Arsene Lupin - Once a Thief Steam Charts & Stats

Microids has a long history of forcing players to look very closely at every single frame of their games. Not in the usual way either. I mean they really want you to STUDY what they created. There's no such thing as running or even walking fast in their games. Impossible! You might miss some of their beautiful artwork! When they did add a running feature in one of the Agatha Christie games, the character just refused to do it. ("Poirot does not run," our hero retorted several times in the game). OK, then why the f___did you get our hopes up?! All Microids games have a subtext that runs in the background. It involves the ego of their developers. Focusing only on solving puzzles or the storyline? Totally unacceptable. Instead, they want you to notice every single item they created and praise their extreme genius as developers. Why else would they have you running all over a bunch of useless empty buildings in the Sinking Island? Or include those ridiculous controls in Syberia 3? Or that awful rotating camera in this game? They're different, damn it! They worked very hard on these games and they will not rest until you acknowledge it. They also expend an inordinate amount of effort on sound effects, especially the sound of boots/high heels walking on hard floors. Just ask Hercule Poirot, who tap dances his way through every game at a snail's pace. Perhaps that's the reason other parts of their games suffer. This game could have been decent were it not for the terrible rotating camera. They force you to use the mouse wheel for various tasks. Some players prefer to use the keyboard, but Microids doesn't care. It's their way or nothing. There were also issues with the labeling of objects in the wrong place. You'll click on an item repeatedly only to discover that the clickable "hotspot" is actually 10 inches to the right of the object name. And who can forget the 20 second load time when you enter a new room? The graphics in this game were not as good as the Orient Express game, yet had longer wait times. To make matters even worse, the loading screen is a blinding white color that burns through your retinas if you don't look away. Even with the brightness all the way down, it's still way too bright. This game is also cursed with very boring characters and a plotline that drags. Arsene Lupine is supposed to be this slick mastermind, but his spindly legs, high heeled tap shoes, and EXTREMELY tight pants looked more like Guybrush Threepwood without the charisma. Most of the dialogue is fully voiced with French and British sounding actors. The one exception is when exploring the different locations. Whenever you find something new, the character will groan, grunt, mmm, or ummm by way of response. It was annoying from the very first time we heard it. It's also unnecessary. Either record proper responses or keep the character quiet. Nobody would find a chemistry book and respond with a long, "ummm." Unfortunately, the cons outweigh the pros in this game. Since the issues are smaller, you will be inclined to see it through to the end. However, It's just too many little things that are annoying and make up an imperfect whole. It's really too bad because straightforward detective adventure games (without ghosts, aliens, or angsty college kids) have become the exception rather than the rule. Microids could have had a winner here if they had focused more on plot and gameplay instead of sound effects and their own arrogance. Unfortunately, this is a swing and a miss.