Grim Legends 2: The Song of the Dark Swan

Grim Legends: The Song of the Dark Swan
by Artifex Mundi / Grey Wizard Interactive - September, 2014

Series links:  Grim Legends 1: The Forsaken Bride, Grim Legends 2: The Song of the Dark Swan

Available at:
Big Fish as Collector's Edition / Standard Edition



Your healing skills are world-renowned, and you are summoned to the Kingdom of Eagles to cure a young queen who cannot speak. Just after your arrival, the infant prince is kidnapped, and the queen is accused of dark magic, sentenced to death. Use your herbalism skills to solve puzzles and track down the real culprit. Not everything is as it seems and even the young queen has a dark secret of her own. Bring light back to the Swan Kingdom in this enchanting hidden-object puzzle adventure game.

The Collector’s Edition includes:

• Find the numerous collectibles
  
• Acquire all the achievements
  
• Get soundtracks, wallpapers, cutscenes, and concept art
  
• Bonus chapter
  
• An available Strategy Guide
  

For the Standard Edition

• Strategy Guide
  
• Walkthrough (Big Fish)
  

Click images to enlarge

Looking Very Promising****

BASED ON DEMO

FIRST IMPRESSIONS
A very low key start to the second Grim Legends game. The first reaction is to the graphics, which as stated, don’t feel complete. They in fact look like very cool concept art, and I found myself liking the art just the way it was.

SIGHTS & SOUNDS
The art style clearly echoes the first Grim Legends, The Forsaken Bride. There is that same bold saturated colour, the same rich texture. And some marvellously conceived creations. The voices sound good, but they aren’t synched and their intonation is sometimes off. The music is fabulous and the sounds are quite good. I liked the music designed to build tension in particular.

WHAT’S HAPPENING?
You are a healer called in to assist the queen, who has never spoken. Things go badly wrong from the beginning, and before you can even examine her, her baby is kidnapped and the queen thrown in the dungeon, allegedly for practising dark magic. The king is convinced of her innocence, and begs for your help. The dowager (the queen’s mother-in-law) is, frankly, less than convincing in her grief. In your investigation you begin to discover the history of the kingdom and its neighbour, and how the past plays a part even now in the present. You are not sure just where all this will lead, but it is becoming more and more dangerous.

GAMEPLAY
This game does have a similar style to its predecessor’s gameplay,  with the first Grim Legend. This story too involves the need to manufacture potions and elixirs. There is a herbarium in the notebook to help, and one of the HOPs it is needed to identify a particular herb, which then you must find several of in the scene. Other HOPs include a fragmented object game and progressive silhouettes. All three HOPs require some interaction.

The puzzles are familiar ones given new twists, and they are not all that easy. In fact, I skipped a few. Other areas of interest – an interactive jump map, a directional hint, 3 levels of difficulty, inventory lock, notes with map, objectives, and herbarium. You befriend a swallow which then stays with you to help with those high places. There are also some fun touches, such as the bas relief knight in your bedroom tapping his fingers impatiently, and the baby’s toy.

CE BLING!
There are 31 collectible medical emblems similar to the caduceus, with an indication in the location of whether you have already found this or not.  They are not overly easy to be found. There are achievements, with separated performance and story ones. The HOPs (13) are replayable. There are the usual gallery items – wallpaper (just locations), concept art, videos, music.

COMBINED IMPACT
This promises to be as good a game as the first Grim Legends, in fact, I think it is shaping up to be better yet.

I recommend this game!

I liked the first one, and with the great sale this weekend, I grabbed this as soon as I woke up this morning.  Downloading it now along with Danse Macabre so that should fill my rainy Saturday with happiness.

So what do you think of the latest scandal in the BFG forums about people reviewing the beta version of the game so they can get their reviews published right away?  Apparently some people are pretty annoyed that the reviewer isn't playing the finished version of the demo.

The argument has merits each way. Yes, the reviewer is seeing an earlier version - and usually without the CE features included. And the earlier version has on occasion been very very different.

But there are good things about a beta review too - as long as it is acknowledged as such. believe it or not, most reviewers are keen to get in first mostly because they want their review read, not for the kudos, and there is some pressure in a large forum like BFG for reviewers to review everything instantly so that their readers/fans can make a quick decision about which games to download to demo or to buy outright.

