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dkirschner's 80 Days (PC)

[February 21, 2021 07:42:21 AM]

This is a fantastic homage to the Jules Verne classic. If you've read the book, I think you will get a lot more out of the game (you'll understand more context, the personalities and relationship between Passepartout and Fogg, the one random appearance of Fix in my game, the Chinese opium den scene, etc.). But, essentially, it's an interactive visual novel re-telling of the story. The main change is that it drops the story in more of a steampunk setting. Instead of it being the 18xx of our history, this timeline has airships, commercial submarines, automata, and so on. This makes it different for those who know the original story and inspires wonder all over again.

So, as you might expect, you have 80 days to circumnavigate the globe. As Passepartout, Fogg's loyal servant and valet, you are in charge of choosing your route, managing money and items, talking to people, and keeping Fogg comfortable. As you travel, you can buy and sell items (some of which fetch high prices in specific cities), but are confounded in this by the fact that different modes of transportation allow different numbers of suitcases, so you cannot just carry around all the useful and valuable items. Useful items include those that are part of "sets" (e.g., an altimeter and binoculars for the Airman's Set), which allow you to negotiate ticket prices and departure dates for modes of transportation, or may allow special conversations. Despite that, I never ran out of money until the very end, and I suspect that everyone runs out of money near the very end because the final leg of the journey suspiciously cost me nearly all I had left (a very random amount of $5300 of my $5476 for tickets, which set my heart beating quickly).

Part of the excitement comes in seeing which routes open up as you travel, as your path will be winding! You start in London. I went from there east into Germany (or Prussia? Ouch, my history...). I had a route planned taking the Trans Siberian Railroad, but then decided to go south because I obtained some valuable item that could be sold in Southern Europe somewhere. Long story short, I wound up in the Middle East, headed toward India, and eventually took a wild airship ride all the way to Hong Kong. Then to Japan, then across the Pacific (with much drama, and my favorite part of my playthrough!) to the US. Across the US and over the Atlantic to London in 75 days. I definitely wanted to see other cities (like Singapore) and parts of the world (like the Caribbean and South America), but my time was running out! At some point it really did feel like a mad race to the finish, hoping that I could find efficient and affordable routes to finish within 80 days.

The only thing I didn't like about the game is the conversation system. When you travel, you can talk to drivers, crew, other civilians, and Fogg. You can ask them about cities and routes (that's it) and they often reply with nonsense. "Can you tell me about the route from Atlanta to New York?" "I dare say! You can buy amethyst in Atlanta that sell for a fortune in San Pedro!" "What? Okay, that's not what I asked..." These conversations broke with the otherwise stellar writing. Seriously, playing this is like reading a book. It's so well done. I'm tempted to play it again to see more cities, try for a tough achievement, and read some more great writing. There are achievements for finishing as quickly as 40 days, not using banks (which I only did once just to try it! I would have gotten that achievement!), and not staying in hotels (which means Fogg has to sleep on the street, ha). Maybe sometime!