valuating a title like Attentat 1942 is not easy. The videogame born of the collaboration between Charles University and the Czech Academy of Sciences is a particular educational adventure that retraces some events of the second world war through the memories of eight elderly survivors.
The characters we are talking to are fictitious and are interpreted by actors, but what we are told is the result of careful historical research and is part of an educational project called Czechoslovakia 38-89. The result is an atypical videogame, halfway between documentary and adventure, with cross-talk dialogues and tests to be overcome in the best possible way to increase the chances of reaching the truth.
THE SHADOW OF HEYDRICH
Made in the Czech language and subtitled in English, Attentat 1942 takes us back to the assassination of SS general Reinhard Heydrich, killed by Czechoslovak partisans in June 1942. Actually the death of what was for many the most dangerous in Germany was due to an infection treated badly, but this did not detract from the seriousness of an attack that triggered a harsh Nazi retaliation.
And it is with the story of the reaction of the SS that our investigation into the past comes alive, following the stories of a grandmother who has passed many and a grandfather who may have played an important role in the story. From here you
can check out other voices, other memories, historical stories and details packed in a couple of rather intense hours,Effective high-definition footage, raw details, original documents,
comic book objects and flashbacks tell us about rebels, innocents and survivors, all interspersed with interactive sessions that passive viewers suddenly turn us into an active part.Linked to flashbacks, the mini-games are designed to involve us directly in the events of the past, where retracing what happened to the characters we find
ourselves deciphering a document, having to hide something in a few seconds, to reconstruct an article and answer Nazi questions in the best way possible. The mechanics are nothing short of simple and
we are talking about very short game sessions, but increase the involvement, add details to the narrative and are essential to progress allowing us to earn coins that allow us to repeat an interview in order to explore all the crossroads of dialogues, find out the keys to reading the characters, and get as much information as possible. The number of coins made available by minigames is limited, which should be kept in mind,
THE POWER OF HISTORY
Attentat 1942 is a historical tale that becomes a videogame, evokes the clichés of sad educational applications and mixes the languages, using simple but effective comics to tell us about the events of the past.
The shooting is excellent and the acting is almost always good, allowing the historical power of the story to reach us and get involved in a journey in memory decidedly intense.
Intense but unfortunately far from perfect. Despite the simplicity of the code we were baffled by some crashes and sobs during the transitions from one scene to another. In addition, the quality of the drawings is fluctuating while the mini-games are really simple, in some cases enough to be almost negligible.
The audio, however, is of excellent quality and enhances an emotional dimension that serves as the backbone for the title. Among massacred civilians, painful memories and entire villages razed to the ground, we find all the madness and oppression that has made the massive and compact
Nazi occupation a symbol of the abuse. An absolutist abuse, able to transform into monsters or victims people who until recently had lived in a society considered civil. Flashbacks, the documents and the small encyclopaedia that is gradually being fleshed out do not forget all of this, putting us in front of the weaknesses, the cowardice and the suffering of survivors who,
faced with the wrong question, often slam the door in our face, unable to face a maze of memories made of memories, secrets and dramatic events that are not always willingly spoken. All elements of a narrative that never exceeds in crudity,
and this does not surprise us because of the educational intent, but does not make too many discounts, holding a sincerity that is absolutely necessary to credibly describe certain events and give the right weight to the twists. And it is thanks to this that Attentat 1942 is decidedly superior to the vast majority of educational games,
Too bad for the simplicity of dialogue options, probably necessary to ensure full accessibility to all, and shame for the duration really reduced
, not unlike that of a documentary unless you want to examine in detail each document and explore every possibility of dialogue, but on the other hand we are talking about a product of an explicitly modest nature, even in price.
