Runaway: Dream of the Turtle

List Price: $29.99 Discount Price: $6.40

Features:

• More than 30 animated characters to control or interact with throughout the story, each with his/her own unique (and sometimes uniquely tongue-in-cheek) personality
• Engrossing plot filled with twists, turns and plenty of hilarious action and dialog
• Nearly 100 locations scattered about the world immerse the player in the rich storyline, including action that takes place in Alaska, Hawaii, underwater or in the sky, in the heart of the jungle, and on board a huge luxury yacht
• 3D graphics engine that immerses the player in each environment, and offers features that include dynamic lighting, atmospheric effects and panoramic perspectives
• Great soundtrack that provides the game a unique atmosphere

Accessories:
PC Gamer (1-year)	Games for Windows: The Official Magazine

Customer Reviews:

A worthy, ambitious sequel and a decent addition to the genre [Posted on 2007-05-19]
Just finished playing Runaway 2. How to describe my experience playing this game?....
Lets start by stating that the game is in many ways a refreshing reminder of the good ol' days of classic Lucas Arts adventures of Monkey Island, Grim Fandango and the likes, particulary the Monkey Island series which it attempts to, without giving much away, even imitate in setting and humor towards the end. Indeed the colorful caricature of the game contrasts with the grim visuals of the more recent typefical releases in the genre. More noticably unlike many of the recent adventure games... it distinguishes itself in attempting to, fairly successfully put more character in the Non-playing 'characters' or NPCs.

Alright, people who have played Runaway will find that all of the above comes as no surprise, since this sequel has all the ingredients the original had; it just goes about spicing some of those a bit more. Of particular note are the more lively graphics, some of the more wittier mono and dialogues and lengthier gameplay. Some of the details on animation are a nice touch, e.g. footsteps in snow fading out (as done in Dreamfall too). Voice acting sways from being good to OK to annoying, with quite a few actors seeming to go through their lines in a very flat tone such that one could picture them reading those. Thankfully your playing character's is the best of the lot. Music and sound effects are of good quality and mostly keep in the background so as not become a distraction. Some of the characters are a bit excessively stereotyped to the point of apearing as cliche's. Puzzles, at the core of any adventure game, mostly follow a twisted logic typical of a comedy adventure. However, in some cases, the triggers to these are obscure, e.g. having to point with an item selected in a particular direction rather than at an object to cause an effect. I also agree with an opinion voiced elsewhere about the puzzles mostly not intricately linked with the story or the overall objective; talk about ..semi-SPOLER .Thus, its mostly piecemeal combinations of inventory items and surrounding objects that reward progress... many important plot advances are indeed made through cutscenes. The ending might also not make everyone happy but was not unexpected if u play knowing how many chapters the game has and the developments made in the latter half of the game.

So, did I enjoy the game or not? Yes, I did. It is very easy to criticize the game on its weak points which would be most unfair to a genre that rarely sees games that are technically polished, yet have a character and decent gameplay. Despite some of the short-comings mentioned above, on the one aspect that it shines through is that it remains true to the classical point-and-click style of the genre, and yet manages to not take itself too seriously. In fact, often places it ridicules the genre on its obvious unrealism of the playing character holding large amounts of items in its inventory...especially through one act towards the very end of the game, where I felt the designers, script writers came out bolder than anywhere else in the game. Another thing to note here is that other than an odd monologue response error or two when clicking on objects, I experienced no bugs, no crashes on my computer.

Bottomline, I do recommend Runaway 2 to true fans of the genre as well as to those of the original. People new to the genre might find it a mixed bag though. This one may not belong with the genre's best due to some noticable weaknesses, but is not far behind either in many respects. Give it a go! 8 out of 10.

fun game [Posted on 2007-11-09]
bought this for my gamer daughter
she says it a challenge but plays it non-stop!

i love part 1 and part 2 delivers [Posted on 2007-12-17]
the game is colorful and the puzzles are cool and fun...only knock is more dialoge than i liked but everything else made up for it.a must play for adventure gamers.hope they make part 3

Ultimately Pointless [Posted on 2007-12-17]
I had fun playing this game, even though the cut scenes were way too long (20 minutes, at one point!). The nice thing is you can pause the cut scenes if you need to. My complaint is the lazy lack of an ending. NOTHING is tied up at the end, except one important task is completed. Then the game basically tells you to stay tuned for the next game. That's lazy and greedy, in my opinion. If they wanted to do another Runaway game, it could have had a different plot, or they could have made this relatively short game longer. By the way, this game was published in 2006, and I just checked the Pendulo website, and no new Runaway release is on the horizon for 2008, so I wouldn't hold my breath waiting to find out how Brian's wacky adventure ends.

Cliffhangers make me cry [Posted on 2008-01-29]
Considering the uncertainty of the game industry and the likelihood of sequels being murdered in their infancy, I haven't been this disappointed in the end of a game since the unfinished end of Still Life. Runaway II built so well, and got me so into the story - I was so excited to see what the final climax would be and then....it ended. With nothing more than a voiceover promise that the rest of the story was to come.

I sat there with my mouth hanging open while the credits rolled, as slowly I realized the story pinnacle I'd spent 16 hours working toward was never going to happen. That's not just bad game design, that's cruel and unusual punishment. If you want to save yourself some pain - don't buy Runaway II until Runaway III comes out.

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