If you're a veteran PC gamer then you will almost certainly remember the cartoon-style point and click adventures of yesteryear, which were never advertised as action packed graphical marathons but rather heralded for their gripping stories and engrossing atmosphere. The Secret of Monkey Island was one such title, as were the previous three Broken Sword games. The third title in the Broken Sword saga, The Sleeping Dragon, was adventurer George Stobbart's first foray into the 3D world and it met with moderate success - well, enough to justify a fourth instalment when the original idea was that Broken Sword was going to be a trilogy!

There have been some fantastic graphical adventures over the years, such as Grim Fandango and Bladerunner, both acclaimed titles at the time. There are plenty of games that combine action with adventure, but all too often if you're asked what the storyline was about you will only remember the main parts of the story and not the intricate details that made the game something special. If you're anything like me, a new instalment in the Broken Sword saga is something to get excited about, because the adventure genre is one that is not blessed with a thousand clones. However, Broken Sword: Angel of Death takes a slight departure from the genre, because while you do still travel around the world solving mysteries and searching for treasure, there are some action sequences to enjoy here as well.

As usual you take the role of George Stobbart who did have a good job as a Patent Lawyer but since his last adventure, times have been hard and now he makes his income being a Bail Bonds agent. George enters his workplace where his friend Virgil informs him that a woman is waiting for him in his office. With a wry smile on his face, George enters his office and is met by the dazzling beauty of Anne-Maria. She tells him that she has a manuscript that could point to some amazing treasure and also that the Mafia have heard about this and are after her. She wants George to help her decipher the manuscript whilst at the same time save her from the Mob. Soon after the conversation, a bunch of goons can be heard breaking in and there begins the adventure. Funnily enough, the manuscript contains information of the Knights Templar, an organisation that George knows all too well...

The gameplay in Broken Sword is very easy to comprehend, but the puzzles that you deal with along your journey range from the obvious to the oh so very difficult. However, the difficult puzzles always make logical sense - for example using a fireproof cloth to soak up the grease from a sweltering pig that is being cooked in an abattoir then using that same grease to loosen up the rusted wheels of a cabinet! The tasks in this game will test your mettle but after completing one such trial you will feel a real sense of satisfaction. Just like the previous games, each scene or location is like the next level of the game, so what you uncover in Alfonso's Hotel opens up access to another area. The puzzles are usually linked solely to the location they are set in, so you won't need to backtrack between locations too much, and while there are couple of tasks that require you to go to a previous location, it will be a location where you've left your partner. One example is the Bail Bonds Office - Virgil won't speak to you because the Mob broke his imported MP3 Player, but later on after you have been to another location, Virgil perks up and actually offers you some valuable help. This is different when compared to the earlier instalments of Broken Sword, especially the first two, where George could jump from one location to another without too much bother. In Angel of Death you can only travel within a certain number of areas within a country - on the map there seem to be other famous looking landmarks but they are never revealed. So it seems that some additional linearity has been incorporated. I think this help makes you play the game better, but I do miss the random location hopping trying to see if you missed something.

Back at the Bail Bonds site, you and Anne-Maria have to get out of the office and away from the Mafia. The front door is blocked off, so you need to make your way out the back, and once there you realise that you have to climb up through to the top to get to safely. This is where one of many block moving puzzles are set, and they tend to get more complex as you move through the story. With common sense and some trial and error you should be able to breezeblock (get it, breeze-block, I'm not a reviewer by chance I tells ya!) through these kind of puzzles. Quicker than you can say Bails Bonds Bondsman, the next test of problem solving skills is upon you. You have to stop the goons following you, so you need to block the elevator. Logic tells you that you need to put something under the elevator door to stop it shutting and thus moving down a floor to pick up these second rate Sopranos-wannabes. This happens to be a two-person job, so you get Anne-Maria to hold the elevator shutters whilst you put your trusty telescopic golf club underneath. However, while you might have stopped the goons reaching you, you're still no closer to escaping. You notice a rickety old air-conditioning unit that is part of the wall, and using your wit and willpower you pull the unit out and replace it for the golf club. Not only have you found an escape route but you have also acquired your golf club back, which you will undoubtedly need to use again.

Just like its predecessor, Angel of Death features a very intuitive and easy to grip system of interacting with items within your surroundings. Sometimes your characters will move towards the direction of something of interest. Some items can be looked at, whilst others can be moved, picked up or turned on. It is wise to look at something before you choose one of the action icons, because then you will know what you're dealing with. Items of interest don't always make themselves clear either, whilst some items possess more than one action, so sometimes you need to carefully comb an area. This might not appeal to you action fans out there, but with patience and a keen eye you will find what you're looking for whilst also taking in the breathtaking scenery that you are surrounded by. In the previous game there was an icon to listen behind doors, but this is not present in Angel of Death; if you click on a door then George automatically tells you if there are any sounds that can be heard. I found this a little disappointing and thought it was a good addition to Sleeping Dragon, but it's a minor omission.

