Awakening 3: The Goblin Kingdom

Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom
by Boomzap Entertainment - August, 2011

Series links: Awakening 1: The Dreamless Castle, Awakening 2: Moonfell Wood, Awakening 3: The Goblin Kingdom, Awakening 4: The Skyward Castle, Awakening 5: The Sunhook Spire, Awakening Kingdoms "Free-to-Play", Awakening 6: The Redleaf Forest, Awakening 7: The Golden Age

Available at:
Big Fish for PC as Collector's Edition / Standard Edition
iWin for PC as Standard Edition
Steam as Collector's Edition



After overcoming the Dreamless Castle and Moonfell Wood, you  have come to the rugged, mountainous snow-peaked Goblin Kingdom.  Princess Sophia, the only human seen in over a century in this part of  the world, seeks answers from its wise King about the fate of the rest  of her people. But dark portents await: things are not well in the  Kingdom, and dark shadows lurk waiting to trap the unwitting Princess in Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom!

The Collector’s Edition includes:

• Bonus gameplay
  
• Integrated Strategy Guide
  
• Wonderful Wallpapers
  

For the Standard Edition:

• Strategy Guide
  
• Blog Walkthrough (Big Fish)
  

Awakening 3: The Goblin Kingdom (IHOG)

In this third installment of the Awakening series, Princess Sophia journeys to the Goblin Kingdom to meet their wise king.  An evil force watches her every move, however, and Sophia faces dangerous trials as she tries to learn the answer to the burning question: Where have all the humans gone?

Options include Full-screen, Custom Cursor, choice of Normal or Casual Mode, and separate sliders for Sound and Music.  Dutch language also available.

Although there is a running storyline through these games, the intro gives you a brief synopsis of the previous games, meaning that you don't have to have played Dreamless Castle or Moonfell Wood in order to understand the story.  Having played the three back-to-back, it's easy to see the changes that were made to make each game better than the last.

Gameplay:

The Goblin Kingdom beautifully combines adventure, hidden objects, puzzle and story into an experience that feels perfectly-balanced.  The game is split into four chapters, each with its own distinctive environment, but still maintaining the feeling of everything being connected.  There is no MAP, but we have a limited number of scenes that we work with at any given time, so the to-ing and fro-ing is kept to a minimum.

In addition to the standard find-by-list Hidden Object Scenes, we also have a few other types of HOS:  Find by silhouette, put items back into the scene and find x-number of an item (ie. 12 gears).  HOS are lightly-interactive, with yellow items requiring some kind of action before you can find them.

HINTS are refillable, and while there is still no directional hint during the adventure portion, the hints we DO get are more useful than those in the two previous installments.

There are at least 40 Mini-games, and while they all look different, there are some repeating themes, including: identifying differences (not your typical spot-the-differences scenes, though!), solving riddles, tangrams, putting things back together, logic, a couple of different kinds of match-3, deciphering patterns, etc.  (No Simon Says this time!)  There are a few timing-based puzzles, but they're easy-peasy, and all mini-games are SKIPPABLE.

Our Journal documents our journey and will make note of anything unusual (puzzle hints/solutions), and while the Goals tab can contain a bit more story, it also has what I feel are mild spoilers, so I recommend staying away from that part unless you need some help.

Bonus Content:

• 30 in-game Achievements
  
• Integrated Strategy Guide (accessible via the Menu button)
  
• Bonus Chapter
  
• 9 Rewatchable Cutscenes
  
• 6 Music tracks (cannot be saved)
  
• 6 Wallpapers (mostly from cutscenes)
  
• 3 Morphing Concept art (hover mouse over concept to see finished product)
  
• Tangram Mini-game
  

Bonus Chapter:

Immediately upon finishing the game, you will enter the Epilogue (bonus chapter). This seems like the true ending, so I'm glad to have the CE of this one.  Gameplay is just the same as in the main storyline, and doesn't feel at all like it was just tacked on.

Verdict:

This game polishes the best parts of the franchise and combines it into a perfectly-balanced addition to the series.  Despite the fact that we saw the beginnings of actual danger for our heroine, I found Awakening 3: The Goblin Kingdom to be bright and cheery and absolutely delightful.  Recommended!