Sam & Max — The Chaotic Team Has Now Also Made Virtual Reality Unsafe
Maybe some of you still know the adventures of Sam & Max. I accompanied the dynamic duo for you in VR.
Sam & Max are back. The dream team is now also trying to put a stop to the villains in virtual reality. With “Sam & Max: This Time It’s Virtual”, their first VR adventure was released today. The dog with the hat and the violence-prone rabbit captivate here with a quick-witted humor and NPCs that couldn’t be crazier. I have now joined the Freenlance Police as a cadet and will write a detailed report for you on what to expect and how the duo is doing in virtual reality. So put on your headset and get down to police training.
History lesson
Sam & Max are already well known in the video game scene. From once a series of short comic book appearances, the creator of Sam & Max got the chance to bring the crazy team to life as a video game. The first Sam & Max game was released in 1993 under LucasArts and was called “Sam & Max — Hit the Road”. The game quickly became a hit and the iconic duo thrived on their harsh humor and crazy cases they had to solve as freelance police. This was unfortunately followed by years of failures. Newly announced Sam & Max games were gradually abandoned and canceled, and the duo fell more and more into oblivion. Until 2007, when Telltale finally broke the curse and brought the two investigators back into the spotlight with two consecutive games (Sam & Max: Save the World and Sam & Max: Beyond Time and Space).
In 2010, Telltale released another game called “Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playhouse”. All games received top ratings and yet the series disappeared again for almost 10 years. Then in 2020, a remastered version of “Sam & Max: Save the World” was released and is available on Steam and on the Nintendo Switch. But now in 2021 we can also experience the two dopey cops in VR. With “Sam & Max: This Time It’s Virtual” their first VR adventure is released today on 08.07.2021, and we will test it for you. The good thing is that the Sam & Max creator and many people who also worked on the first adventure of our furry friends in the 90’s are back on board. That includes the original voices of Sam & Max.
Gameplay
The gameplay consists of various training missions, which are supposed to turn you into a real freelance policeman. On the other hand, there are investigation sections, where you have to solve various puzzles to advance your case. The training missions mostly just consist of a sequence of small mini-games that you’ll have to complete within a small time window, or you’ll have to dodge various things to increase your chance of survival as a servant of the law. Unfortunately, most of these mini-games are rather boring or frustrating. I often wished during my play session that various minigames would just end. A couple of them really dragged on and sometimes didn’t prepare me at all for various game mechanics I encountered within the game.
The investigation sections, on the other hand, were quite good. You try to solve various puzzles in order to unfold the whole story. And these puzzles are not always easy. Often, though, I would have liked to bite into Sam’s virtual desk, as some of the solutions are not logical. And the hints you get from Sam and Max don’t always help you either. I did manage to bite my way through some frustrating situations, but often the fun fell by the wayside. However, the amiable chaotic characters make many situations bearable with their quick-witted humor.
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Something for the eyes?
Graphically, the game is okay.Unfortunately, you notice the limitations, since this is also a Quest game and it has to run smoothly on the older Quest 1hardware. Nevertheless, the graphics here and there are nice enough and the character models of all figures look good. Everything fits into the universe of Sam & Max without standing out like a sour thumb. The office of the two investigators, for example, was very lovingly transported into virtual reality and it’s fun to be in the world of Sam & Max. From time to time, however, some areas seem rather reduced to the bare minimum and I would have liked to see more details and a more lively world. Also larger freely explorable areas and more interaction with NPCs would be great and this is unfortunately very lacking. But that would have also blown the budget of the game many times over. But one can still dream.
The game will also be released soon on Steam as well and I’ll see if there are any graphics differences. But basically it seems like the game was mainly designed to run on the Quest 1.
Just something for fans?
Now we come to the hard part. I’ve never played a Sam & Max game before, so I watched a full playthrough of Sam & Max — Hit the Road (thanks to Day9) and fell right in love with the two crazy characters. Sam & Max are just adorable and the dry and ironic humor really carry the game here on their shoulders. And yes, the humor is not made for everyone and so the game is not designed for the masses either. But unfortunately, you can’t build a game solely on nostalgia and its main characters. The entire concept has to be right, and the developers unfortunately sailed right past that. While some missions are fun, others seem like a set-up mini-game collection.
Is the game worth a look? Yes, but don’t expect a fully thought-out detective game here, where you solve complex cases and set up big investigations. It’s more of a light-hearted game with a lot of humor and various mini-games, spiced up with smaller puzzle sections. Fans of the series will definitely get their money’s worth, where newer players will have to get used to Sam & Max’s honest humor first. I like the two daredevils and had a lot of fun at times and would even wish for a sequel at some point.
Language barrier
For those of you who don’t speak English, the game can become quite a problem and you should wait for a language update. Many puzzles are not easy to solve and you will always get hints from your fellow players on how to solve them. And the humor of Sam & Max also falls by the wayside if you can’t understand a word. All that’s left then is a mini-game collection with very frustrating puzzle sections. That’s why I can’t recommend the game at launch to anyone who doesn’t have a good command of English. There are subtitles, but they are only available in English. Maybe helpful for some, but without English language skills you will be left behind. However, the developers have already announced that more languages will soon be added to the subtitle selection. Among them are German, Spanish, etc.
Conclusion: Fun and frustration balance each other out
Unfortunately, the game could not fully convince me. I had a lot of fun in parts, but in some other game situations a lot of frustration or even boredom set in. Instead of a never-ending sequence of small mini-games, I would have preferred a sequence like in Accounting+, where there would have been more story elements and even more of the Sam & Max humor. Because it’s the humor and the two main characters that the game thrives on. The rest is just okay in my eyes. Some mini-games are fun, others are just hair-raising and you’re glad when it’s over. That’s how I felt most of the time, especially during the training missions. The game offers around 4–7 hours of gameplay and I would have rather done without an hour of it for a snappier flow and less annoying minigames.
The humor and charm of Sam & Max have been preserved and I’m very happy about that, even if not everyone will get along with the dark humor of the two. But the game is worth a look for every Sam & Max fan and also for those who want to become one. I do hope that we’ll get a sequel at some point that focuses more on the characters, interactions and puzzles, rather than a big mini-game collection. But it’s also hard to port a point and click adventure into virtual reality. And even with a bigger budget, I’m sure more could have been done. I would just like to see more story elements that are also fun. Maybe a little city tour with Sam & Max, where you can see different, crazy things on the side. Stealth elements. And much more.
But that would require a larger team and a much bigger budget. But one can still dream. Still, the game is pretty solid, but not for everyone. I’m glad to have played it, though, and to be able to face Sam & Max almost for real.
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