Hovering over an object will show what can be done with it - often something in your inventory found at the top of the screen can be combined with the object to make it move or work, for example, using a key you took from a bone-crushing machine to operate a forklift truck. Items in your inventory can be combined to make something more useful, plus some items can be investigated further, which usually leads to a discovery that takes you to the next part of the story or in some cases offers up an additional object to your inventory. All the movement within the game, including interacting with your environment, is very easy, and you'll soon be jumping and running like a decathlete! Actions such as jumping across ledges or crawling along pipes are never risky because there is no chance of you falling off to your death, which saves you from stupid and annoying deaths but you could argue it limits the realism. In Broken Sword 1 & 2 there were death and end sequences that differed depending on how you died and what you did, but that's not case here. The game can end prematurely but it usually just ends with a guard shouting at you or you touching something at the wrong time. I think the developers should bring back the end sequences because they give the impression of less linearity in a game and it's always fun to see the different endings, whether it's you being thrown into a river or simply just turning up in a graveyard.

Your character is fully controllable with the mouse and also the arrows keys, which makes walking and running a lot easier - some instances are easier with the mouse and others seem easier to manoeuvre with the arrow keys. The camera makes use of a cinematic viewpoint like Resident Evil, changing when moving between rooms or towards areas of specialist interest. Sometimes the camera follows you, but only in huge areas where you're travelling from left to right. Much like many games that use this camera angle, it is possible to get confused with directions as you run about, but it never results in anything fatal, so it's more of an annoyance than a damaging problem.

George has a PDA, an excellent little tool that not only charts your progress, noting what you have found out, but also allows you to call people and access the Internet. If you can get a signal then you can ring any of the people you have previously taken a number from, so you can continue to annoy a guard you met in Istanbul or even a nun! You can even use it to hack into a system - I'm sure it's a lot easier than it is in real life but it is fun nonetheless. Lobineau, a character who has appeared in previous editions, has barred George from accessing his website, but with George's trusty PDA and your hacking skills you've got Lobineau hacked in no time! You even get a chance to hack into the Vatican server; blasphemy has never felt so good!

The scenery is superb throughout the game, whether it is the eastern delights of Istanbul or the dour, rain-drenched streets of New York where George plies his trade. The characters fit in with their surroundings - even the Elvis wannabe. They are all modelled expertly, including the characters who you may speak to for only a few minutes. Fair enough, some may be a little stereotypical but there is a reason for stereotypes - it's because they actually exist! The characters never grate and often the conversations are comical in a good way, like George putting on his best American accent when speaking to the Swiss Guard. There's an emphasis on strong female characters, although they always seem to be in need of your help! Each location has its own individual tailored background that is noticeable the minute you enter a new area. You may enter a new location within the same country, but the theme is carried on whilst still maintaining some individualism, which I can only applaud.

The lighting and shadow effects are excellent all the way; it really adds to the atmosphere when as you're walking up some creepy steps you see shafts of light from the sun trickle through, bouncing off the steps and George. The playable characters are animated very smoothly too, moving with real vigour whether running up stairs or pushing blocks. However, there are a few graphical glitches that irritate on a technical level but don't affect the experience too much. Sometimes you'll run yourself within a wall and you won't get stuck but it looks weird; furthermore, I do admire George's telekinetic ability where he can push buttons or pick up items when you're not actually close to the object you're performing the action to! The cut scenes are clever and always insightful; they don't feel like they have just been tacked on to increase the action. During these cut scenes borders appear and the camera switches around a lot like you're watching a widescreen movie, which is captivating throughout not only during the cut scenes but also as you try to expose the treasure.

Within the game there are times when some of the puzzles are time-based and you might die if you don't solve them in time. There isn't an autosave facility but you can save at any time, which is a very good thing. Sometimes when you're running it's too hard to manipulate your cursor over an area because the camera angle changes, requiring patience more than anything else. Occasionally you have to run away from someone and due to clicking the wrong area you get caught, but luckily the game doesn't make you replay an entire scene. There are distinctive kinds of puzzles throughout that spice up the gameplay, such as the simple block moving tasks, combining objects and using stealth or teamwork to hide from the enemy. You're not going around killing people, so stealth is needed to ensure that you progress from one area to the next. George and Nico have never proclaimed to be sharpshooters, so guns and weapons don't appear - remember you're using your mind to survive this adventure, not just spraying bullets to get the job done.