Apart from having the info early, a reviewer also gets to take her time over the details of the game, and so give a better analysis of the game. Including replaying parts. This is because there is no time limit on the games and also there is no pressure. I used to write beta reviews and publish them on the beta page at BFG, but found out they didn't really want us to do that.

I also used to do beta reviews (always acknowledged) for the finished game, until I found out I had goofed completely because a significant detail of the game had been completely altered. So I now write beta reviews for here, and amended ones here and in BFG once I have replayed the demo. Particularly the CE additions.

There was a lot of stink about me writing SE reviews based on the CE too, in fact, I walked away and was going to stop reviewing there, but I knew it is only a certain few, in every forum, who are looking to ruin someone's day.

I am not at all friendly with the person who was attacked yesterday, but she did nothing wrong as far as I could see. And a much better review than what I was capable of then.

I hope it didn't look like I was one of her attackers, I just stated that I preferred actual reviews that told me the facts... just the facts.  I don't care for her style of writing, I find her attempts to be clever kind of annoying but I'm old and as she's mentioned several times, she's young and hot, so we obviously look at things completely different.

Someone else, I think it was Valdy, said that they prefer to just trial the game without reading the reviews so she can view them without others' very strong opinions influencing her.  I know exactly what she means, I've started to dread seeing the ERS logo due to the incredible differences of opinion they always create in the forum.

I understand that you weren't attacking her - and please, on a different topic, well, ... I am aware of how irritating some commentators can be. Intelligent and open discussion of both games and game related topics are the attraction of this smaller but far nicer forum

I also prefer to read others' comments only after I have written my own review. Again, any reviewer who takes herself seriously would probably agree. I have a horror of reflecting someone else's thoughts and not my own.

As I said at BFG, this game was so familiar that at first I thought I had already bought and played it through another gaming portal but it's one of the few that I've ever bothered to beta test and it's also one that I thoroughly enjoyed.

It's funny how we all react so differently to things.  I thought that little bird was charming and I was sad to see it fly away but apparently others are so fed up with the whole idea of helpers that when one shows up, the entire game is ruined.  I remember loving the heck out of that Siamese cat helper about a month or two ago but he also pissed some of the members off.  I'm going to be unhappy if the very loud vocal minority scares the developers into removing them from future games.

Yes, there is room enough for all sorts of games, from horror classics, D&E, fantasy pretties and straight HOGs without a story at all. That some people think that all games published by BFG should meet their specific preference! Don't get me started llol

Luckily for me, I like all of the above, so it is strictly win/win for me!

Well... I finished the game and the bonus.  Maybe I shouldn't have played it all in one sitting but those little fairy voices drove me up the wall.  I still think it's a beautiful game but I could have done without the Cousin It voice.

What I really liked about the game was the inclusion of "adult" material.  Several people died (and I actually felt pretty bad about a couple of them) and the swan king was an adulterer. 

I really didn't like the look of the king married to our swan princess, I thought he was very unattractive.

snapnhiss---is that a picture you made up?   Or is that included somewhere in the
game?  I think its hysterical!!   Your right--this does look like the BF King.    Who I
would not want to be alone with.  

I just bought the same two games you did.   I really like this Grim Legends game.
I had forgotten that I beta'd this,   it must've been a long time.
I immediately do not like King's mamma.    She strikes me as a MIL from the Dark
Magic that she claims to outlaw.     She is pretty quick to want to do away with
DIL.


About Beta's and reviews----CCC forums had a Sneak Preview thread where one's
who had beta'd a game could give a review.
So,    not having been in the forums,    what is the big deal.

By the way,   I am never going to admit to being old,  I'm still hot and can be
curmudgeonly......why limit myself?  

Oh my gosh, this is too funny!!! He does look like the freaky BK dude.

I was over in the Danse Macabre forum at BF. Wow, people can be cruel and it's a wonder reviewers still want to post reviews.
I look for key info (things I like) in anyone's reviews. In lengthy reviews, I'll fast-read over certain parts. I don't care if a review is 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. paragraphs long. I take what I need and move on.

I don't care who posts a review first and more importantly, who gives a flying fig? Evidently, it does bother some people since they're bitching about it.

Goodness, will the drama ever cease? Nope, I don't think so.



Oh yeah, I plan on getting Grim Legends 2!!!