I'm a big fan of the Edna & Harvey and Deponia series, so I figured I'd give this game a shot. I'd say that I enjoyed myself most of the time playing it. It has a pretty immersive story, and the gameplay of exploring stuff and solving puzzles can be pretty fun. However, it is a bit rougher around the edges than most of Daedalic's other point-and-clicks, and it doesn't quite have the magic that the other series do.

The first big difference is the tone. While Daedalic's other point-and-clicks are comedic (and often very black comedy), this one takes itself much more seriously. It's full of Very Serious People doing Very Serious Things and Saving the World. It's also a lot darker. Most of the characters are rather unlikeable and dislike every other character, which doesn't make them too easy to identify with or root for. At first I thought it was just weird writing, but I actually think it was quite intentional. I think the game's writers wanted to show how, even if grand plans and god-level technology were used to try and save the world, basic human nature and human flaws will likely win out and destroy us. It's a valid point, and one that I can't deny has merit after the last few years. But it's not exactly a story that will give one much hope for the future.

Also, fair warning: a significant part of the game is characters behaving absolutely awfully to the only woman on their team, talking down to her and assuming that she has no ability to do anything. The level of sexism is ridiculous and rather depressing. While I don't think that the developers themselves are sexist, they certainly succeeded in making the player experience what it's like to have people be sexist against you! I'd definitely understand if this turned some people off from the game entirely.

A New Beginning is also a bit technically rougher than other games. The English translation has a number of issues, with some item descriptions and other text labels here and there showing up in Russian and French (I think). Thankfully, it never blocks progress, but it's rather jarring. There are also a lot of typos and weird grammar constructs (some of which the voice actors fixed!), and the text has a weird aversion to contractions. The English voice acting is also middling to bad. In particular, the male lead's voice actor often reads stuff with the wrong emotions/emphasis, and it just sounds like lines being read off a script. Last but not least, I ran into a bug where one of the puzzles (the bomb defuse) behaved incorrectly, making it impossible to solve and driving me crazy till I looked it up. Considering the devs don't speak English I can understand a few localization mistakes, but none of their other games that I've played have anywhere near this level of issues.

Regarding the gameplay itself, A New Beginning can be a bit... some would say "challenging", but I'd say "unpleasantly hard". It's OK for 90% of the game, but there are a few places that require more brainpower than I was willing to commit. For example, 85% of the way through the game, you'll have to recall a password that was given to you in the first hour. Can't remember? Tough! Your only option is a walkthrough. Or how about when you need to get a certain very annoying person to move so you can search his room. You can't do it by talking to him, threatening him, or bribing him. You have to find a suspicious towel in a washing machine. Yes, seriously. Meanwhile, a lot of the puzzle sections are hard not because they are inherently difficult to solve, but because the game doesn't tell you the rules up front and you have to just struggle and futz around until you work it out. It's common for adventure games to have difficult puzzles, and some people might enjoy the challenge, but I really didn't.

But, there are some things I quite liked about A New Beginning. The art, for one -- it's very well done, especially in the larger outdoor areas and the cinematics. It's beautifully drawn and often quite detailed, and the mix between a more animated style and more realistic one fits the tone of the story well. The story, also, has some complexity to it. The basic premise is similar to other time travel fiction like Travelers, but it takes things in a different direction -- largely by having a crew of misfit time travelers who *don't* get along, and showing us how they handle that. And I have to admit, part of me loves how cynical Bent is -- after my few years in academia, I was feeling exactly the same way, like it was me against the world, and the world was winning. So he's pretty convincing to me. The ending resolves things in a clever way, and with a somewhat more optimistic tone than most of the story. Turns out that generating media attention about a near-miss catastrophe is as good at spurring change as, if not better than, the catastrophe itself! But, it also changes the context of most of the story before it, and you're left to believe one of three things:

*One character has been lying to you in their flashbacks for the entire game
*Another character has gone insane and decided to destroy the future rather than save it
*The two different time travelers come from different futures: one where no time travel happened at all, and the other where the first attempt to change the past failed

It's an interesting way to end it, and I have mixed feelings.

TLDR: Not my favorite Daedalic game, but still worth playing if you don't take it too seriously.

