Having been fans of the Sam and Max series since the first series graced the Xbox Live Arcade back in 2009, we've been waiting for ages for the third season to make it's way onto the service - but then we saw the Sam And Max: The Devil's Playhouse Limited Edition. Coming with all five episodes, a poster and a set of five badges, it provided all the persuasion we needed to take the plunge - especially as the series doesn't require a massive super computer to run fine. My old, decrepit, takes-a-decade-to-turn-on PC does fine - in fact, I'm surprised it hasn't trundled off to join the Computer Obsolescence Prevention Society itself...
All for just £24.99! Or even less if you check Amazon!
Sam And Max follows the adventures of the Freelance Police, an organisation made up of a suit-wearing, country-singing dog called Sam and the hyper-kinetic rabbitty thing, Max. Their adventures are usually crazy at best, and downright weird at worst, and include things like getting Max elected as president, being kidnapped by a load of time-travelling Mariachis and setting their perpetually lonely friend Sybil Pandemic up with a statue of Abraham Lincoln's head.
Their games are best described as point-and-click games - players collect objects, solve puzzles and talk to people to uncover clues and progress the story. Generally, this means you pick up everything in the environment that isn't nailed down and combine items or use them in weird ways to solve the puzzles. New to this game is the ability to swap between Sam and Max, making this the first game where you can control Max - and the reason behind this is that Max has now developed his own special abilities, in the form of psychic powers. For reasons not even Sam understands, Max is now able to channel his new powers through the 'Toys of Power' - a set of childrens' toys that give Max all sorts of crazy abilities. A brightly coloured toy telephone unlocks the ability to teleport to the location of any phone you call; the rhinoplasty, a nose-shaped piece of plasticine that grants Max the ability to shapeshift by picking up a picture of an inanimate object; the playing cards give him the ability to read other characters minds.
In the opening sequences of the first episode, The Penal Zone, you need to place a homing beacon on General Skunkape's back without being spotted in order to transport him back to his prison in the Penal Zone. But you can't just walk up to him and put it on his back - that would be too easy. Instead, you need to find some way to sneak up undetected - by making use of Max's Rhinoplasty. Using the Rhinoplasty on the painting of a potted plant on the wall allows Max to transform into the plant, which is the perfect thing to hide behind without Skunkape noticing - in fact, when he does turn round, he assumes the plant is Girl Stinky's attempt at decorating his spaceship. Before he knows it, he has a homing beacon planted on his back and is holding onto his steering wheel for dear life, trying not to be sucked into the Penal Zone portal.
Telltale usually release their games episodically, splitting them into five parts, each released monthly. Our version of Sam and Max: The Devil's Playhouse had them all on the one DVD, although they were still split into their constituent episodes, each with their own individual stories, which all tie up in the final episode:
Episode 1: The Penal Zone
The season begins with "power mad space-gorilla" General Skunkape coming to Earth, supposedly to spread his message of peace and love, and locate some valuable artifacts - particularly, a toy capable of seeing the future. But Max finds it first, and watches a vision of the future, where Skunkape is out to take over the world - only Sam and Max can stop him and send him back to his prison in The Penal Zone.
Episode 2: The Tomb of Sammun-Mak
After watching some old film reels, Sam and Max learn of their great grandparents, Sameth and Maximus, and what was to become their final escapade. By beating a Nicholas St. Kringle in Mr. Papierwaite's special challenge, Sameth and Maximus are chosen to travel to Egypt to locate the Devil's Toybox, hidden in the Tomb of Sammun-Mak.
Episode 3: They Stole Max's Brain!
Discovering Max's head has been opened and his brain has been removed, Sam sets off on an uncharacteristically savage rampage to locate his friend's brain. His search leads him to a museum where General Skunkape and Papierwaite are fighting over Max's brain and the psychic powers that come with it. With the help of 'The Forgotten Pharaoh' Sammun-Mak, Sam sets about getting his friend's brain back, tracking down the Toys of Power and saving the world.
Episode 4: Beyond The Alley of the Dolls
Surrounded by a hoard of clones of Sam, Sam and Max lose the Devil's Toybox as the pair flee into the nearby Stinky's Diner. Following a secret escape tunnel, they come across a room full of high-tech cloning equipment, all bearing the BoscoTech logo, and suspicion falls with the ghost of Mama Bosco. Although, after a visit to her labs, Sam and Max find out she made the equipment for an unnamed customer - and should be able to put a stop to the hoard, if she can get a new body.
Episode 5: The City That Does Not Sleep
For reasons not yet known, Max has been transformed into a giant monster - to save the city from his wrath, Sam must reverse the changes by finding a way inside Max's body. Once inside, he discovers a giant tumour in Max's brain, which they need to remove to return him to normal. Somehow.
One of the problems - not necessarily with this game, but just with the genre as a whole - is that the sometimes warped logic involved in solving some of the puzzles doesn't come naturally to a lot of people (fortunately, as I was raised on these sort of games I don't suffer too much). Due to the very specific steps required to solve each puzzle, you might find you have the right idea, but it's not working because you've missed a little step out - and it throws you off the track completely. Either that, or you really can't think of how on earth you're supposed to get past a certain bit with just a broken TV aerial, octopus and some custard. Thankfully, Telltale have given you a walking hint machine in the form of Max - if you seem to be lingering too long on one part, he might start giving you vague hints of what to do, and you can always strike up a conversation with him and ask him what you need to do now (although this is more in case you've forgotten where you'd got to). What I did find took a bit of getting used to was making use of the new psychic abilities, and when and where to use them - like often you find you need to use the future-vision goggles to see the future before you can do something in the present.
On a more personal note, I was a bit upset to find Bosco's gone to Las Vegas with the Bluster Blaster, so wasn't around - he was one of my favourite characters to talk to/wind up (the 'Have you got any...?' jokes never got old). Maybe we'll end up have to go and rescue him from T.H.E.M in one of the later episodes or something - if not, he better be back for Season Four or I'll cry.
These days, there's not really that many point-and-click puzzle games out there - and Telltale do an admirable job of keeping the genre alive. And while we were initially a bit sceptical about how Max's new psychic powers would affect the game, we found it was still exactly the same Sam and Max underneath, with plenty of laughs and puzzles, with a weird story to accompany them. With a RRP of just £24.99, the Collector's Edition of Sam and Max: The Devil's Playhouse is well worth the investment - it works out at just £5 per episode, and you get some cool badges too!
Format Reviewed: PC
