The Beard in the Mirror Reviews

Point & Click adventures are my favorite genre of computer game. I am a fan with equal appreciation for Sierra and LucasArts titles. The Beard in the Mirror has a Sierra type interface with the humor of a LucasArts adventure. The graphics and animation are high quality, although the game fades to black whenever a sophisticated animation would have been required and ends up wrecking the immersion. There are ways to die, but the rather than forcing you restore a previous save, the game allows you to rewind and make alternate choices. There are a couple of timed and arcade sequences. Be careful and save often because I ran in to a situation where the rewind feature restored the game state with only a few seconds left on the timer and made it almost impossible to progress without extreme precision. I was able to perform the correct maneuver after multiple attempts, but it would have been less stressful if I had a save game that left me with more time on the clock. The writing for the game was edited well. I did not find any typos or translation errors that are typical of indie releases. The music was adequate -- it doesn't have a soundtrack that I would listen to outside of the game itself. I did not earn the maximum amount of points in my initial playthrough, and I have not yet decided if I want to try again and earn them all. I don't believe that the missing points will have much of an impact on the narrative or experience. Should you play this game? If you are a fan of point & click adventures, then yes. Developers: Please use a version of the AGS engine that allows for borderless fullscreen gameplay on future titles.

brilliant old school point and click witty and the puzzles are not too easy if you like point and click you will love this

Great game. Loved the pixel art. Storyline was original. Puzzles were a good difficulty. Recommend anyone to play.

I would give a sideways review if they were available, as this seems like a true labor of love, a tribute to a lost age of gaming and not a terrible experience. OTOH, I couldn't get myself to finish it. The story was pretty trite and the graphics were jarring (a really bad color palate). I smiled a few times but in the end I just didn't think it was very good. It was competent though, and I would say to the devs not to give up if they are still making games.

I liked that you could fast travel by pressing ESC. All P&C should have a fast travel option. Good humor and dialogue. Graphics are typical pixel art. Color scheme is nice and calming. The time-travelling aspect of the story went completely over my head...too confusing. Just seems like a nightmare time loop, imo... The game is short (and I take forever to finish games). But I also finished this quickly because I really enjoyed playing this. A light, funny, short P&C.

This really scratched the itch for a well written, classic Sierra / LucasArts style adventure game. Funny, cute, and fun little fairy tale adventure in the tone of Princess Bride or Stardust that never felt bloated for the sake of making it longer. I played through the entire game on a Steam Deck, and it worked beautifully that way.

What a charming tale to play! Clearly inspired by the games from the old days, this little gem is a fun and well-designed PnC game filled with adventure, romance and magic. It is definitely a must play for any PnC games afficionados!

Amazing story, setting, characters, puzzles...everything. This game was a blast to play. The puzzles weren't overly difficult, but they weren't too easy either. The story and characters are engaging and hilarious. I loved every second of it.

A hapless young adventure-player gets sucked into a world of fairy tale intrigue and romance along with his trusty pink crowbar and three vegetarian gumballs. You know, it's really goofy -- purposefully so most of the time -- but it's really earnest and sweet, and has enough self-knowledge to capitalize on its own naivete without being [i]too[/i] self-aware. Oh, that self-awareness! It'll reach right up and poke you in the a$$ when you least expect it! Fun fact: the scariest character in the game is none other than Artie, the rock-collecting forest guardian. That guy will literally [i]kill[/i] you over a colorful mineral. Puzzles are solid, not too difficult, but occasionally spike into head-scratcher territory. You won't tear your hair out, I think. I want to brag on the game's storytelling a little. Despite the fact that this is a relatively simple fantasy world (the time travel element does mix things up in the second act), and even though the game is only about three hours long, it does an [i]excellent[/i] job at building a believably strong relationship between Lily and Paul -- you can totally see [i]why[/i] they care about each other so much. It doesn't matter that Paul is only about 1.5 degrees removed from Guybrush Threepwood. (I originally got a little ticked because I couldn't blow the game up to fullscreen, and I was ready to drop it out of hand -- but then, I'd been going around humming Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror" all day long in anticipation of playing it, and on top of that, I remembered that I've played through things a lot clunkier and glitchier than this, so I gave it whirl . . . and it was a very pleasant experience! I actually had a lot more fun with [i]Beard in the Mirror[/i] than that overrated sepia turd [i]Grim Fandango[/i], I kid you not.)

This was a nice retro-graphic point-and-click adventure. It took me about 4 hours to play through, which I consider to be a good length for the $10 price. The story starts off a bit confusing, however it does make sense as you play through. An interesting take on an "amnesic character" in a strange land. The puzzles were not overly simple but never lead to my being so confused that I couldn't finish. After completing the story I felt satisfied, and its got a nice lead up for a sequel which I'd be glad to buy if they make it. If you're a fan of old-school adventures with a fantasy setting I'd definately recommend it.