This is the first game I played that made me feel I was merely turning the pages of a pre-programmed novel. There is nothing you can do out of order, nothing to build up (skills or inventory), nothing you can skip (maybe a little bit), no side quests, no rewarding fights.

What is worse, the story is too abstract, too complex. When the game ended, none of the loose ends were resolved.

In short, playing this game is like watching half a movie.

Point and click adventure games are almost (if not already) extinct. Dreamfall does the genre proud. It's pretty easy, and has little action, but that's not the point. It's a fun interactive story with very nice (especially for last generation) graphics. The story is really interesting, and a real treat for people who played the previous games in the series. The locations are varied and well designed. My only complaint, is that it has a cliff hanger ending, and from what I know, there are no plans for a sequal.

This game is a great adventure game. Nice graphics, and it plays well on my xbox 360 system. I added it to my collection of games. It is hard to find, and worth the price.

This is a perplexing game. I'm torn between giving it a high ranking or a low one. It's not easy for me to explain the why's of that either. But sit down. We have some time and I have a story to tell you...

Once there was an adventure game called The Longest Journey. It was an intricate tale of approaching doom. Once there was a woman named April Ryan who could live in two worlds. The Longest Day was that unusual thing in games of the time - it was thoughtful, with a rich plot and any number of interesting characters. Long after I have forgotten what happened, I still remember scenes from the game and the pleasure of playing it. That was in 2000, and I had yet to consider adding a game console to the household entertainment.

Now, it's 2007 and my PS2 and XBOX are faithful companions. I was surprised to discover that, miracle of miracles, a sequel had been made, this game - Dreamfall. Dreamfall recaps the style of the original, in terms of a complicated plot that ranges over two worlds and many cities but with some definite differences. We have a new heroine, Zoë Costanza, who lives in Casablanca in the 23rd Century. While there is a great deal of technology about, society has a carefully studied not quite technical style. This helps minimize the contrast between the world that is Zoë's home (called Stark) and the more medieval world where a good bit of the game takes place - Arcadia.

When Zoë volunteers to help her ex-boyfriend out by picking up a package she little expects that this will catapult her out of a state of self-pitying numbness and into an adventure that will turn her life upside down. Soon we are shifting back and forth between Stark and Arcadia. In the former Zoë struggles to stop a corporation from taking over the world by making us all dreamers. In Arcadia April is trying to stop the Azadis from completing their own conquest of the world and the magic in it.

Gameplay is a bit awkward, but bearably so, but fighting control is inadequate. However, fighting isn't really what the game is about. Like a classic adventure game puzzles are the order of the day. Most are interesting, if surmountable, but there is one and only one way to pick locks and it happens way too often. But once again, it is a pretty game, with strong characters and it's easy to forgive any number of sins. Except for one.

At best, this is a bleak game with an endless supply of dark moments. Hope, of course, is an important factor in the playability of the game. Unfortunately, Dreamfall leaves you very little of that, and ends in a truly depressing cliffhanger. In fact, there's no indication from the game that there is any hope of a continuation. It took a desperate search of the Funcom site to discover that the Norwegian Film Fund, of all things, was going to pay for some number of continuation episodes that might, if we are all very good, appear as a collection some day. And that irritated the heck out of me. After all, who, in this world, needs depressing cliffhangers with only a faint hope of relief?

Well, there you have it. After a great deal of hanky twisting I've decided to recognize the game's artistic merits and give it four stars. But be warned. Also be warned that there are some moments of gratuitous profanity that add nothing to the story or atmosphere and one wind up giving the game an unnecessary Mature rating.

Dreamfall - The Longest Journey is the sequel to the original adventure game named The Longest Journey. This game is more like participating in a 10 hour movie than playing a game, and your primary goal is to watch cut-scenes, solve a puzzle or two, and run on gathering quests.

I'm not saying at all that this is not FUN. The graphics are really immersive and push the XBox to its limits. Each world is fully developed and integrated, with the textures, atmosphere, sounds and visions all merging in together nicely.

The sound is equally well done. The dialogue and voices are simply stellar, Sure, there are one or two exceptions, but in general this game provides a standard that others games could be held against. You really believe these are individual people who have a history and personality.

Like any good novel, there are a TON of characters, each with their own wants, desires, aims and goals. Refreshingly in the gaming world, most of the main characters are female. You start with Zoe, a smart college drop-out who is trying to find a new goal in her life. Her best friend is a savvy computer wiz - a female - who is able to help with all sorts of issues. Another character you play is also female, the leader of her group. It's really great to see so many powerful female characters in one game.

The down side is, for being a "game", there is not a lot of "playing" here. There are a few puzzles worked in. There are an awful lot of "find item X and bring it to place Y" missions. There is combat - but the combat system drove me completely insane. You could block, hit hard or hit soft - and the controls were sluggish and difficult to work with. I think I've played most combat games that are out there, and this rates down near the bottom. Sure, combat isn't a main part of the game, but if you die repeatedly due to a really silly interface, it makes the game not fun.

Another part of the game that gets tedious really quickly is the fact that you somehow don't know where anything is, even in places you apparently live in. You have to search all over to find your best friend's apartment? I can understand when you get into new towns that you have to track down the bar or whatever, but hunting in your own hometown for places you really should know how to find is nonsensical.

The maps in general are very unwieldy. I know they mean to add to the adventure to cause you to search for a half hour to find place X, but it doesn't make the game more fun to do that. It seems like a way for them to claim the game took more than 10 hours to solve, because half the time you're roaming aimlessly on a map looking for something. The other half of the time you're trying to click on the exact right spot to open a door or to perform an action. Aim slightly off, and you could find yourself climbing down a ladder you didn't mean to get on, or heading off into another loading screen.

Again, it's not to say the game is bad. For people who love "playing a novel", and who have a lot of time and patience, this is a really great game. But for gamers who are only alloted 2 hours after homework is done to play something enjoyable - and who then waste 2 hours roaming around a rainy map trying to track down one specific doorway - it can lose its shine very quickly.

Finally, while the game boasts super-long cut scenes and interactive dialogue (where you can be, say, pushy or docile in response to a question), it became a bit excessive. Many choices seemed unreasonable, and in many cases when I chose one option, it ended up doing things I didn't want it to do at all. For example in one situation I tried to be uncooperative and not divulge private information - and the next thing I know, Zoe is blabbing every last detail. It makes for a bit of frustration.

There's going to be a sequel to this, so we'll see if they find the right balance between longer gameplay that involves actual gameplay, instead of adding in even more super-long cut scenes and maps you have to wend your way around for hours on end.