The Whispered World
Encyclopedia
The Whispered World is a traditional-style point-and-click adventure game for Microsoft Windows
. It is designed by Marco Hüllen, developed by Daedalic Entertainment, and is published by Deep Silver in Europe and by Viva Media
in the United States. The four-act game takes place in a fantasy world and features a sad 12 year-old clown as its hero. The graphics are 2D
and are all hand-drawn and animated. As of September 2010, the game has a cumulative score of 70/100 and 71% on Metacritic
and GameRankings respectively.
of a young, sad circus-clown named Sadwick. The story starts as he wakes up in his travelling circus trailer after having experienced a recurring nightmare, where he sees the world falling apart.
Sadwick wanders off to a nearby forest and meets Bobby, a Chaski, messenger of the King. Bobby is heading to Corona, the royal floating castle, to deliver a powerful artefact, Whispering Stone, to the king. He claims the end of the world is near and that the land is already breaking apart and that Asgil, hideous horde of underground creatures, are surrounding Corona. He tells Sadwick he has been unsuccessfully seeking an oracle named Shana who may have advice on shortening his trip, and asks Sadwick to help find her. Sadwick believes she could interpret his nightmares and convinces Bobby to give him the Whispering Stone to activate a secret passage that could lead him to Shana. Shortly after Bobby gets scared away and disappears in what Sadwick believes was an Asgil attack. Sadwick manages to locate Shana and finds out that his destiny is to destroy the world.
Shana directs Sadwick to a nearby island to find mysterious Kalida who eventually takes him near Corona. There Sadwick manages to listen in to the plans of Asgil leader Loucaux but gets captured and thrown in a jail cell. After successfully escaping, he manages to board a flying train to Corona, where he meets Bobby again who tells him that he is too late and the king has locked himself in his quarters. After exploring the castle, Sadwick finds a model of planetary system linked with space-and-time itself. He meets the royal astronomer who tells him that the Whispering Stone represents the planet Silentia in the model of 5 planets and that he must repair the system to restore the balance and activate the fountain of Water of Life to wake the king who has fallen ill.
Upon repairing the mechanism, a blue sphere from Sadwick's nightmares appears saying that Sadwick is inevitably ending the world. Trying to prevent that, he jams the planetary system's mechanism and the time itself stops with castle and world breaking into pieces. The asgil attack the castle, but Sadwick manages to trick Loucaux and reactivates the mechanism again, restoring passage of time. He escapes and arrives at king's quarters, where he instead finds familiar settings and a large mirror. Upon looking into the mirror, another boy drags him into a room with two opposite mirrors. The boy explains that in reality Sadwick is this boy lying in a coma in a hospital and that the blue sphere is his father reading him stories. Sadwick then breaks the mirror he came from and wakes up in the real world.
layers. The game is almost exclusively controlled by mouse. The player holds the left mouse button over objects or characters to bring up an interaction menu with "look", "talk", and "use" options. The player may hold the space bar to have the interactive portions of the world, such as objects, highlighted. This shows differently coloured indicators for objects, characters, and travel points.
Sadwick is accompanied by his pet caterpillar Spot who may perform certain actions. Spot can transform into several different forms useful for solving various puzzles. The forms are unlocked as the player progresses through the game.
The game also features an inventory screen accessed by the right mouse button. Objects gathered from the world are stored in Sadwick's backpack. He may then use them in the world or combine with other items.
and 71.40% from GameRankings score aggregators. Overall, the reviews gave the game above average scores, criticizing puzzle design and voice acting, yet praising hand-drawn artwork and emotional story.
Brett Todd from GameSpot
deemed the game as average. He praised the game for "gorgeous [..]" and "beautiful painted scenery and cartoon characters", "dreamlike storyline", and "some good, logical brainteasers." However, he criticized it for "erratic voice acting, including a whiney, nasally protagonist." Although acknowledging "detailed script", he criticized "excessive dialogue" and pointed out that "some of the charm of this dreamy fairytale is lost because there is too much dialogue." He also noted that "[..] many puzzles [..] defy logic" and "common sense is trampled on much of the time."
Darryl from Gaming Union praised The Whispered World as an undoubtedly "beautiful game" with "[..] a wonderful cast of characters and some lush scenery..." However, he criticized its gameplay "[..] in terms of puzzle plausibility", deeming progression as being "[..] down to dumb luck instead of logic."
