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Don't speak!

Speak no Evil is a weird game.
Everything starts like in Dawn of the Dead: people are living their lives, our protagonist Alex just quarreled with his mother and left the house to go and watch a movie with his girlfriend, when the world goes to hell. Oh yeah, no premise or explanation, it just happens, but no this time the menace aren't zombies or aliens, but demons.

So here starts a sort of survival game in which we play as the silent protagonist Alex (and silent is not e metaphor since after the prologue he will become mute after a certain event, the title "speak no evil" is clearly a reference to this) as he recruits some survivor to form a band of scavenger in this end of the world bleak scenario.


Save Point + warning: this means boss fight! Let's prepare for the encounter!

The game is centered around battles against these demons, each kind has its own weaknesses and strength and it will be soon clear that to survive it's necessary to use the right attacks to dispatch the opposition quickly. Each character will learn new abilities and attacks as he/she levels up, but this is not enough: each character can also equip different Perks that will alter his/her stats, giving immunities or some abilities like a double attack, improving attack/defense or making the standard attack able to cause elemental damage (and there are different elements, of course). The Perks can be found as loot, or bought and sold at the save point store, and in some cases there are more powerful and costly versions of the same Perk.
The save points will also heal the party after a certain number of combat encounters won (just interact and the save point will tell you!), because there are no healing items or consumables, and the only way to heal is using the skills (luckily more than one party member is a skilled healer).

Healing and other special skills (attacks) cost energy points, and since, as mentioned before, there are no consumables, the only way to recover them (besides the save point restoring power) is to use the "recharge" action in bomcat, that gives some points (10, if I am right) back.
Each character is different, and the same goes for the enemies: to win it's important to do three thing:

- exploit enemy weaknesses (using skills and changing equipment accordingly)
- exploit save points (walk a bit more, and save once more just to be sure!)
- exploit... flee command!

Ok, while the first two are obvious, let me explain the third: there are no random encounters, every opponent is avoidable or it's a boss enemy. The game descriptions tells that it's suggested to avoid encounters, but this isn't always a good idea, since you will miss experience points needed to level up and be strong enough to kill the more dangerous foes. Anyway since the opposition group is randomized, you can flee from combat and re-enter against totally different enemies. So you can clearly exploit this trick.


A concitated combat encounter with a variety of enemies! Victor hits but he's poisoned! Ouch!

There is also optional random loot in some coloured boxes scattered around the levels, but I rarely used them because while it is true that you these can sometimes heal your party, give extra esperience points or some extra points to buy Perks, they can also harm or inflict some bad effects to the characters! And, even worse, in a couple of cases the game froze. Yeah. Sigh, that was awful, so in most cases I ignored them (EXCEPT the blue ones that contains the keys that are necessary to progress on some maps!).

Visually the game is particular because it uses simple custom resources that some players may not like but have a certain charm (for example I like some little details like when Nicole hits Victor, and then his faceset has a black eye!), I mean they give a more realistic and dramatic outlook to the game than the chibi charsets and I like the design and variety of the monsters. Mapping is ok (even if places look a bit empty sometimes), especially for the interiors of the various buildings, that while they do not offer much interaction, at least the places are realistic and fit the urban setting perfectly. For the outdoor areas it's not the same case, especially in the beginning when you have to flee but there are not many explanations about where you are supposed to go, anyway once unlocked the hideout, things becomes clearer and easer to understand. Oh yes, at a certain point you will unlock the hideout that will let you speak with the party members and rest to unlock the next chapter, but you can also revisit old places to grind. Nice.


Uhm ok, this is an horror game some parts made me laugh!

Ok now the bad things: there are some map errors, like darker areas, doors that lead to nothing and railings that overlap the protagonist head, I also experimented some freezes when opening some bexes, like I mentioned before, but also in the main base while triggering one of the first cutscenes. I do not know if this also happened to others, so I won't judge these occasions too severely, because they also happened only once (luckily!).
Finally the music, it's not bad at all, but for example the one that I heard in the office level does not seem very fitting. But yes, this is totally a minor issue, clearly.

Then there is the game concept that you may or not like it: the game is hard, and I'm sure that this is a big turnoff for some less experienced players or those who prefer a more story driven adventure, but I really do not mind, since the idea is well realized, and once you know your enemies things will be easier (ok, boss fights will be a totally different matter, but this is obviouse!).
It's a game where you dire a lot, try and re-try until you are successful, but for example the lack of consumable/money management makes the game somewhat simpler (but still difficult!) for some aspects.

The worst thing are the freezes that happened in some part. I admit to fix a couple of events in order to proceed, it's a shame because otherwise the game would have been perfect for those who enjoyed some


Interlude between two chapters... and there are many of them!

Final Verdict
A survival horror made using Rm2k3? Oh yes and this is a hard, unforgiving game, but mercifully there is no way to screw things (except at the very end!) since you can re-play areas and grind until you are ready. There are also many save points so you usually die if you are unprepared, reload, win and survive... until next combat, probably! It's not a game for everyone, combat is really brutal and unforgiving (the two magi you meet one-shotted my characters before I learned the skill I had to use. Then Alex and Victor one-shotted them in return because they had the right skills to dispose of them!). The enemies are total bastards that can stun or steal energy points, so make no mistake, the game is hardcore and has even an hardcore mode available after finishing it once (for me it's no, thanks! I had enough! But every player is different, isn't it?).

Unfortunately I found some bugs and errors in some parts, some small, others game breaking (like the blue box on the hotel that always ). Pity, because the base idea, graphics are cool, and the story is captivating. There are even some missions that are about collecting food and eradicating monsters, so I'd have given a 3.5 or even 4 if the game had no issues/freezes that meant not being able to progress. I am bit torn, still I will give 3/5 to my experience. Too generous? Maybe, but I liked the story and characters, I appreciated the custom graphics and I find interesting this kind of game even if it may appeal only a selected few. For better or worse this is a game that stands out, so 3/5, an average rating for a game that is not average at all!