If you are a player of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, the name The Forgotten City probably tells you something. If not, and for the others, at the end of July 2021, a standalone version of this famous mod was released in 2015 and downloaded more than 3 million times. And what a standalone version!
For players who swear by the Nintendo Switch, note that The Forgotten City will be available on this support in the third quarter of 2021, but that it is already offered on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S.
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View PriceRead ConclusionThe Forgotten City
- Solid writing and ending
- A well-thought-out and well-sized universe
- A working investigation and characters
- Technically a bit dated, especially on the action
- We wouldn't have spat on a few more hours
- Some somewhat complex quest resolutions to dig up
A day in wine
The game mods subsequently transformed into real successful independent games can today be counted on the fingers of a few hands. Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, Dota 2, Counter Strike or The Stanley Parable are some examples. Today, a name is added to this list: The Forgotten City. Like its inspiration, the game of Modern Storyteller (a very small Australian studio of a few people, of which this is the first real game) mixes investigation and exploration.
If your character (whose gender and one of four "careers" you can choose) starts in our time, he will quickly find himself propelled into the heart of a very small secret Roman city from which it is obviously impossible to escape. . Welcomed by the locals, the player will then quickly understand that an enormous weight rests on his shoulders, since he will have to investigate and discover who, among the twenty inhabitants of this strange place, is about to commit a crime.
If he fails in his task, he will see applied the mysterious Golden Rule imposed by a no less mysterious god: whoever commits a crime (murder, theft, etc.) condemns the entire population to be transformed into golden statues . To help him in his mission, the game offers a very practical time travel mechanic. Each time the Golden Rule is broken (by the player or an NPC), it is possible to pass through a time portal which sends the player back to the very beginning of his investigation, but retaining objects and information recovered until here.
Bill Mure
It will therefore be necessary to intelligently exploit this loop to progress in the plot and avoid certain dramas. Like the recent Outer Wilds and Paradise Killer, the player is free to operate as he wishes: almost the entire map is accessible to him from the start, NPCs can be interrogated and their few possessions searched, and most quests can be solved in any order. But despite the possibility of solving certain quests in different ways, The Forgotten City offers a slightly more modest scale, which makes it possible not to feel drowned in quests, places, characters and possibilities.
JVFR
Similarly, and it's a player with a deplorable sense of direction who tells you, thanks to this compact world and a good level design, we get lost very little despite the absence of a map. Same thing on the side of the quests, even if it can happen to make some futile round trips or to turn in circles a few tens of minutes before realizing that the dialogue necessary to progress was hidden behind other dialogues already used. We also appreciate the fairly light and non-intrusive system of indices, and even optional since version 1.1. So much the better, because apart from a few slightly convoluted passages, the game is (too?) simple.
JVFR
JVFR
But these flaws are just a small hiccup in a work otherwise close to perfection in terms of writing and execution. It is not for nothing that the original mod was awarded a Writers Guild Award: the dialogues and characters are very well written and dubbed (and translated) and everything is linked together brilliantly, despite the multiple possible branches and the potential mess that this story of time loop incurs. The icing on the cake, in addition to a few intelligently asked background questions, the end is one of the best and most surprising that we have had the opportunity to see in a while in a video game.
JVFR
The times of death, remember the times of the world
It took us about 8 hours to get the cannon ending (there are four in total). We invite you to do the same and not stop at endings 1 to 3, as the best passages and revelations are found towards the last. The atmosphere and the concept of The Forgotten City work so well that we would have gladly stayed a few more hours in the adventure, but it is the small price to pay to enjoy an adventure mastered from start to finish. 'other.
JVFR
JVFR
Technically, the game is a bit dated, especially in terms of animations and very basic archery combat. But these action phases are few and do not spoil the experience, which is above all based on discussion and investigation. Whether it's the central plot or the more personal concerns of the NPCs, the player is constantly involved without losing interest - even if the dialogue options are not very numerous and most of the choices to operate ultimately have little influence on the scenario. For example, having blocked an NPC by backing them off can easily be reset by performing a time loop.
JVFR
JVFR
The Forgotten City: JVFR's opinion
The Forgotten City is an example of what an investigation story with a time loop twist should be. The full game version of this Skyrim mod offered by Modern Storyteller may be a bit technically lacking and has a few minor flaws and limitations, but almost everything is swept away by the excellence of its writing, its narrative design and of its concept, supported by an excellent atmosphere.
The Forgotten City8
The Forgotten City was a solid mod. Today it is also a very solid game in its own right. The long work (4 years) of its handful of creators (3 main people) has paid off and leads to a very nice game of investigation and exploration. Its memorable writing, its mastered concept based on a time loop and its successful atmosphere quietly compensate for some technical and content limits imposed by an ambition restrained by means that one imagines modest.Most
- Solid writing and ending
- A well-thought-out and well-sized universe
- A working investigation and characters
The lessers
- Technically a bit dated, especially on the action
- We wouldn't have spat on a few more hours
- Some somewhat complex quest resolutions to dig up
Test carried out on PC using a key purchased by us.
