I learned about Carol Reed games when I was adding profiles for Neoseeker. Given the fact that I frequented a lot adventure games sites, I naturally was drawn by the Carol Reed series (which was at the 5th game I think). I've immediately liked the quality of the photos and the concept of being a foreigner in Sweden.

Unfortunately, back then, I couldn't order MDNA games. And with my life evolving, I"ve kinda forgotten about them. I knew about Bosh's Damnation after adding the profile on Neoseeker last year but still, I didn't order anything. I don't remember if I saw it going through Greenlight. But when I saw the title in the upcoming list, it was wishlisted. And when I saw the release, I didn't hesitate to spent money for it.

So in other words, what's a Carol Reed game? It's a game about a young woman, loving Sweden and solving cases around like a private investigator. This time, a cleaner called her about the disappearance of his employers. Carol began to investigate until the family is giving a sign of life. Carol forgot about it... but in the summer, is brought back into the family's business as the daughter's boyfriend is found dead at a barn and the murder isn't from yesterday. Guess who will snoop around?

It's a point and click game, you find objects, you use them, you solve puzzles thanks to clues and you speak with people. The game is done with real life pictures and real people. There is no video inside but you can see differences in the pictures: people are making differents expressions, if you open a door, you'll see it open.

It could be a walking simulator as you're walking from scene to scene without having to search something and each close-up doesn't bring everytime a clue or an object, just a nice view... and the fact that in real life, you would have looked at that. In other words, Bosh's Damnation, which is the 10th game in the series, is trying to stick to reality.

The soundtrack is quite good, the mystery is well done too and the voice actors are also good. But the quality of the pictures and the beauty of some are also the strongest points for the game.

I really enjoyed it. Even the hint system is quite interesting.

I recommend it, mainly for those who love solving mysteries.

I recommend this if you like point and click adventures. It's a murder mystery set in Sweden with interesting locations and easy but satisfying puzzles, partly due to the fun hint system which I used a bit too much:)
The visuals are real photo's and look fantastic and along with a weird and wonderful soundtrack create an atmospheric game.
Well worth picking up, especially in a sale.

Just wish the rest of the series was on steam!

I've been hearing positive things about the Carol Reed games for years and was interested to see a couple of the titles show up on Steam.

Bosch's Damnation is a classic point and click (directional arrows to move and drag/drop find-and-use inventory). What makes the game unique is that it is created entirely from still photographs. These are linked together in a way that creates a fairly seamless and very detailed environment to navigate. A map is created as new locations are discovered and used to move between points of interest. There are a handful of characters to be interviewed along the way and these are effectively done with still photos and a check list.

The game takes place in a Swedish city and you end up traversing through a variety of scenes - houses, museums, abandoned buildings, and the Pyramid. The Bosch paintings and the historical detail you encounter are very interesting. The English voice acting is reasonable and subtitles are provided. A manual save system with multiple slots and a hint system (suggesting where you should go or what you should do next) are provided. Puzzles are easy and straight-forward and inventory is used in a manner that makes sense.

Where the game fell flat for me was the story. It is a murder mystery that seemed very loosely threaded together. Puzzle pieces gathered from multiple areas did not come together into a package that was compelling or terribly interesting. Your game time is spent moving between locations, looking for one or two active items in each area. Usually there is one locked door or box that requires three more errands to open. And, at last, when opened... a single item is revealed for use elsewhere. Rather than unraveling a mystery, it felt like a linear exercise in 'find and use.' Items are not accessible to pick up until you discover where they are needed. This means visiting most locations multiple times.

I have to assume that this is one of the weaker titles in the series, as Carol Reed games are generally held in high regard within the adventure gaming community. If you are new to Carol Reed, you might want to try another title as your entry point. If you do play Bosch's Damnation, I would wait for a sale and be prepared to do a lot of fetching...