Pros:
* Beautiful art
* Interesting and thought-provoking story for a good chunk of the game
* Good music when there is music
* Characters do have some depth to them, though they take their sweet time showing it

Cons:
* English voice acting is mediocre at best.
* Localization issues. Lots of typos and weird grammar.
* One puzzle bugged out and was impossible to complete, driving me insane for a bit
* The story suffers from a few bad plot holes and incredibly poor decisions, even accounting for time travel shenanigans

Depends on you:
* Most characters are quite unlikeable
* Gameplay and puzzles can get pretty difficult

I'm a big fan of the Edna & Harvey and Deponia series, so I figured I'd give this game a shot. I'd say that I enjoyed myself most of the time playing it. It has a pretty immersive story, and the gameplay of exploring stuff and solving puzzles can be pretty fun. However, it is a bit rougher around the edges than most of Daedalic's other point-and-clicks, and it doesn't quite have the magic that the other series do. The first big difference is the tone. While Daedalic's other point-and-clicks are comedic (and often very black comedy), this one takes itself much more seriously. It's full of Very Serious People doing Very Serious Things and Saving the World. It's also a lot darker. Most of the characters are rather unlikeable and dislike every other character, which doesn't make them too easy to identify with or root for. At first I thought it was just weird writing, but I actually think it was quite intentional. I think the game's writers wanted to show how, even if grand plans and god-level technology were used to try and save the world, basic human nature and human flaws will likely win out and destroy us. It's a valid point, and one that I can't deny has merit after the last few years. But it's not exactly a story that will give one much hope for the future. Also, fair warning: a significant part of the game is characters behaving absolutely awfully to the only woman on their team, talking down to her and assuming that she has no ability to do anything. The level of sexism is ridiculous and rather depressing. While I don't think that the developers themselves are sexist, they certainly succeeded in making the player experience what it's like to have people be sexist against you! I'd definitely understand if this turned some people off from the game entirely. A New Beginning is also a bit technically rougher than other games. The English translation has a number of issues, with some item descriptions and other text labels here and there showing up in Russian and French (I think). Thankfully, it never blocks progress, but it's rather jarring. There are also a lot of typos and weird grammar constructs (some of which the voice actors fixed!), and the text has a weird aversion to contractions. The English voice acting is also middling to bad. In particular, the male lead's voice actor often reads stuff with the wrong emotions/emphasis, and it just sounds like lines being read off a script. Last but not least, I ran into a bug where one of the puzzles (the bomb defuse) behaved incorrectly, making it impossible to solve and driving me crazy till I looked it up. Considering the devs don't speak English I can understand a few localization mistakes, but none of their other games that I've played have anywhere near this level of issues. Regarding the gameplay itself, A New Beginning can be a bit... some would say "challenging", but I'd say "unpleasantly hard". It's OK for 90% of the game, but there are a few places that require more brainpower than I was willing to commit. For example, 85% of the way through the game, you'll have to recall a password that was given to you in the first hour. Can't remember? Tough! Your only option is a walkthrough. Or how about when you need to get a certain very annoying person to move so you can search his room. You can't do it by talking to him, threatening him, or bribing him. You have to find a suspicious towel in a washing machine. Yes, seriously. Meanwhile, a lot of the puzzle sections are hard not because they are inherently difficult to solve, but because the game doesn't tell you the rules up front and you have to just struggle and futz around until you work it out. It's common for adventure games to have difficult puzzles, and some people might enjoy the challenge, but I really didn't. But, there are some things I quite liked about A New Beginning. The art, for one -- it's very well done, especially in the larger outdoor areas and the cinematics. It's beautifully drawn and often quite detailed, and the mix between a more animated style and more realistic one fits the tone of the story well. The story, also, has some complexity to it. The basic premise is similar to other time travel fiction like Travelers, but it takes things in a different direction -- largely by having a crew of misfit time travelers who *don't* get along, and showing us how they handle that. And I have to admit, part of me loves how cynical Bent is -- after my few years in academia, I was feeling exactly the same way, like it was me against the world, and the world was winning. So he's pretty convincing to me. The ending resolves things in a clever way, and with a somewhat more optimistic tone than most of the story. [spoiler]Turns out that generating media attention about a near-miss catastrophe is as good at spurring change as, if not better than, the catastrophe itself![/spoiler] But, it also changes the context of most of the story before it, and you're left to believe one of three things: *[spoiler]One character has been lying to you in their flashbacks for the entire game[/spoiler] *[spoiler]Another character has gone insane and decided to destroy the future rather than save it[/spoiler] *[spoiler]The two different time travelers come from different futures: one where no time travel happened at all, and the other where the first attempt to change the past failed[/spoiler] It's an interesting way to end it, and I have mixed feelings. TLDR: Not my favorite Daedalic game, but still worth playing if you don't take it too seriously. Pros: * Beautiful art * Interesting and thought-provoking story for a good chunk of the game * Good music when there is music * Characters do have some depth to them, though they take their sweet time showing it Cons: * English voice acting is mediocre at best. * Localization issues. Lots of typos and weird grammar. * One puzzle bugged out and was impossible to complete, driving me insane for a bit * The story suffers from a few bad plot holes and incredibly poor decisions, even accounting for time travel shenanigans Depends on you: * Most characters are quite unlikeable * Gameplay and puzzles can get pretty difficult