Reviews of Ken Folletts Pillars of the Earth
Wot I Call up: Ken Follett'southward The Pillars Of The Globe (chapters 1-7)
Laying the foundations
Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth [official site] is a volume which passed me past, even though I've devoured historical novels which must take been sitting mere inches away on the shelves of the library. The activity of the story orbits the building of a cathedral in the boondocks of Kingsbridge in twelfth century England. My experience of the story comes solely from Daedelic'south conversion of the novel into a point-and-click adventure, taking you through intertwining stories from church and state, and allowing you to bend your ain pathway a petty as y'all explore the gorgeous and evocative environments.
The commencement seven chapters of the story comprise a first book of sorts and are at present out with two more sets to follow as function of a flavor pass deal. Here's Wot I Think so far!
In this point and click the story moves between the bespeak of view of the monk, Philip of Gwynedd, the primary architect Tom, and a child Tom meets up with called Jack, who lives with his mother in the forest at the first of the tale. Near of the time you lot're doing traditional signal and clicking, although it has been streamlined in some nice ways. Along the style there are a few points where you get some light rhythm action minigames to see whether you lot execute an activeness well or muck it up. They're not about gating progress, but most giving you another way to brand a choice which felt pleasantly tabletop RPG-ish.
The first affair which struck me was the artwork. You kickoff in a bitter winter and the palette is a similar one to that of The Banner Saga, or the Winterfell parts of Game of Thrones – you lot know the one – muddied with that thin, cold calorie-free which makes the greys greyer. Fifty-fifty though games ofttimes revel in muddy colours, they don't often become total wintertime equally it'due south such an unwelcoming and depressing look, and its novelty makes it peculiarly refreshing.
Equally I made my style through the first seven chapters there's a gradual lightening and brightening as fourth dimension passes but I ended up turning the brightness up early just to help with the visibility. It was a curious moment every bit I found myself conflicted over whether to do so – continuing in low light was uncomfortable, but information technology was besides office of reminding me that this was a 12th century midwinter, so what lite was I expecting?
That sensation of being in a very different historical catamenia was a recurring characteristic. I have a working knowledge of cathedral compages because of my undergraduate caste and The Pillars of the Earth has more than than a few scenes which exhale life into that noesis, tying the end effect to a struggle for construction resources, a need for patience considering the whole thing takes decades (sometimes even centuries), and fleshing out what these buildings were intended to actually Do for the lives of the people of the see. Sometimes The Pillars of the Earth gets clunky on that front, though, with Tom veering from "enthusiastic craftsman" into "pedagogue" while chatting with his kids most edifice. It's non terrible, only a bit bad-mannered.
The sense of existence set at a particular fourth dimension isn't but confined to cathedral architecture – there's a sense of organized religion'south office within the lodge and the general unrest during the Anarchy. Most plain, those aspects of 12th century life are expressed in terms of the variety of people who have taken religious orders and the various allegiances you uncover equally you talk with them. You also get repeated reminders of the brutality of life, the position of women - or indeed anyone considered non powerful in lodge (and brutality/power dynamics/sexual assault around that), the sin attached to kinds of sexuality and living exterior marriage and and then on.
Chatting with Adam (who read the volume a million years agone and played snippets of the game earlier this twelvemonth) nosotros agreed that at that place's sometimes a thin line between an admirable exploration of the cruelties that arise within a setting, historical or otherwise, and a shift into unrelenting grimness. Forth with the wintry palette, the treading of that line is some other way in which the testify reminds me of Game of Thrones. There's enough in common in terms of tone and the positioning of women and other disempowered people that, as with Martin'due south books and the Tv show, I'm a fleck wary of how this game is going to play out on that front. That said, through mine and Adam'south conversation it seems similar the game definitely has its own voice and that the writing squad seem to be approaching critiques of the source textile thoughtfully so it'due south wariness tempered with hope.
