Calm Waters Demo

Adventure games have the power to keep you entertained for hours on end without showing an explosion every other minute, and without providing you with a more powerful gun after each stage. As long as you enjoy solving puzzles and exploring the world created by the developers, the journey is all that matters, in addition to all the nice memories you make for yourself along the way.

Calm Waters is a point and click adventure game similar to classics like Broken Sword, in which your goal is to analyze every clue about the characters and the environment in order to solve various puzzles. The gameplay mechanics are not as complex as in most games in the genre, and there is no actual puzzle in the demo to form an opinion, but there's the potential for something nice to come out of it all.

The story is pretty unimpressive, on the other hand, and it is presented in a very rushed manner. Hence, you play the role of Peter Taylor, a man who lost his wife three years ago and suddenly decides to take a vacation somewhere to relax. He chooses a remote island in the middle of the ocean, but it would seem like there’s something wrong with it. More exactly, people go missing and no one has any reaction to it.

As mentioned before, the gameplay mechanics are rather simple, given the fact that all you can do is either use an object or observe it. There are few items lying around as well, which is a tad disappointing in a genre that relies on the player’s interaction with the environment. You can also start conversations with other characters, and it’s quite annoying that you have to click on them again if you wish to find out more about them after one question.

The graphics are pretty simple as well, but it doesn’t really make a difference anyway. As long as the experience itself is fun and engaging, the visual aspect matters a lot less, except that this is not the case here. It may be just a poorly thought out demo, but the lack of content makes it difficult not to observe the horrible animations and the low-quality textures plastered on everything.

All things considered, Calm Waters needs a lot more work before it can be released, especially when it comes to gameplay and the story. The graphics could use an upgrade as well, at least if the other components are not engaging enough to keep the players distracted.