As you may already know i thoroughly enjoy a point and click adventure. They used to be ten a penny on the PC but these days a lot of them get ported over to consoles. Wailing Heights is one such port, the initial premise of multiple playable characters and a 60’s based rock music plot is certainly intriguing, lets see how well it pans out.
Wailing Heights’ plot tells the background of the producer of the 60’s pop band The Deadbeats; otherwise known as Frances Finklestein. After the death of the final member of the band, Finklestein is contacted randomly and asked to produce a remembrance for the band. On the way to the studio, Finklestein ends up in the town of Wailing Heights, whose occupants are the souls of dead people who have come back to life as one of the following; a ghost, vampire, werewolf, or zombie. Unfortunately for Finklestein, he ends up in a police station and has to find a way out and get the Deadbeats back together. You see The Deadbeats have come back reincarnated as a ghost, vampire, werewolf and wait for it…….zombie.
Wailing Heights requires you to point and click your way across the town, talking to the various townsfolk. Through these conversations you’re able to progress the story, receive items, solve puzzles and most importantly, possess dead people. There are quite a few characters you can possess if you find 3 items related to them. This possession outfit is quite clever and excellently delivered, basically the items complete a set of lyrics which allow you to possess someone, then you can interchange between the characters you have possessed. As the Ghost who happens to be a lawyer you can make yourself invisible, as the vampire you can turn into a bat and fly higher than the other characters, as the wolf you can follow a scent to uncover something useful and the zombie…well…. your able to understand the murmurings of the other zombies. In their second forms they are able to traverse quicker across the scenes, in their original forms they are a lot slower which can be a little annoying.
Graphically Wailing Heights is full of spooky hand drawn scenes and uniquely appealing characters. Each characters theme song is very different to another character and they never fail to raise a smile when you switch. The whole musical element of Wailing Heights is fun and adds a lot to the story and general gameplay. The dialogue is witty and delivered with real professionalism, it sounds like the voice actors are having a lot of fun with it. It was an area where Wailing Heights could have fallen flat on its face but entire story is really fun to watch and listen to. The comic panel cutscenes continue the undead theme and also come across very well.
The puzzles can be quite difficult at times, especially when you are trying to possess someone new, there are a few cases where the things you are required to do are confusing. There will be a few occurrences of just using each character you have possession of and end up just using good old-fashioned trial and error with one of the non playable inhabitants. There were a couple of glitches encountered, nothing game shattering and the latest patch seemed to fix most of them.
Wailing Heights is a fun, if at times slightly confusing, challenging point and click game packed full of clever puzzles/witty dialogue that need beating. It’s a very unique and enjoyable experience, if a little on the short side. If you enjoy point and click adventures that require a fair bit of thinking interspersed with some musical charm, then Wailing Heights will surely be top of the pops for you.
REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Playstation 4 code was provided to Bonus Stage for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to press@4gn.co.uk.
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Wailing Heights Review
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Gameplay - 7/10
7/10
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Graphics - 7/10
7/10
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Sound - 7/10
7/10
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Replay Value - 7/10
7/10
User Review
( votes)Overall
Summary
The Deadbeats need reforming, time to get the drum set out.