Heaven’s Hope is a point-and-click adventure game that puts players in the role of Talorel, an angel that has fallen from heaven. If you keep up with my reviews here at GiN, you know that this genre isn’t one of my favorites, but that I still jump into it from time to time. Well, this time I wish I would’ve stayed away.
The basic story of Heaven’s Hope is that Talorel falls to Earth while being foolish and needs to make his way back to Heaven. Unfortunately for all of us, his wings burned up in his fall to Earth and his halo has lost its power. Players will have to help him get back to Heaven, but they’ll have to do so while navigating the town of Heaven’s Hope, which is currently under the control of a reborn Inquisition that’s quick to judge anything out of the ordinary as witchcraft.
Honestly, Talorel is one of the most annoying characters in video games. He’s presented as the loveable goofball that can’t do anything right, but having to hold his hand through the entire game just made me hate him. The other main characters, his two angel friends, are just as bad and there’s not a single good voice actor among them. Actually, Talorel’s voice talent is the worst in the game, which just makes it all the more annoying that he’s who you’re stuck with during the entire game.
The idea behind Heaven’s Hope isn’t a bad one, but the game isn’t really all that polished. What I mean is that the puzzles are really easy and there’s not much at all in the way of challenge. Most of the player’s time will be spent listening to various different character’s dialogue, which is available in both English and German, and it’s never really all that interesting. Still, I will admit to there being a couple of interesting scenarios in the game, but they don’t make up for the rest of the experience.
However, the game does have one major feature that I think more point-and-click adventures should consider: fast travel. Players can fast travel to just about any location and it makes it really easy to backtrack and saves a lot of time. I guess you could say it’s a “blessing” from Heaven. *nudge, nudge, wink, wink*
Did that joke feel lame? Like. Really lame? If so, then I managed to capture the essence of Heaven’s Hope’s humor. The game really isn’t funny at all. It tries. It tries very hard, but poor dialogue and voice acting causes just about any possibility of humor to fall flat on its face. This is actually how all dialogue is in the game. Poor voice acting really does a lot to hamper what is already a mediocre-at-best, point-and-click adventure game.
Animations are another problem with Heaven’s Hope that really stick out. The characters are 3D models and they move around on hand-drawn, 2D backgrounds, which are quite beautiful. They don’t really blend into the world well. It gets worse due to stiff, choppy animations anytime something besides walking is going on. It’s sad really because you can tell the developer’s were trying to add charm to their world through the visuals, but it doesn’t really take hold.
I will give Heaven’s Hope this: it has solid background music. There’s often tunes playing in the background that do a good job of setting the mood for the different areas in the game. Other aspects of the sound design, including sound effects, are well done. It just sucks that the voice acting is so bad.
Overall, I can’t really recommend Heaven’s Hope at full price. The gameplay is mediocre, none of the challenges are particularly hard and it has horrible voice acting. Only grab this game if you really love the point-and-click genre, and even then wait for it to go on sale before you do. I’d also recommend turning off the voice acting to make the experience go by quicker and with less annoyances.
Heaven’s Hope earns 2 GiN Gems out of 5!