The Council was released in 2018 by Big Bad Wolf and Focus Home Interactive on PC (and some of the boxy things...). I've not always liked games that have come out under the Focus Home portfolio of games, and so I have been quite wary about playing this game. However, given that most of the games that I haven't liked have been attempts at open-world, I finally decided to give this episodic adventure game a try.

Adventure games used to be THE genre of computer gaming in the long lost past and in recent times, TellTale Games managed to bring back some of its former glory with heart-wrenching and engaging storytelling. That is the key to these games, it is only partly the puzzles... but it really the story and narrative that need to be top-notch to keep a player engaged. This isn't your regular brainless shooter with a flimsy story... there is ONLY story!... and perhaps character development.

The Setup

That is you on the left (Louis de Richet)... and your mother (Sarah Faustine de Richet) on the right! The tutorial drops you into a weird situation where you have been captured and tied up alongside your mother. Apparently you are part the French order of a secretive society known as The Golden Order.

The tutorial also introduces you to the pacing of the game, this is a slow game, relying on reading and listening. You will need to take the time to soak up the ambience of the scenes, and also be ready for some quick time events and dialogue choices. Later in the game, you are introduced to the more developed mechanics of managing your energy and the various potions that can affect your dialogue interactions with the other characters.

However, like any good old murder mystery... you are dumped onto a desolate island, where the secretive Lord Mortimer invites notable historical characters to shape the world's destiny over fancy dinners and parties. Oddly enough, it is your mother that has gone missing...

Just after arrival on the island, you are able to choose a class for the light RPG elements of the game. The class choice only defines which group of skills get an initial boost to the their first levels. Going forward, you are free to develop and pump skills in any way you choose fit!

The Game

The 15 episode (5 season) long involves the usual adventure staples of picking up and finding random stuff to solve puzzles, and most importantly dialogues with the influential characters on the island. Your actions are defined by the skills that you have invested in (these unlock actions and dialogue choices) and the amount of energy that you can expend on them. Your pool of energy is severely restrictive (see the bottom left corner) so you will have to ration them, and spend some potions to maximise their usage. Higher level skills will also have the effect of reducing energy cost, but you don't always have that choice...

Conversations and dialogue choices are the key part of the game and this is where you will definitely be wanting to save your energy points for. The non-verbal puzzles can generally be completed without resorting to skills and energy, so it is best to do that.

Playing the characters weaknesses will also refund some energy, whilst attacking their strengths will give you debuffs. So, discovering these character traits is an imperative and can generally be found by exploring the scenery... or stumbling into them in conversation.

At the end of each episode, you are given the chance to level up. This restores a measly tiny amount of energy, and more importantly the XP that you earnt (depending on your achievements in the episode) allows you to allocate points towards your skills.

You can also discover artifact books throughout the island manor, and upon the resting at the end of each episode, you are given the chance to "read" some of them. These give instant boosts to a particular skill or group of skills, so this is definitely a way to better round out or specialise your character, leaving your previous free allocation of skill points to complete skill levels!

... and speaking of skill levels. It is incredibly difficult to know what sorts of skills you will need going forward. However, the game does seemed to be well designed to allow story progress without having the "perfect" build. However, you do see the missed opportunities in the greyed out choices... and you are left wondering if it was something important that you missed, or some trivial tidbit that doesn't really matter!

Feeding into the skills is a sort of metagame achievement list as well. I'm a little less fond of this, as it a bit of box ticking if you acheive certain metrics in gameplay. Level 1 on everything, complete a episode without a potion, complete an episode by using exactly one of each potion... that sort of thing. Some of the less thought out "achievements" encourage an artificial play-style in order to collect the skill bonus that comes with ticking the box!

Finally, skills can also develop from the progression of the story. I'm not 100 percent sure, but I think you get different skill boosts depending on how you have chosen to progress the story. So, there is no "right" way to collect a bonus, but the type of bonus will depend on how you passed a certain story checkpoint.

Visuals, Sound and Performance

For an adventure game, the visuals and soundscape are actually quite stunning! There is so much though placed into the atmosphere of the game. However, that does mean that you are likely to require something a little beefier than a iGPU to run it.

On my gaming laptop, it had no problem running... but it certainly did get the fans up and running! Not something that I had expected would happen for an adventure game!

My Thoughts

There are interesting little tidbits of information through out The Council about various art and paintings that adorn the walls, plus many allusions to historical events and figures. In the beginning I had thought that it was pretty interesting to learn little things about the artwork (keeping in mind that there was started to be a healthy dose of occultism....). However, when things started to move into areas that I was more familiar with, I noticed that the information was not quite right. So, take the information with a grain of salt... it may just be repeating popular misconceptions in the way of the internet instead of real facts about the objects!

Anyway, little historical griping aside... I really have enjoyed playing The Council. The pacing is slow, but atmospheric... and things rapidly take a turn for the weird! The characters are pretty interesting, and the game mechanic is unusual and takes some getting used to... but it works! The story is engaging and as I had mentioned before, that is what is going to make or break a game of this ilk... so, if you liked any of the TellTale games, or if you just like a good yarn... I can recommend The Council!

Review Specs

Played at 1080p (144Hz) on:

XMG Fusion 15

CPU: Intel Core i7-9750H
RAM: 16 GB
Storage: SSD (SATA/Nvme)
GPU: Nvidia GTX 2070 Max-Q

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