b])[/h1] [h3][u]Eng:[/u][/h3] At first I was very hesitating to get this game because of the art style but I got it recommended and gave it a try which I surely dont regret. It took me an hour to get used to it after which I really started to get into the story and enjoyed it. Still the non fluid camera movement made it for me sometimes hard to watch. But thats actually were all the negativity ends. Well for me atleast... the story has still a long way to go. I love how u have this 3 realities. The story she gets forced into by a wild beast while she is really just in a dream doing what its supossed to do and help her to process. And on the other side we have this very clear showcased disturbing reality. Its very noticable that its not our journey. We in the third perspectiv have the full extend while we only can watch and hope from scene to scene that she also will gain full concionous. And when the borders finally blurred I'm glad she decided differently from princess Ilo while I think it would be bad to judge any side on their decision as both deserve respect. So all in all it was a very [i]enjoyable experience[/i]. Okay that was a lie its pretty disgusting when the final barrier fades away and you remember that this is daily reality. And that is the beauty of this gmae. A part about in our firefighter training is the confrontation with what will await us when the pager doesnt read "test". Problems doesnt need to be tackeld only by the ones confronted and thats why I have to recommend this. I'm glad this medium does exist and can give us feeling for it so we can understand that its important to watch out for those vunerable. Opening our eyes is always the first step to an better future so lets all just take a moment and remind us that every of us can do a change with just looking out for each other like the nurse did for her. So if you read to this point know its your turn for training. [h3][u]Ger:[/u][/h3] Da ihr bereits hier am lesen seit habt ihr schon teilweise Interesse gezeigt. Lasst mich diesen noch weiter füttern. Ich habe ungefähr 9 Stunden mit diesem Spiel verbracht und bereits nach der ersten Stunde war ich in dieser Geschichte gefangen. Ohne zu spoilern kann ich verraten dieses Spiel hat einen starken Bezug zur wirklichen Welt bezüglich mentalen Leidens und dessens Konsequenzen und Verarbeitung. Es ist eine Reise durch das Leben eines Opfers, dass sich entscheidet und im Grunde schon selbst entschieden hatte, dass es sich nicht ihrem Schicksal beugt und kein Opfer bleibt. Diese Reise wird einen tatsächlich sehr kindlich beigeführt, denn es ist nicht unserer Reise. Es ist ihre und wir sind jediglich die Zuschauer. Wir werden zudem auch noch mit alternativen Entscheidungen konfrontiert mit solchen Ereignissen umzugehen. Davon hatte mich eine tatsächlich überrascht. Nach dem Film The Autopsy of Jane Doe dachte ich ich würde nie so blind sein wie der Vater im Film aber das Spiel hat mich vom Gegenteil überzeugt. Überzeugt ich muss mehr auf das achten was um mich herum geschieht. Und das ist die wahre Schönheit dieses Spiels. Eine Konfrontation und gleichzeitig eine Lehre aufmerksam zu sein und nach einer besseren Gesellschaft zu streben. Spieletechnisch waren da einige Rätsel die Spaß gemacht haben. Als Mathematiker bin ich sowieso ein fan von Rätseln. Die Grafik wird einen nicht umhauen aber definitiv auch nicht verscheuchen. Leider muss ich sagen manche Sequenzen sind teilweise stotternd. Das ist dann etwas schwer zuzuschauen aber das ist jetzt auch nicht der Großteil des Spiels. Also wenn ihr Geschichten und Emotionen in Spielen mögt holt es euch. [h3]Quick point like summary:[/h3] [table] [tr] [th]*[/th][th]*/10[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Graphics[/th][th]4[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Story[/th][th]8[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Gameplay[/th][th]5[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Game length[/th][th]7[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Playable 14+[/th][th]yes[/th] [/tr][tr] [th]Would reference game[/th][th]yes[/th] [/tr] [/table] I hope this will help narrow it down what to expect.

Okay, here's the deal. I am a writer, so I see the story as one of intrigue, empathy, and a "lessen to be learned." However, this game just isn't for me. This is more of a late childhood to teens type of story. Just can't get into the way it needs me to be. I recommend it, but not for grown men ... or probably even grown women, for that matter.

If you've liked the previous games from this developer, you will enjoy this game too - even if the fantasy elements are not something you like. For those who think they don't want to play some elf-fantasy nonsense I want to say this has a lot of "regular world" gameplay too. And the fantasy parts are surprisingly fun and engaging to play. I've loved every single game this developer has released on Steam and this is right on par with the quality of the others. 5/5 stuff.