This is one of those special Indy games that comes around sparingly. It's more of an interactive novel than conventional game, like most point and click adventures. What this adventure does well is in writing, voice acting and art design. It breathes the intricate world and characters to life with a minimalist approach. Each member of the Unavowed has their own motivation and tragic backstory, whether due to the PC or other events surrounding them. The backstories of these characters are gradually unfolded across the missions as you build rapport with them.
The world building is top notch and expanded upon in each mission by introducing new creatures or lore. This makes each mission feel unique despite the typical point and click adventure trappings. You encounter a Dryad, a Dragon, Merfolks, a Fire elemental, Demons, Ghosts and more. My personal favorite was the Brooklyn mission involving the Muse.
Each area feels meticulously and lovingly built. The music does a great job of supporting the atmosphere and tone. You can rightfully critique that most of the music is kinda samey; it is basically melancholy jazz for a majority of the game, but there are a few moments where it shifts to dissonant tension which helps give the dramatic moments more punch.
The issues I have with the game is the lack of impact from player choice and the depth of the puzzles. While it's a cool concept that you can tackle any mission with any combination of companions, it ends up drastically retraining the game play ultimately not making it worth it. The puzzles are never complicated and I rarely felt clever for figuring out the solution. This is because each level had to accommodate any combination of companions and there are limited screens to explore in each mission. It's a shame, because there was potential for a ton of replay ability if each combination of companions could lead to multiple solutions, different areas or complete pivots in mission progression. Instead, the impact of companions feels marginalized. Another issue with this structure is you never know which companions will be best suited for a given mission (ultimately it's irrelevant since most missions pan out the same way regardless of companions) since you need to make a decision before departing on said mission.
While you are given multiple response options in dialogue, you are pigeonholed down a 'good' path, further attenuating any sense of player choice. While I get the reasoning from a narrative standpoint, to role play a more evil character could have lead to more nuanced decisions towards the end of the game. While each origin story is interesting, there is little impact on the narrative or mission progression as a result. You will periodically get a dialogue option based on your profession, but I never found these to be impactful.
This also led to a contrived moment in the plot if you chose a cop profession. Vicki is nearly killed by you at the start of the game and while there is tension between the two of you when you first meet, it feels like a tame response given what happened. She also drops the whole issue before the end of the mission. I think more could have been done by expanding their tension across multiple missions, ultimately leading to her accepting you. It's not poorly written as is, but could have been improved. There isn't a moment like this for the actor profession and I never played the bartender past the prologue.
Overall, while the puzzles may lack depth and feel very similar to any point and click adventure, the game excels with it's writing, acting and art design. It's a shame that player choice didn't have a larger impact on the plot, but it's at least well written and worth experiencing.
