For me, The Silent Age has a rare honor. There are many games that I stopped playing because I lost interest and my desire to play the game tapered off. But The Silent Age is one of the few that I stopped playing because I was frustrated at it. Frustrated at its gameplay, frustrated at its execution, and frustrated because I felt like I was promised something that was not delivered.

Now, the adventure game genre is no stranger to puzzles with crazy logic. Be it using a parrot with a police radio, using a stuffed rabbit with a memorial shrine, or using a balloon art wrench on a chandelier, I have played games with pretty weird puzzle solutions. This game is not that. In fact, I'd say the puzzles were on the easy side, at least once you actually found the stuff that you needed (there's no option to highlight the clickable items in a scene).

The thing is, most adventure games are planned out carefully so that you get items in a progression that makes sense. If you, the player, work hard to get something useful, it's comforting to know that that item can stay with you for the rest of the game and help solve problems. Think like the croquet mallet in Edna and Harvey -- you get it early, and use it for like 5 different puzzles throughout the game. This also helps with immersion and realism because your character takes (semi-)logical actions with the items they acquire -- they don't just pointlessly throw away something that would be useful later.

The Silent Age was clearly designed with no regard for this progression and it drives me insane. The worst example I can think of is when your character spends a fair amount of time acquiring a chainsaw and the fuel to run it. Finally! You can get through the wooden door that is blocking your way! Only, once you cut down the door, you're confronted with... another wooden door. Easy, right? Just use the chainsaw again! Nope, it's been removed from your inventory, with zero explanation. No "it broke" or "it ran out of gas". It's just gone, and you can't even go back through the door where you left it. Instead, you have to spend the next 10+ minutes moving stuff around until you find... an axe. To chop down the next door. Ooookay. This sequence completely ruined my immersion in the game, never to recover.

Frankly, I think that what happened was that each small part of the game was designed in isolation, with the assumption "oh, we'll just make the player character drop all their items" used as a hand-wavey way to stop people from playing the game in unintended ways. But this really hurts the game, because the puzzles end up being more about pixel hunting looking for the few items you need rather than thinking up creative ways to use items. Also, most areas ended up pretty confined and linear -- while your player character technically has a whole city to run around in, you often feel like you can only move on rails through a linear sequence of screens. Compared to other point-and-click adventures, it just feels very railroad-y and like you can't be creative.

However, the gameplay was only part of the reason I got frustrated with this game. Another big issue is the sound, or lack thereof. Unusually for an adventure game, The Silent Age is almost completely without music. At first I thought it'd just be the opening scenes, but I got over halfway through the game and most areas just had a background noise track playing. Maybe it's just my preference, but I'm a game music lover -- music helps set the tone of the game, and provides something for my ears to "do". Without music, the game feels... empty, impersonal. (A feeling not helped by the game's art, which, while it has a unique and attractive style, feels flat and undetailed when viewed on a large monitor). There is some voice acting for the more important lines, which is... fine, I guess, but it doesn't feel like it adds much. All in all, I felt like the game experience would not have been very different if I just didn't put on my headphones at all.

This brings us to the last big issue: the story. I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum, but suffice it to say that the story feels quite unoriginal in a world already saturated with time-travel fiction and pandemic-based apocalypses. For pretty much every element of the plot in this game, I can think of something else (Steins Gate, A New Beginning, A Whole Nother Story, Doctor Who, Heroes, Travelers, etc) that did it better. But even if the plot is unoriginal, a story can be supported on the backs of its characters, right? Well, not in the case of The Silent Age. Your main character is simply an unknown quantity, an average Joe who has little personality and who we never learn much about. And the only other character who gets much screen time spends most of it being an unhelpful jerk to the main character and talking down to him for daring to try and save the world... and yet, he's also technically a good guy, so you have to work with him. Neither of these dudes are very likeable or charismatic.

Full disclosure, I only got about 2/3 of the way through the game, so maybe something happens with the story in the last few parts that makes it a lot more fun and satisfying. However, since, by where I stopped, they already strongly imply that time is immutable and the world is always going to be destroyed in a stable time loop, I'm not holding my breath.

I will say one nice thing about this game though, which is that the opening ~20 minutes is pretty good. You start as a janitor for Evil Science Inc, then, after a dying time traveler shows up in your lab, you get arrested under national security charges and interrogated. Just as it looks bleak, you are transported forward into the future, and escape your cell to find that everyone is dead and the place is covered in wanted posters where you are Public Enemy No. 1. This part has a lot of intrigue and subtle storytelling, I like it! It's just a pity that the rest of the game could not keep up this quality standard.

All in all, I do not think I will continue playing The Silent Age past where I am, and more than that, I feel cheated. Based on the trailer, the screenshots, and the description, this game had a lot of promise, but it just didn't live up to what I was hoping for.

