Blair Witch Volume 2: The Legend of Coffin Rock Review

Anyways, as I was saying, it doesn't take an art connoisseur to figure out that the game looks uglier than its predecessor. The programmers have even neglected to include the animated leaves that added so much to the atmosphere in Vol. 1. Even the lighting and the shadows are not nearly as realistic as they should be considering the Nocturne's past track record.

But wait, if you thought a few bugs and poor visual appearance are the things that did it for me, you got it all wrong! No, my friends, it's not the graphics and the wacky bugs, it's the complete and total lack of gameplay!!! Yep, Vol. 2 strikes me more like an interactive movie trailer than a full-blown PC game. Instead of going the right, adventure route, Human Head opted to make an action game?? Ugh, playing an action game powered by the Nocturne engine is just stupid! The aiming is terrible, the game pace is dreadfully slow, and well it's like trying to play an action game set in one of the Sierra's old adventure worlds. You know, any of the Quest series. Hmm, I'll just say this one more time, and then I'll shut up about it - Nocturne engine is a nice adventure engine, but please don't ever consider making an action game with it! What upset me even more, bearing in mind how Rune had such an outstanding gameplay is that besides the awkward action game controls and cameras, Vol. 2 action scenes just had no gameplay depth whatsoever! The action consists of constantly shooting or slashing ghosts and stick creatures, and running across an occasional boss or two. Figuring out how to kill those is a breeze, since there's absolutely no mental activity required to get past the action scenes. The average interactive ghost encounters last about a minute (or the time it takes our Editor Dex to wrap it up with his girlfriend). The rest of it is just non-interactive scripted scenes in which Lazarus discovers the awful things that happened to him in the past...

Let me just say in closing that I have often wondered in the last couple of days how can a company like Human Head, that made such a great game like Rune, excrete such a pile of smelly nasty stuff like Blair Witch: Vol. 2. What ever possessed you guys to make such a crappy game??

Oh yeah, forgot to mention the story... In case you haven't read it in a preview somewhere, our boy Lazarus was "found in the woods near Burkettsville during the time of the Civil War with a huge lump on his head and no recollection of the past events. He's taken in and nurtured 'till he's well by an old lady who knows a whole lot about the "haunted woods." She gives him the name, Lazarus -- as that biblical character who rose from the dead, and lets him crash at "her crib for a while." As the woods would have it, our boy Lazarus has developed some kind of a telepathic connection with an old hag from the woods, and he suffers from constant flashbacks that cast the player in the role of 'Lazarus,' the Gettysburg veteran commanding a squad of Union soldiers that went into the woods and mysteriously disappeared. If you ever watched Highlander, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. The constant Highlanderish flashback movie dramatics are a nice touch, and should've been exploited more, but they simply fall under the "shoot for a minute, and then run around the woods like crazy" category, and really blend into the sub par overall impression of the game. I won't give away too much of the story, as it is about the only thing that could get a few players (spectators) going, but I'll just tell you that the real trouble starts when the town's search party and Lazarus go separately looking for a little girl that disappeared in the woods. If you ever watched the Blair Witch movie you damn well know what happened to those men at Coffin Rock. Unpleasant, very unpleasant...

I know; it was that damn Blair Witch. She got to you too!