Something which was curious to me every bit a newcomer to Follett'south world was that the game feels both light and heavy when information technology comes to the story. I made my way through the 7 chapters in a few hours (probably an afternoon, if I hadn't been taking breaks for other piece of work tasks) and I never felt lost or overwhelmed. In fact I was surprised at the speedy footstep! On the other paw a few things which happened and which my characters would find out well-nigh through letters seemed incredibly dumbo in terms of data and were difficult to weave into the story playing out in front of me given they involved people who only got passing mentions in the dialogue. Information technology's not a big affair, just occasionally I would gloss over a letter thinking it was setting the scene and so find myself a little dislocated in a conversation, or uncertain about the selection I was making. Overall I'd say the result is a positive 1 considering information technology gives yous the impression that the world is built on these hefty foundations and it helps give the sense of a fully realised setting without battering you with lore/historical documents.
I as well want to annotation the streamlining in Daedelic'south interface. I actually appreciated that you never have too many items to go along rails of, all visible by glancing at the bottom of the screen, nor practise you always have a list of more almost 3 tasks. There'south a chance some people might find that a bit on-rails-y only for me information technology helped with keeping the story moving.
At that place'south an dandy twist on the 'look' verb also. When you right click an object, instead of getting a visual description, you hear related thoughts from the graphic symbol you lot're currently controlling - sometimes those are just an assortment which requite you a sense of how the grapheme relates to the earth and its inhabitants, simply other times it's used really effectively to communicate fright or urgency, just showing you the same idea over and over once more. You can besides utilize your bible on objects and people when playing as Philip of Gwynedd, and this often yields a relevant snippet of scripture, which is a nice touch on.
You go to make choices about how the characters human action and in that location seem to exist bodily consequences to those deportment, but I have no idea how much is illusory or superficial given the game would demand to follow the basic major plot beats of the novel. For instance, I definitely got a novice into trouble in my playthrough by choosing to report his misdemeanours. There was a consequence to that action for him in that he got punished but I'one thousand less clear nearly whether that affects anything beyond how I relate to the characters involved. It might take altered how a particular meeting played out in terms of the opinions of the monks (although I call up that meeting concluded upwardly playing out a particular fashion regardless because "story") or it might come up back to seize with teeth me in a afterward set of chapters but I'm not sure how much is flavouring and how much is me doing any of the steering here.
Before I finish I'm just going to get dorsum to the strand of sexual violence in the story which I mentioned in passing a few paragraphs up. The game has a xvi+ PEGI rating which didn't exactly surprise me considering I've read similar historical novels that don't shy away from cruelty and suffering. Equally the game'south rating isn't explicitly given on its Steam page, the art manner and a sense that information technology might be a lighter period piece might wrongfoot some people, especially those not familiar with the sort of grim historical or semi-historical style.
PEGI give their reasoning for the rating as "Realistic looking violence - Strong language" but for me that doesn't impart information virtually sexual violence. The sexual violence in this game is verbally rather than visually explicit, but that doesn't make its impact whatever less forceful. Reading the PEGI description I don't think I would have been able to accurately guess the force of that particular content and so I wanted to make sure I gave a clear "this is a thing which is strongly present in this game" note in case that influences either you buying it for yourself or ownership it for others. I'd need to encounter more of how it plays out across after chapters to know if it's making a more than interesting point than simply underscoring brutality or painting a graphic symbol as an awful person through that violence, though.
In terms of where this opening salvo of game leaves me, I'k interested to see how some of the characters progress and wary of others. The latter is because some of the jerks are and so clearly going to take their douchebaggery too far and I don't trust historical novels to requite people their comeuppance! In terms of where I'yard the most emotionally invested, though, I'd say information technology's actually in the fate of the cathedral. They're so complicated and prone to expense/disaster/overrunning/all of the above and I really want to know if this ane is ever completed!
All of the above bodes well for my interest in future instalments Just it also raises a question. The game is not complete but the volume is so... do I buy and read the bodily volume or not? ARGH!
The Pillars of the Earth: Book One is out now, with two further releases coming in December and early 2018. It'due south bachelor via Steam for Windows, Mac and Linux, and is bought as a full season for £26.99.
Source: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/ken-folletts-the-pillars-of-the-earth-review
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