For me, The Silent Age has a rare honor. There are many games that I stopped playing because I lost interest and my desire to play the game tapered off. But The Silent Age is one of the few that I stopped playing because I was frustrated at it. Frustrated at its gameplay, frustrated at its execution, and frustrated because I felt like I was promised something that was not delivered. Now, the adventure game genre is no stranger to puzzles with crazy logic. Be it using a parrot with a police radio, using a stuffed rabbit with a memorial shrine, or using a balloon art wrench on a chandelier, I have played games with pretty weird puzzle solutions. This game is not that. In fact, I'd say the puzzles were on the easy side, at least once you actually found the stuff that you needed (there's no option to highlight the clickable items in a scene). The thing is, most adventure games are planned out carefully so that you get items in a progression that makes sense. If you, the player, work hard to get something useful, it's comforting to know that that item can stay with you for the rest of the game and help solve problems. Think like the croquet mallet in Edna and Harvey -- you get it early, and use it for like 5 different puzzles throughout the game. This also helps with immersion and realism because your character takes (semi-)logical actions with the items they acquire -- they don't just pointlessly throw away something that would be useful later. The Silent Age was clearly designed with no regard for this progression and it drives me insane. The worst example I can think of is when your character spends a fair amount of time acquiring a chainsaw and the fuel to run it. Finally! You can get through the wooden door that is blocking your way! Only, once you cut down the door, you're confronted with... another wooden door. Easy, right? Just use the chainsaw again! Nope, it's been removed from your inventory, with zero explanation. No "it broke" or "it ran out of gas". It's just gone, and you can't even go back through the door where you left it. Instead, you have to spend the next 10+ minutes moving stuff around until you find... an axe. To chop down the next door. Ooookay. This sequence completely ruined my immersion in the game, never to recover. Frankly, I think that what happened was that each small part of the game was designed in isolation, with the assumption "oh, we'll just make the player character drop all their items" used as a hand-wavey way to stop people from playing the game in unintended ways. But this really hurts the game, because the puzzles end up being more about pixel hunting looking for the few items you need rather than thinking up creative ways to use items. Also, most areas ended up pretty confined and linear -- while your player character technically has a whole city to run around in, you often feel like you can only move on rails through a linear sequence of screens. Compared to other point-and-click adventures, it just feels very railroad-y and like you can't be creative. However, the gameplay was only part of the reason I got frustrated with this game. Another big issue is the sound, or lack thereof. Unusually for an adventure game, The Silent Age is almost completely without music. At first I thought it'd just be the opening scenes, but I got over halfway through the game and most areas just had a background noise track playing. Maybe it's just my preference, but I'm a game music lover -- music helps set the tone of the game, and provides something for my ears to "do". Without music, the game feels... empty, impersonal. (A feeling not helped by the game's art, which, while it has a unique and attractive style, feels flat and undetailed when viewed on a large monitor). There is some voice acting for the more important lines, which is... fine, I guess, but it doesn't feel like it adds much. All in all, I felt like the game experience would not have been very different if I just didn't put on my headphones at all. This brings us to the last big issue: the story. I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum, but suffice it to say that the story feels quite unoriginal in a world already saturated with time-travel fiction and [spoiler]pandemic-based apocalypses[/spoiler]. For pretty much every element of the plot in this game, I can think of something else (Steins Gate, A New Beginning, A Whole Nother Story, Doctor Who, Heroes, Travelers, etc) that did it better. But even if the plot is unoriginal, a story can be supported on the backs of its characters, right? Well, not in the case of The Silent Age. Your main character is simply an unknown quantity, an average Joe who has little personality and who we never learn much about. And the only other character who gets much screen time spends most of it being an unhelpful jerk to the main character and talking down to him for daring to try and save the world... and yet, he's also technically a good guy, so you have to work with him. Neither of these dudes are very likeable or charismatic. Full disclosure, I only got about 2/3 of the way through the game, so maybe something happens with the story in the last few parts that makes it a lot more fun and satisfying. However, since, by where I stopped, they already strongly imply that [spoiler]time is immutable and the world is always going to be destroyed in a stable time loop[/spoiler], I'm not holding my breath. I will say one nice thing about this game though, which is that the opening ~20 minutes is pretty good. You start as a janitor for Evil Science Inc, then, after a dying time traveler shows up in your lab, you get arrested under national security charges and interrogated. Just as it looks bleak, you are transported forward into the future, and escape your cell to find that everyone is dead and the place is covered in wanted posters where you are Public Enemy No. 1. This part has a lot of intrigue and subtle storytelling, I like it! It's just a pity that the rest of the game could not keep up this quality standard. All in all, I do not think I will continue playing The Silent Age past where I am, and more than that, I feel cheated. Based on the trailer, the screenshots, and the description, this game had a lot of promise, but it just didn't live up to what I was hoping for.