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Overclocked: A History Of Violence (PC)
By: Adam Waddilove Overclocked is a Psycho-thriller point and click game. But can it scare up some past memories or will it succumb to its own issues? In Overclocked, the adventure game veterans from House of Tales tackle a problem that is as archetypal, as it is topical: violence. Set against the backdrop of a catastrophic thunderstorm raging over New York, Overclocked mixes frightening fictional thriller Elements with real research findings on war simulation and psychology. As a US army psychiatrist, the player is tasked with exploring the memories of several characters as he finds himself in a true psychological thriller. Using innovative narrative structures, Overclocked charts the diffuse areas where memories and illusions, dreams and reality, perpetrators and victims meet and deals with an issue that is as topical as it is ancient: violence. Technically, Overclocked takes the engine from The Moment of Silence to the next level with an innovative character animation system, improved facial expressions, more real-time camera movement, cinematic dialogues and lots of interaction – the results are strong visuals and an involving story. Overclocked is a political psycho-thriller with survival-horror flair that offers thrills, as well as plenty food for thought. Overclocked: A History of Violence Features: PC point and click games have been around for years, from adventure ones like Broken Sword to the comical satire of Sam and Max, there’s always been something for everyone in the genre. Overclocked takes a different approach, putting you in the life of a David McNamara, a shrink who’s life slowly begins to crumble around him. You are sent to New York to investigate 5 teenagers who have been sent to the local mental hospital. As you progress you’ll find out what set them in their deranged state through a large number of flashbacks in which you play as them. However, things aren’t as they seem and the main character has his own problems, his wife decides to file for divorce, his work colleagues act very strangely around him and he has a mysterious past that will be revealed towards the end. It’s all very well done; I actually didn’t put the game down until I was finished with it. However, it does have a few issues. The first being replay value, once you are done with Overclocked, you won’t come back to play it a second time. Also, it’s quite a short game, I was done in a few hours but the methods to get patients to open up to you takes some time to get used to. The usual way is to play a recording from a previous session with another patient to trigger a memory, but things tend to get in David’s way. Odd things like your best friend acting strange on the phone, getting drunk in a bar or having confrontations with a few people in town. You’ll see that David is on a downward spiral and its out of your control, all you can do is try and help the 5 people in the asylum.    Howevcr, I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed with the ending. It just felt like an after-thought, the game seemed to be building upto an epic climax but it didn’t happen. Instead you find out the truth, which did sound somewhat predictable and daft and then...well, I can’t go on without spoiling it but let’s just say it won’t blow you away. It’s a shame, the story building upto the ending is brilliant, you will care about each character and want to know what happens each step of the way. It’s also interesting to see it from the perspective of a shrink, one whose world is crashing down around him. He manages to cope with it during the day, but at night it all seems to go horribly wrong in his head. It’s rare to see such character development; it’s certainly impressive to say the least. Graphically, Overclocked looks a little odd. The character facial models look weird, it’s constantly raining in New York but the rain itself looks great. However the weird thing is that when the game enters a cutscene that isn’t in-engine, the DVD tray goes a little wild, making really odd noises and so forth. This happens every time there’s a cutscene, and there are very frequent. They can happen even for using objects, so expect a noisy PC for when playing the game. Voice-acting is also damn impressive, you’ll notice the vulnerable state of David just in the tone of his voice. Seeing and hearing him going through all the emotions from anger to calm is compelling and the other characters are just as memorable. Some you will hate, while others you will come to care about. It’s an interesting notion and one that’s difficult to get right. The Verdict Overclocked: A History of Violence is a brilliant psychological thriller, even if it a point and click game. The range of emotions with David and the other characters are just outstanding, you will play the game from start to finish and be fairly satisfied. Even if the disc tray starts making weird noises and the ending is disappointing, I hope this is the start of something and that we will see more games that have characters as compelling as these ones. 
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