The 7th Guest

1993 Trilobyte
Designed by Graeme Devine, Rob Landeros
Reviewed 1995 August 1

Rating -4 Linearity narrow
Reasonability deductive Connectivity disconnected
Difficulty challenging Relevance weak
Interface 1st paned simple Real-time none

The 7th Guest is a gorgeous looking game, but it is simply a collection of logic puzzles. There's a tiny bit of story, but it has nothing to do with the puzzles, and vice versa. The story is revealed to you in a mostly linear fashion. The puzzles just control the your access to various bits of the story.

Many of the puzzles are old standbys, but at least they're good. You've got to see them first somewhere, and this is a nice packaging. Some are easy, some are moderate. The hardest is not a puzzle, but a board game: you have to beat the computer at attaxx.

I found the story disappointing. The characters and setting start off well, but there is very little development. The lack of player integration makes for no suspense. There's not enough "space" between the puzzles to tell a good story, and not enough interaction to create a good story.



David Tanguay's Game Reviews
Here's a description of all the gobbledygook in these reviews. It's also a bit of an essay on the nature of adventure games.