John Walker
on Eurogamer
praised the game as "absolutely beautiful" with a remarkable, enormous world. He also noted the "splendid writing" and that "jokes are often fantastic, Sadwick's remarks inventively downbeat." However, he criticised the delivery and the "excruciating" voice acting. He also noted "annoying [..] impossibly random moments" with illogical puzzle solutions and often having "no idea what you should be doing next."
Nathaniel Berens from Adventure Gamers praised the "quality of the visual presentation" with "absolutely stunning hand-drawn artwork" and "excellent soundtrack", as well as "charming" and "emotional" story, and Sadwick and Spot as a "uniquely likeable pair". He also noted that "puzzles are generally quite clever", however criticized that "a couple of puzzles make no sense until after you’ve figured them out by accident". He also noted awkward humour and Sadwicks voice. He mentions that The Whispered World is "polished, well-realized adventure in the classic tradition".
During the German Game Developer Award 2009, The Whispered World received six nominations, more than any other title. The game was nominated in "Best German Game of the Year", "Best Game Design," "Best Graphics," "Best Youth Game," "Best Story," and "Best Soundtrack" categories. The game won "Best German Game of the Year" and "Best Story" titles.
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
. It is designed by Marco Hüllen, developed by Daedalic Entertainment, and is published by Deep Silver in Europe and by Viva Media
Viva Media
Viva Media, LLC is a privately owned New York company dedicated to publishing a wide array of interactive content in family entertainment and educational software....
in the United States. The four-act game takes place in a fantasy world and features a sad 12 year-old clown as its hero. The graphics are 2D
2D computer graphics
2D computer graphics is the computer-based generation of digital images—mostly from two-dimensional models and by techniques specific to them...
and are all hand-drawn and animated. As of September 2010, the game has a cumulative score of 70/100 and 71% on Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
and GameRankings respectively.
Plot
The game takes place in Silentia, a dream fantasy worldFantasy world
A fantasy world is a fictional universe used in fantasy novels and games. Typical worlds involve magic or magical abilities and often, but not always, either a medieval or futuristic theme...
of a young, sad circus-clown named Sadwick. The story starts as he wakes up in his travelling circus trailer after having experienced a recurring nightmare, where he sees the world falling apart.
Sadwick wanders off to a nearby forest and meets Bobby, a Chaski, messenger of the King. Bobby is heading to Corona, the royal floating castle, to deliver a powerful artefact, Whispering Stone, to the king. He claims the end of the world is near and that the land is already breaking apart and that Asgil, hideous horde of underground creatures, are surrounding Corona. He tells Sadwick he has been unsuccessfully seeking an oracle named Shana who may have advice on shortening his trip, and asks Sadwick to help find her. Sadwick believes she could interpret his nightmares and convinces Bobby to give him the Whispering Stone to activate a secret passage that could lead him to Shana. Shortly after Bobby gets scared away and disappears in what Sadwick believes was an Asgil attack. Sadwick manages to locate Shana and finds out that his destiny is to destroy the world.
Shana directs Sadwick to a nearby island to find mysterious Kalida who eventually takes him near Corona. There Sadwick manages to listen in to the plans of Asgil leader Loucaux but gets captured and thrown in a jail cell. After successfully escaping, he manages to board a flying train to Corona, where he meets Bobby again who tells him that he is too late and the king has locked himself in his quarters. After exploring the castle, Sadwick finds a model of planetary system linked with space-and-time itself. He meets the royal astronomer who tells him that the Whispering Stone represents the planet Silentia in the model of 5 planets and that he must repair the system to restore the balance and activate the fountain of Water of Life to wake the king who has fallen ill.
Upon repairing the mechanism, a blue sphere from Sadwick's nightmares appears saying that Sadwick is inevitably ending the world. Trying to prevent that, he jams the planetary system's mechanism and the time itself stops with castle and world breaking into pieces. The asgil attack the castle, but Sadwick manages to trick Loucaux and reactivates the mechanism again, restoring passage of time. He escapes and arrives at king's quarters, where he instead finds familiar settings and a large mirror. Upon looking into the mirror, another boy drags him into a room with two opposite mirrors. The boy explains that in reality Sadwick is this boy lying in a coma in a hospital and that the blue sphere is his father reading him stories. Sadwick then breaks the mirror he came from and wakes up in the real world.
