Supreme League of Patriots Issue 1 - A Patriot is Born (PC) Review

The team at No Bull Intentions ('noble'? No 'BS'?) has taken a look at the wide array of themes within previous point and click adventures and attempted to bring something fresh to the table. An honourable concept and one that, in theory, lends itself well to a comedic romp, yet it is ultimately let down by some awkward game design matters and a massive chunk of really hit-and-miss humour.

From the slow pace of every single character, playable or otherwise, to the clumsy user-interface for making use of items collected along the way, it all starts off rather frustrating, and even the range of puzzles either goes from the ridiculously basic to overly obscure, with a hints system that does not always shed any real light on how to complete the main objectives, rather giving innocuous clues as to the final goal itself, which is not always too helpful. The whole shebang does not start smoothly, to say the least.

However, then the script will deliver a quick one-liner that will result in a hearty guffaw - either stemming from the morose British sidekick of Mel or the oafish, bumbling fool that is Kyle, aka the Purple Patriot - followed by a clever piece of gaming wizardry with an impressive conundrum attached. Sadly, though, the laborious to'ing and fro'ing when unsure of where to head next will once more return, followed by more usage of the clunky item combination technique being required (shockingly, it is not possible to use the actual inventory on the lower screen for this, instead having to go into a separate menu option at the top), result in the entire atmosphere of proceedings plummeting in a downwards spiral, fast.

Even the simple task of getting the right individual item to work with something else in the current location is not entirely simplistic - once figured out it is 'useable' but it has been crafted in such a non-user-friendly and unobvious manner that those with less patience will grow frustrated and cut this adventure short before even sampling Issue 2 - Patriot Frames and Issue 3 - Ice Cold in Ellis.

It is a game that wants players to love it, but sadly does itself no favours, and the humour is so forced that it becomes cringe-worthy at times. The aim was to be a pastiche of "pop culture, politics, reality TV, and more", as Press Releases boast, and with a the core story revolving around a TV show called 'America's Got Superpowers,' complete with barely veiled digs at David Hasselhoff and Simon Cowell, it does indeed stay true to its promise. The problem is that the script thinks that it is far funnier than it actually is, delivering only on a handful of occasions.

Then there are the puzzles, some of which are marvellously crafted and require decent quantities of logical thought and feel very satisfying upon completion. However, the quotient of those positives compared to annoyingly pointless back-and-forth tasks and those that are simply so obscure that it becomes a case of trying every permutation of item, person, conversation thread, piece of scenery (ad nauseam) is not as high as it should be. There is just enough potential contained within Issue 1 - A Patriot is Born to warrant interest being held until the final credits in anticipation of what Issue 2 - Patriot Frames has to offer. With any luck, in the words of D:Ream, things can only get better…