Blacksad: Under the Skin

Blacksad: Under the Skin – A Game Adaptation of the Comic Collection

Blacksad is a collection of comic stories that address many important topics, from racism and extremist ethnic groups to corruption, socialist ideology, and other topics. The announcement of its adaptation in a video game titled Blacksad: Under the Skin was interesting. Made this game Do you offer the appropriate adaptation of the world of Blacksad? And the problems it brings with it? We find out in this test report.

The story begins with the discovery of the body of Joe Dunn, the owner of a boxing gym in New York City, who apparently hanged himself. After Joe Dunn’s suicide, his young student Bobby Yale disappears 15 days before the most important fight in his career as a boxer, in which he will compete for the belt with the current champion Al Stone. In the tournament, he takes on the role of Detective John Blacksad, who takes on the task of searching for Bobby Yale in order to help Sonia Dunn save her father’s club.

The themes raised by the comics, such as racism, are present here, but their role is only secondary, as they are part of the background and nothing more. It’s unfortunate that we didn’t get a more detailed listing of the themes raised by the comics. However, the story remains interesting and difficult to predict as the events start slowly and there are many… Questions: As you start to get an idea of ​​what is happening, you are surprised by a sudden change or a branching of the case. The plot progresses in multiple directions, making solving the mystery a difficult task for the best investigators. This branching and sequence of events keeps things exciting and unexpected.

Technical Issues and Design Shortcomings

When it comes to the technical level, the game has many problems and it can be said that most of its shortcomings are purely technical! Frame drops are very common, environmental elements disappear and sometimes reappear, texts disappear from dialogues, sound effects and some dialogues between characters are missing in many parts, background music sometimes also disappears and we also encountered the problem of the game stopping or The screen went black several times, requiring a restart of the game or return to the main menu.

The world of Blacksad presents its characters in the form of anthropomorphic animals, that is, with a physical appearance similar to humans, and depicting various creatures in this way requires mastery of design, which is exactly what the experience unfortunately lacks. With the exception of John Blacksad the Cat, we see different designs for the other characters, many of which seem plastic, the movement of the lips and the drawn facial features of the characters sometimes look strange and sometimes very funny. Even Blacksad’s movement while walking isn’t smooth and the experience generally requires more refinement in terms of graphics and designs.

Gameplay and Choices

The gameplay experience relies on you wandering the environment and examining the evidence within. There are many facts that you will discover and theories that Blacksad begins to form, and when you have the necessary details, you will be notified of the availability of the ability to reach a new conclusion by connecting the details together and come to a conclusion that is helpful. To advance in the investigation, use Blacksad the cat’s senses to examine the characters’ features during their interrogation, or listen to the heartbeat, its speed and other details to make quick conclusions during the interrogation.

Many of the main events of the experience will not change, but the player’s choices during dialogue affect many other events that can mean the difference between life and death for the characters around you. Your decisions will also affect the ending of the story. There are many occasions when you press the button. The corresponding QTE before time runs out to interact with another character or engage in a fight, and that’s all the experience actually offers in addition to a group of collectible images depicting the most famous athletes (in the world of the game) from baseball players to boxers. These images can be found in the world around you, and some of them may appear clear while others are well hidden.

Blacksad: Under the Skin is a game that is particularly suitable for fans of narrative games similar to the Telltale games because of its exciting story. The experience offers 9 hours of gameplay and provides value for reliving and knowing how events unfold as you make different choices, but it all depends on the extent to which you accept the limited gameplay system and are able to handle the ignoring many technical issues that plague the experience. Finally, we would like to point out that we have completed the review following the release of the update that was issued to address the technical issues. Although it improved the overall experience, the update doesn’t fix many other issues.