Gameplay
The game is made using the Visionaire Studio engine. The game features a 2D scrolling viewport with parallaxParallax
Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight, and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines. The term is derived from the Greek παράλλαξις , meaning "alteration"...
layers. The game is almost exclusively controlled by mouse. The player holds the left mouse button over objects or characters to bring up an interaction menu with "look", "talk", and "use" options. The player may hold the space bar to have the interactive portions of the world, such as objects, highlighted. This shows differently coloured indicators for objects, characters, and travel points.
Sadwick is accompanied by his pet caterpillar Spot who may perform certain actions. Spot can transform into several different forms useful for solving various puzzles. The forms are unlocked as the player progresses through the game.
The game also features an inventory screen accessed by the right mouse button. Objects gathered from the world are stored in Sadwick's backpack. He may then use them in the world or combine with other items.
Development
The game's development began in 2004 as Marco Hüllen's diploma work for Rhein-Sieg Academy of Realistic Visual Arts and Design . He was then hired by now defunct Bad Brain Entertainment and a demo was released in 2005. Bad Brain Entertainment went out of business in 2006 and the game was discontinued and offered to the community to continue as (and only as) a freeware adventure. However in 2007 relatively new Daedalic Entertainment acquired the rights to the project and re-hired Marco Hüllen and the game was subsequently finished and released in 2009.Reception
The Whispered World received 70/100 rating from MetacriticMetacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
and 71.40% from GameRankings score aggregators. Overall, the reviews gave the game above average scores, criticizing puzzle design and voice acting, yet praising hand-drawn artwork and emotional story.
Brett Todd from GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
deemed the game as average. He praised the game for "gorgeous [..]" and "beautiful painted scenery and cartoon characters", "dreamlike storyline", and "some good, logical brainteasers." However, he criticized it for "erratic voice acting, including a whiney, nasally protagonist." Although acknowledging "detailed script", he criticized "excessive dialogue" and pointed out that "some of the charm of this dreamy fairytale is lost because there is too much dialogue." He also noted that "[..] many puzzles [..] defy logic" and "common sense is trampled on much of the time."
Darryl from Gaming Union praised The Whispered World as an undoubtedly "beautiful game" with "[..] a wonderful cast of characters and some lush scenery..." However, he criticized its gameplay "[..] in terms of puzzle plausibility", deeming progression as being "[..] down to dumb luck instead of logic."
John Walker
John Walker (journalist)
John Walker is a British computer games journalist, as well as a cartoonist and TV critic.-Journalism:Walker has contributed to a range of print publications, including PC Gamer , Total Film, Linux Format, Cult TV, Edge, NGamer, Windows XP, PC Plus, Official Xbox Magazine, Gamesmaster and PC...
on Eurogamer
Eurogamer
Eurogamer is a Brighton-based website focused on video games news, reviews, previews and interviews. It is operated by Eurogamer Network Ltd., which was formed in 1999 by brothers Rupert and Nick Loman. Eurogamer has grown to become one of the most important European-based websites focused on...
praised the game as "absolutely beautiful" with a remarkable, enormous world. He also noted the "splendid writing" and that "jokes are often fantastic, Sadwick's remarks inventively downbeat." However, he criticised the delivery and the "excruciating" voice acting. He also noted "annoying [..] impossibly random moments" with illogical puzzle solutions and often having "no idea what you should be doing next."
Nathaniel Berens from Adventure Gamers praised the "quality of the visual presentation" with "absolutely stunning hand-drawn artwork" and "excellent soundtrack", as well as "charming" and "emotional" story, and Sadwick and Spot as a "uniquely likeable pair". He also noted that "puzzles are generally quite clever", however criticized that "a couple of puzzles make no sense until after you’ve figured them out by accident". He also noted awkward humour and Sadwicks voice. He mentions that The Whispered World is "polished, well-realized adventure in the classic tradition".
During the German Game Developer Award 2009, The Whispered World received six nominations, more than any other title. The game was nominated in "Best German Game of the Year", "Best Game Design," "Best Graphics," "Best Youth Game," "Best Story," and "Best Soundtrack" categories. The game won "Best German Game of the Year" and "Best Story" titles.