Saint Kotar

Developed By: Red Martyr Entertainment

Published By: SOEDESCO

Price: £22.99 / $24.99

Adventure, Point-And-Click, Horror

Growing up, I never really considered myself religious, so the idea of horror pertaining to religion only gets to me if there’s something truly wicked. That being said, there’s plenty to enjoy in the horrors of religion, from the dogmatic fervor to the gods’ horrific wrath. Saint Kotar is a narrative driven point-and-click adventure game that tries to tap into such horrors, but can it pull it off? 

Two Religious Men

Saint Kotar takes place in a town called Sveti Kotar, where the people worship Ancient Gods. Two men of more monotheistic belief, Benedek and Nikolay, are here to search for the missing sister of Benedek, Viktoria, who is also Nikolay’s wife. In doing so, they march themselves right into a horrific nightmare filled with strange events and even stranger characters.

Unfortunately, I found the story to be wanting. I was interested in possibly the first hour, wondering where it might lead to, but it didn’t lead to anything exciting or even intriguing. What is worse is that there were points that felt like they’d lead to something worth talking about, but it only amounted to nothing. 

Of course, I can’t forget to mention the characters. I am confident in saying that I don’t think any of the characters in Saint Kotar are likeable or even interesting. The two main leads are both annoying and just outright abhorrent at times. If that was the point, I’m afraid that doesn’t excuse it, for I just didn’t care what happened to anybody, leading to me not caring what happened next. 

Not to mention the fact that the voice acting, most of it at least, is abysmal. Most of the time I’d laugh at the way a line is delivered, or mock it. There are a few good voices, but they are mostly drowned out by the bad. This also makes it hard to care about these characters. 

The Mystery of Saint Kotar

The most interesting part of the story itself is the setting, I would say. The mystique around this strange town actually hooked me for that hour I spoke of. There were times where something bizarre happened, or an actually intriguing concept was brought in. For example, they brought up The King in Yellow, a rather famous book of short horror stories. They introduced them as an actual character, and literally twenty minutes later we killed him by strapping him to a pendulum saw. At least… I think that was him. They also said a cat was the King in Yellow, so things were a bit muddy. 

Saint Kotar, as I’ve said, has these interesting ideas that never fully formed. And it made it all rather dull, so much so that I really had to force myself to play through the game. Even my friends had to force me to do so. 

Part of the problem had to do most likely with just how much nothing happened. Most point-and-click adventure games have at least something interesting or funny happen that grabs your attention, but instead we get the insane ramblings of zealous men. Sometimes we’ll get a disturbing image that will get a few lines out of the character before it’s just gone and done with. It made it hard for me to focus on the story.

I’m not asking for keys jingling in my face all day; I just think the dialogue and turn of events can be improved to keep that pacing going. The dialogue is not only just not that interesting, but sometimes it goes on for way too long on topics that aren’t important. I’d like to delve deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole instead of having Benedek keep telling me this and that is sacrilege and how his sister is a witch. Have us do more instead of talking all the time. 

Puzzling Puzzles

That brings me to the next part, which are the puzzles. There aren’t too many of them, or at least, not too many involved ones. They involve minor interactions, and the only one I can really think of that requires even a smidge of thinking is one near the very end. For example, one puzzle had me looking for a leech that matches the one you have, and it was an annoying travail. If there were not only more puzzles, but better puzzle design, that would serve to at least make things more interesting. 

There was even an interesting mechanic where you can switch between the two lead characters. Sometimes they are in different places, and their interactions can affect the other. Sometimes, when they are in the same place, one character will either have a different item to use, or just see things completely different from the other. For example, one character just sees a lake, while another sees a moon in it that isn’t there. If they utilized that more I feel like the puzzle designs could be improved. 

Gorgeous Moon

Saint Kotar, overall, is a lot of walking, though I will say the environments are rather well done. There aren’t many backgrounds that I would say are boring or even drab. There’s usually some interesting part to it, and if not, then there will be. The entire game is at night, so we do get this beautiful lighting from the moon upon the water of the lake, or poking through the branches of the trees. It creates some gorgeous scenes.

Though I will say, it’s obvious the character models weren’t made to accompany some of the angles. In some instances, you will genuinely see the model squish as they try to make it seem angled like you’re looking down at them. It looks silly, but otherwise the visuals are good.

The game does have nice ambience to join alongside these nice visuals, but they aren’t the best. It’s your basic assortment of night sounds along with forest noises. I wouldn’t say they create much creepy atmosphere, though. Other than that, there really isn’t much to talk about it, to be honest. Just that there are sounds, and they work for what needs to be done. The music is rather forgettable, too. I can’t seem to remember any as I type this out, actually. 

A Shining Rock

Otherwise, for all this game needs to fix to be actually good to me, it’s a rather well-polished game. I didn’t run into anything too game-breaking. What I did run into were nearer to the end and could be easily patched out. They really went through with a fine comb. They actually put attention and love into making sure the game worked well. 

However, that isn’t enough to sway me on what I think is a rather dull adventure. As I said, this was a slog to get through. Every time I got on to play it, I hoped we were near the end. This could’ve been an interesting horror game about zealotry, witchcraft, and faith. Instead, it’s a mundane experience with two main characters I couldn’t care less about. 

There’s good to see in Saint Kotar, but that good was unfortunately very few and far between. Things I wish explored were left to hang in the wind. Things I didn’t care about took the stage for most of the plot. It’s a slow burn experience, but it burned way too slow. I’m usually fairly patient, but this tested that. Despite this, I will be keeping an eye out for what these developers do next. I think they could make something truly intriguing. Sadly, this is not one of those. 

 

Verdict

Not Recommended

 

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Reviewed by Freelance7. Game provided by Red Martyr Entertainment.