The Last Door: Season 2 - Collector's Edition
Score: 85% ESRB: Not Rated Publisher: Phoenix Online Publishing Developer: The Game Kitchen Media: Download/1 Players: 1 Genre: Puzzle/ Classic/Retro/ Miscellaneous
Graphics & Sound: The Last Door: Season 2 - Collector’s Edition is not going to throw any surprises your way in terms of graphics. Things hit their peak in Season 1. Why? Well, the look is pretty much the point. It’s a retro pixelated look, designed to eschew detail in order to maintain style. The simple, blocky look is one of the game’s strengths, forcing you to imagine and fill in details. This being an atmospheric horror game, those details can be quite disturbing. As with the last season, the sound plays a big part in the experience of The Last Door. At times, there are lonely trills of violin. Other times, it’s soft piano. But when the game really needs to step up the horror, the same instrumental music will step up and the tone will change enough to send shivers up your spine. I will say there seems to be a slight change in tone with the music for this season. Some tracks are rather lighthearted, even pleasant. This might reflect the nature of the story here, and may be trying to convey that the main character of this season is playing more of the detective role than one of a victim trying to find the cause of his fears.
Gameplay: The Last Door: Season 2 - Collector’s Edition drops you in where the last season left off. You play as Doctor Wakefield who is following the footsteps of Devitt, the main character of Season 1. If you played the last season, you may remember that Wakefield is actually Devitt’s physician, and has been trying to help Devitt cope with the nightmares his experiences have brought him. He was helping Devitt cope, at least until Devitt’s mysterious disappearance. Thus begins Wakefield’s quest to find his patient and find answers. The investigation begins with Wakefield traveling to an asylum. There, he looks into the past dealings of Alexandre Du Pre, a character that we met in the last season. His investigation brings him to people who speak of the Veil, and also of a society known as the Playwright. Wakefield diligently follows each lead, but ends up needing the help his friend Kaufman. Kaufman gives a pointed warning, saying that if he would choose to find out the truth about Devitt, he needs to know that he’s going to step into some uncharted territory. Wakefield’s already seen and heard some unexplainable things, so he knows the warning is real. Kaufman has been a little mysterious up until this point, but this is where it tips over. What is his connection to the Veil, to the society? Does he know more than he lets on? Is he pushing Wakefield, or are they both on the same road due a shared curiosity as doctors? It’s this story within a story that is part of what makes this season so compelling to keep playing through. You really want to find out how each relationship plays out in the end. There are some genuine chills to be had here, as always. There was one room in particular in Episode 1 that I really did not want to enter. It’s that feeling of, "Aw, hell no" as you can only see strange things moving at the edge of your candlelight, and you hear something that sounds even worse. Now that’s good stuff. As with the first Season, the episodes here are fairly short. If you go at a fast pace, you’ll probably take an hour on each. Recaps provide an overall summary of the story so far, making it easy to keep track of where you are.
Difficulty: The difficulty of this game has not changed much in The Last Door: Season 2 - Collector’s Edition. Much of the challenge, and unfortunately the frustration, lies in a lack of status or reminders when you’re in the middle of a puzzle. "What was I supposed to be doing again," is a question you may ask yourself if you leave the game and come back. There is also the problem of puzzles that trigger things in other rooms. You may flip a switch and a passage opens, but when there are several rooms, a yard, an attic, etc., you can find yourself searching for the thing you did for several minutes after you did it. That is not necessarily hard, but it’s needlessly frustrating. Again, this is nothing new, and the general feel and difficulty of the game remains fairly consistent. The Last Door will challenge you with riddles, logic puzzles, and other mental challenges. Once you get a feel for it, you can generally figure out what the game wants from you.
Game Mechanics: The Last Door: Season 2 - Collector’s Edition remains very much unchanged in terms of gameplay and mechanics. You’ve got the same point-and-click interface. You will rarely run into an object that is too small or passes by unnoticed. If you need to use it or interact with it, it’s usually clear that you need to do so. Since things remain fairly consistent in terms of gameplay, mechanics, and difficulty, the Second Season’s main draw is the story. Now some will say that the ending is not a true ending, but rather, a cliffhanger. There are some alternate endings you can achieve, but it sounds as if there are only two endings, and you trigger them with just one decision closer to the end. So it seems that the multiple dialogue branches that have popped up here and there throughout the game really are just for fun and do not affect the outcome of the game (apologies, I unfortunately could not play through the game multiple times in order to check). A peak at the Wikipedia page for the game says that the developers are done working on the game for now, and are working on more lucrative projects. The idea of returning to The Last Door sometime in the future has not been ruled out. But that’s the thing, the developers of The Last Door need to eat too. The price for this and the previous season is quite modest. Supporting this game means we may see a return to the wonderful madness that is The Last Door, so I highly recommend you give it a try.
-Fights with Fire, GameVortex Communications AKA Christin Deville
Minimum System Requirements: OS: Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, Processor: Intel Atom 1.6 GHz, Memory: 1 GB RAM, Graphics: Integrated with 64 MB RAM, Storage: 400 MB available space, Additional Notes: Requires Adobe AIR   Test System: Win 10 64bit, 16 GB, Intel Core i7-4720HQ CPU 2.6 GHz, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 M
Related Links: Game Vortex's Coverage of The Last Door The Last Door Official Site The Last Door: Season 1 in Steam Store The Last Door on Wikipedia.org
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