Although this isn't a spectacular game, it's not a terrible one either. I would recommend if you can find it on sale and you're a fan of the whole pointy-clicky mystery/adventure genre. I wouldn't pay the full $11.99 for it by any means, but with a good sale it's a reasonable time-killer. This is one of those games where an option between "yes" and "no" would be helpful. The "maybe" button would be appropriate.

This is a typical first-person point-and-click mystery that suffers from a somewhat lackluster plot and occasionally tedious locations, but is redeemed in my opinion by the beautiful scenes themselves and an interesting sub-plot that interested me more than the main one (one being a current mystery and the other being a fascinating pseudo-historical background story).

The locations are photographic (rather than animated/graphical) and lovely. However, the locations are also sometimes far more sprawling than they need to be. With 360 degrees of view (four static views per room), if you're someone like me that is used to games that are packed with useable or inspectable objects in every corner, you'll find yourself getting annoyed with the sheer expanses of emptiness. I probably could have finished the game an hour faster if I didn't feel compelled to check every nook and cranny for something, anything, that I could use.

And then, there are times when you finally find something you can interact with, and it turns out it's just there for the hell of it. You can poke it and prod it, but then you have to put it down and move along, all the while wondering why it was even there.

There is full voice acting for this game but they sound absolutely bored out of their minds. Very, very "blah" dialogue.

What to do next isn't always that obvious, but there is a handy in-game guidance system in the form of your player character's notebook (although it would have been nice to see incremental hints; there was one part that I just wanted a quick shove in the right direction and instead it gave me the entire solution to a puzzle in gory detail).

So if you can find it on sale and like this type of game, it's worth a go, especially if you've exhausted your supply of comparable games.

A mellow point-and-click mystery game with real photo graphics and Hieronymus Bosch paintings!

You will probably use the hint function a bit, as some of the objectives and items are not obvious.
I actually overlooked one item, but fortunately it did show up somewhere else.
Kudos to the developer for thinking of that. >.>;

I found it pretty interesting, being partly Swedish myself and curious about the culture.

casual, point click, puzzles. I personally knew about this developer even before this one became available on steam. If you liked this then you'll like the several other games MDNA games has made in the past, makes one every year and there are quite a few if willing to check his website(google it). I've enjoyed the atmosphere and calm relaxing game play it has with how the carol reed world has changed since the very first game. The puzzles are not so easy as you may think. I always find it interesting how others live, even though this is fictional, it's still a look into what's in others homes in Sweden. I'm assuming this is actually the developers home, and i've always been fascinated by how many pc games this guy has collected in that one room...kind of like i have on steam.

This is a nice point-and-click title. I love the real photos that make for a whole new type of adventure game. I felt like I was snooping through people's actual homes. This is a great alternative to the Nancy Drew games now that I've played them all, though I would like it if there was a little less hand-holding at times. Sometimes I'd go for a hint and end up with the entire solution to a puzzle by accident. I'd still recommend this to gamers who like point-and-clicks.

pros

- gorgeous environments are presenting with colorful first-person photographic stills.
- calm and immersive atmosphere in many places
- easy to solve and enjoyable puzzles
- easy to use interface
- a intriguing detective story

cons

- Lack of interactivity many environments and you can't go all places these locations
- Dull voice acting

Beautiful point and click adventure game that is very light on plot and puzzles besides simple inventory- based or "find the key" ones. While the photo-based graphics are immersive, the large world could have been utilized better with more interaction points (there were suprisingly few for a rendered world that large). I do not know a lot of Swedish history, so several of the museum locales were interesting (mannequins?!) but I could only interact with things in 1-2 rooms out of 6 (seriously there were whole rooms with nothing to do in them). The puzzles in these locales weren't related to any of the objects in the rooms, aside from a random abacus and Bosch painting, so could have been done anywhere. It would have been nice to have the puzzles better utilize these locations (maybe I could have learned something). Would recommend in the under $6 range.

Gerhard scared the bajesus outta me! I was like take the diary and runnnn!!!! Very intense. Awesome, point-click adventure game. I need more!