Paws of Coal Playthrough - Solve a Rabbit Plague and Break a Strike in this Detective Game
11A playthrough of Paws of Coal, a narrative game where you play as a hedgehog scholar named Charles who gathers evidence and submits reports for various problems against the backdrop of an outbreak of disease amongst rabbits and a strike over said outbreak. Also the king sends word to fix the elevator and go meet him ASAP. This serves as a standalone game for a bigger project called Trip the Ark Fantastic.
The art and worldbuilding looks pretty neat but unfortunately there's a number of problems that make this difficult to recommend outside hardcore enthusiasts of narrative games. For example, the first ten minutes of diagnosing Bates is almost entirely silent with no music and minimal sound (I looped some music from the soundtrack to make it less off-putting). It's easy for your journal to get cluttered with a variety of clues (and sifting through what to uncheck can be bothersome). It also doesn't necessarily update tasks appropriately - for example, if you break up the strike without speaking to Inigo you'll still the task to do so but it's no longer possible (similarly, the ending has three different outcomes for Rowan mashed together). Charles can also get stuck in his talking animation even after conversations are finished that prevent him from rolling (and rolling on the stairs is kind of janky). Since this is a game that you can finish in slightly over an hour (more if you read slowly or have trouble locating a particular NPC to speak with) I'm hesitant to say it's worth $5.
Although learning about this game was nice so that I can keep an eye out to purchase the main game when it releases. My fingers are crossed that I can recommend that one.
You can purchase Paws of Coal at https://store.steampowered.com/app/2368860/Paws_of_Coal/
The demo for Trip the Ark Fantastic (which I haven't played yet) can be tried at https://gamechuck.itch.io/ark-fantastic
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