For some reason, Memento Mori — dtp's upcoming 3D adventure — did not seem destined to find us. At its short demonstration at the GC 2007, the presentation computer crashed; one year later, dtp was so busy that they barely had any time to show the mystery thriller, and the intended press conferences between the exhibitions did not take place. Fortunately, now we've finally had the opportunity to thoroughly playtest the game and were present for some recent voice recordings, so at long last we have the chance to offer our first impressions.

Everything begins with a robbery in the Hermitage Museum of Saint Petersburg, one of the largest art museums in the world. It seems like nothing was stolen, but there's a huge commotion. Apparently an insider was amongst the invaders; otherwise it could hardly be explained how they outsmarted the alarms. The situation is especially irritating for Colonel Ostankovic, the chief of the Saint Petersburg police. A scandal is the last thing he needs right now, since he is soon scheduled to receive a medal from the Russian president. For this reason, he sends out his best people, Maxime 'Max' Durand and Larisa 'Lara' Svetlova, to catch the bad guys.

Lara is an ambitious police officer and an expert in art theft, keeping the rungs of the career ladder in such firm consideration that she's already made it up to Interpol. It was she who arrested Max in the past, when he was still a professional art counterfeiter in France. Instead of going to jail, he was instead offered a deal: as long as he remains at the beck and call of Ostankovic, he remains free.

The story picks up the pace early on. In the Hermitage Museum, it turns out that a picture was exchanged for a counterfeit, and it doesn't take long before the first murder occurs. The mysterious cult ‘Ikuinen Nukkuja’ (Finnish for 'The Eternal Sleepers') that is known to swap select pieces of art with counterfeits for unknown reasons rapidly becomes the focus. Connections lead to the 'Angel of Death' and to ‘Ars moriendi’, medieval scriptures about death. Memento Mori is a game for everyone fascinated by conspiracy theories in the vein of X-Files or Dan Brown novels.

In an attempt to tie things to reality, the game designers integrated real places. In addition to the Hermitage Museum and its surrounding Winter Palace, the game also takes players to and the Interpol headquarters in Lyon. Beyond those, players also visit Scotland, Portugal and a remote monastery in Finland.

Unusual for current adventures are the six different possible ways the story can end. Cécile Schneider of dtp obviously didn't want to share exact details with us, but what she told us was that instead of being subtle variants of the same end, the options span from a negative finale to a happy ending. Which version one ends up seeing depends not only on a single decision shortly before the conclusion of the game, but on several key sequences scattered throughout the whole game. Those who want to see a different ending will have to replay large parts of Memento Mori.

Come to mention it, the repeated deviations from a linear game structure is an interesting feature that is rarely encountered today. During our visit, we were able to test a section in Portugal, where Lara has to break into an apartment. She definitely finds the information that she needs in that scene, but there are different ways to progress within the scope of that fixed point. [Small spoiler alert] Depending on the choices made here, someone – whose identity we obviously won't reveal here — will find death or be saved.

At the end of that section, a timer begins to count down, putting the player under pressure to think quickly. Depending on whether one solves a puzzle in this timespan or not, the transition to the next segment takes a different route. In the end, success or failure in such situations helps shape the end of the story.

Graphically, the game is designed entirely in 3D. That's not just restricted to environments and characters, but also includes the inventory. Items in your possession can — and must — be viewed from other perspectives; to find a battery compartment on the back of a radio, for example. The controls here struck us as a touch unwieldy, as instead of turning objects directly with the mouse, one must click on arrows at the edge of the screen.

The visuals of the proprietary 3D engine are convincing. The technology manages to show detailed environments with a lot of real time effects. Occasionally a few rough textures or jagged objects appear, but in the realm of 3D adventure games, this title will probably be one of the prettiest. The playful use of 3D left a very good impression on us. The camera dives in, zooms, and sometimes displays scenes from unusual perspectives. Even in detailed views, such as inspecting the interior of a drawer, one can still swivel the camera to get a better overview. Players can also light up dark corners with the aid of a lighter or other light sources. The split-screen feature is also a nice addition. During specific actions, a 'picture-within-picture' is displayed, showing the action from another perspective simultaneously. It's not relevant for gameplay, but certainly a stylistic enrichment.

Memento Mori is controlled like any familiar classical point-and-click game. The preview version occasionally hiccupped in this regard, but the bug is known to the developers and should be fixed in the released version. The by-now-almost-obligatory hotspot display gives colour-coded insight as to whether the hotspot is necessary to progress or not. The icon-based dialogue system isn't very specific in the options it grants the player, allowing only the opportunity to define the general direction. Should Lara continue in a friendly or negative fashion, or should she ask a question?

Responsible for the music is composer Lumír Hrma, who has also been involved in other Centauri titles before. An atmospheric sample of the game's music can be found in the GC trailer and the soundtrack itself is now available for download. And then there is the fact that the musicians of Oomph! are taking on vocal roles in the game [for the German version only], and we witnessed these recordings in the Düsseldorf studio. The three band members Dero, Crap, and Flux all had lots of fun and proved to be convinced by the game (though as gamers, they prefer other genres). However, many of the game’s other characters, including the two lead protagonists, have been assigned to professional voice actors by dtp.

With the completion of the audio recordings, the release of Memento Mori approaches steadily. The German release should appear on the shelves on Halloween as the first version of the game available. Fans of dark mystery thrillers that like to delve into the world of secret alliances and church conspiracies can look forward to it. The puzzles that we played offered some interesting approaches and the non-linear aspects along with the well-executed use of opportunities granted by a completely 3D engine will probably find supporters. We're curious to see if the full story will be suspenseful to play, as our early look showed it certainly has that potential.


This article was originally published on the German website Adventure-Treff. It has been translated and reprinted here with permission. Translation provided by Neike Taika-Tessaro.