The sound in Angel of Death is of the highest calibre and real effort has been put into making it as good as it can be. The effects such as the random pigeon coos feel very real, along with a number of other ambient background sounds that at first you don't even notice, but the longer you spend in an area the more you'll begin to notice the subtle squeaks of a mouse or the rain drumming on a roof. The voice acting is excellent; every voice fits its character, whilst the voices for George, Nico and the Mafia are worth a mention as being particularly great. The voices are a little cliché but they all sound professional and because the dialogue is witty and interesting it never feels tiresome - it made me laugh on plenty of occasions. There are a variety of people to interact with too; the quite sadistic Mafia, your R'n'B mate Virgil, Alfonso the grumpy hotel manager, the playful nun Sister Serene and the action-film-loving priest Brother Mark to name but a few. The music that sets the scene during the breaks sets the mood and the location music works well too, fitting in nicely with the environment. When something important happens the music changes, setting the scene, whether that is one of relief or one of impending danger.

There are more characters in this particular instalment of Broken Sword when compared to others, which is a positive, but it seems like there aren't as many locations. However, the locations you visit are huge and structures such as the hotels and temples you explore are intricately designed with plenty to discover, which makes up for the lack of locations. Changing from one environment to the other without too much backtracking makes you feel like you're making progress, which makes you want to play a little more to see what secrets you can uncover next. The different locations such as Phoenix, Rome, New York and Istanbul also allow for a change of puzzle type that fits in with the scenery, i.e. pushing boxes in a warehouse compared with manipulating levers in a temple, similar puzzles but very different in execution. Along the way you do learn about the Knights Templar, so it's even educational and a very fun way to learn, although of course you have to remember to separate fact from fiction.

I have sung the praises of Angel of Death not only because I love the adventure game genre but because it's a fine example of an adventure game, although there are minor bones of contention that detract from the gameplay. There are times when you might get stuck whilst doing something that seems obvious but for some reason you can't do it; for instance, using a key to operate the forklift but you forgot where you left the key, which can annoy. After persevering through a puzzle that frustrated you though, you feel relieved and get a good sense of satisfaction from beating the puzzle. The block puzzles aren't exactly exciting and the slow pace may deter some players, but the best stories are the ones you've spent the most time deciphering. The story does unfold at a good pace, with various surprises and twists to the tale as you travel around the world. Anne-Maria is an interesting inclusion too, as it seems at the start like she has replaced Nico, although there isn't much sexual tension between her and George compared to George and the always-alluring Nico. For some reason you can't skip to the end of a conversation; you have to wait until every word has been spoken. This is annoying, especially in cases where you're trying to use up all the conversation icons when speaking to someone. There are periods with certain characters where there are still icons present when speaking to them; no matter how many times you speak to them about a subject, the subject matter remains open, so some repetition occurs.

There are points in the game where you can use objects in your inventory as conversation starters or produce a witty comment from George. One example is where George has a knife, and if you combine that with the receptionist then George utters "it's tempting" along with a similarly comical comment if you click the knife on a waiter. Other items simply result in stock phrases such as "I won't do that." I would like to have seen each object in the inventory at least offer a different sound-byte in each location, as there aren't that many objects and it could have produced a lot more entertaining set pieces and ending sequences. I'll use the first X-Files game as a comparison; you could use most of your items in any of the locations, for example pulling your gun out on your Lieutenant or shooting a passer-by. I think this could make an adventure game like this so much better - imagine if you could stab Anne-Maria! It is worth it once I reckon!

Due to the nature of the genre, the gameplay is very linear; you are part of a story and so must progress through each part in order. I would have liked some options in terms of what you could do; the ending would be the same but what you do in locations doesn't have to be a set routine, i.e. more than one way to open a cabinet would be appreciated. This is touched upon a little already, as there is more than one solution to hack the various servers during your journey. Also, because the game only has one ending, the lifespan is quite low no matter how good the story.

Broken Sword: The Angel of Death is an engrossing story that's backed up by excellent visuals and sound that immerse you within the game's setting and locations. The puzzles will push your grey matter and although the pace is slow at times, such is the nature of adventure games. While its old school design might not convert too many new fans to the genre, it is still an excellent game that should be tried by all gamers, particularly those who love a good adventure romp. So all you wannabe discoverers better give this go or I'll set The Knights Templar on you! Meanwhile, I await the next instalment of this always impressive franchise with keen interest.

Reviewed by Christopher McNally for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).