Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror

Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror is a point-and-click adventure game released for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation. Revolution Software released a remastered edition for iOS devices in late 2010 with Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows ports following in early 2011. It sold about 1,000,000 copies according to Charles Cecil in the mid-90's. ^[2]

The game opens with George Stobbart witnessing the kidnapping of his girlfriend, Nicole Collard. From here follows an adventure involving a conspiracy revolving around a forthcoming solar eclipse.

Gameplay

The Smoking Mirror is a point-and-click adventure game that is, the user primarily used his mouse to navigate and interact with the game world. The game is centred around solving a number of puzzles in order to advance the story-line.

The game uses animated 2D graphics. The game world is separated into several zones. At a time, player may find himself travelling along several zones to solve puzzles. The user controls a single character, who may travel within and between zones. For the majority of the game the player controls George, and at times controlling Nicole.

The game uses an inventory system. The player may attempt to use any item within the game world or on another item. The items cannot be destroyed or wrongly used. However, the player can die. Several events within the game require the player to perform a sequence of timed actions.

The player may talk to other characters in the game. A list of topics is provided that the character may inquire about. Advancing in story-line, acquiring and using items often opens additional conversation options.

Plot

The game opens with a narration from George Stobbart, the protagonist of the series, explaining that he has been away from Paris for nearly six months, and has reunited with girlfriend Nicole Collard. Despite George's wishes to celebrate, Nico instead wishes the two to visit an archaeologist, Professor Oubier, who can tell them more about a mysterious Mayan stone Nico uncovered while researching a story. George has suspicions about the visit, which are proven correct when they are ambushed by two Central Americans, who proceed to shoot Nico with a poison dart and take her away. To deal with George they tie him to a chair and leave him at the mercy of a menacing poisonous spider and a freshly started fire. The scene is juxtaposed with a Mesoamerican sacrifice to Tezcatlipoca.

Using the environment around him, George manages to untie himself, crush the spider by knocking over a bookcase onto it, and putting out the fire. While he has been locked in the house, he uses a note from Nico's handbag (which she dropped during the struggle at the beginning) to contact Andre Lobineau, whom he meets at a cafe in Montfaucon square. Lobineau reveals that Nico suspected something would go wrong and entrusted the stone to him because of this. He refuses to give the stone to George, citing the reason as not wanting George's death on his conscience. After George shows him a Mayan pot that he found in Oubier's house, Lobineau tells of a friend of his that owns a gallery and can tell him more about Mayan art.

At the Glease Gallery, the protagonist discovers that Oubier supplies the gallery with Mayan artifacts and imports the artifacts at a docks in Marseille through a company named Condor Transglobal. Following this lead, George heads to the docks in Marseille. After slipping past a dock guard with a particularly vicious guard dog, George finds the warehouse at the end of a wharf. Looking through the window reveals that the men inside the warehouse are the two Central Americans who kidnapped Nico at the beginning of the game. One of them, later revealed to be called Pablo, is shown to be threatening and berating the other (later revealed to be called Titipoco) constantly. George goads Pablo out of the warehouse and knocks him out using a barrel lift from a neighboring warehouse. Making his way into the warehouse, he discovers that Condor Transglobal has links with a city in Central America called Quaramonte City, and frees Titipoco, who had been manacled by Pablo. Making his way to the second floor, George discovers Nico in a hidden room. After freeing her, Nico reveals to George that while trying to expose a drug ring, she was sent the stone instead, prompting her to arrange the appointment with Oubier. The drug ring is led by a fearful man named Karzac, who apparently made even Pablo uneasy. The two escape the warehouse and after retrieving the Mayan stone from Lobineau decide to head to Quaramonte City in hopes of finding Condor Transglobal and uncovering more.

Upon reaching the city they discover that it is ruled under a dictatorial regime by 'Madame La Presidente' Grasiento, and that there are no Condor Transglobal offices there. The two finally meet Professor Oubier, who is talking to the chief of police, Raoul 'The General' Grasiento, over a mysterious chart. Away from the General's presence, George confronts Oubier about his girlfriend's abduction. The professor claims he knows nothing, and that he has not been back to Paris in months. George also meets Pearl and Duane, whom he met previously in Syria. Duane states that he is still working for the CIA and has travelled to Quaramonte to bust a local agitator, Miguel, out of jail using a bomb in the back of his truck, but he forgot a detonator. George helps by getting General Grasiento and his deputy Ronaldo out of the way, he tells the general that Nico wants to interview him and so the General takes her to his apartment whilst George persuades Ronaldo to take Pearl to the nearby Mayan ruins. George then talks to the owner of the local mining company, he persuades her to give him a detonator by telling her General Grasiento has a geological survey map in his offices and so clearly he is involved with Oublier. Having retrieved a detonator George gives it to Duane and then heads inside to warn Miguel of the impending blast but Ronaldo returns and arrests George.

Using a piece of rope belonging to Miguel, George gets Duane to tie one end to his truck whilst George ties the other end to the wall thereby pulling the wall down, alerting General Grasiento. Miguel escapes with Duane and soon after Nico returns, Nico and George then make a run for it and escape down river on a boat before it is attacked by a helicopter and sunk. George wakes up the next morning on the river bank hearing the sound of an organ playing, upon further investigation he finds a treehouse belonging to a Christian missionary Father Hubert who has been nursing Nico back to health, but she has suffered a snakebite and requires the medicine of a specific plant root. Father Hubert takes George to the local Mayan village as he believes the village Shaman will know where to find the root. George speaks with the shaman and shows him his Mayan stone who then explains to George the significance of the Mayan stones. He tells George how hundreds of years ago, Mayan shamans had trapped the god Tezcatlipoca inside a mirror, but he was so powerful that he would inevitably escape, at the end of the 5th age signified by the eclipse, so they built 3 stones that contained the power to keep him imprisoned inside the mirror, but before they could be put in place they were stolen by Spanish explorers. One was stolen from the Spanish by a pirate who went on to hide it on his private island in the Caribbean, one had been stolen by an English ship somewhere in the mid-Atlantic and had been taken back to England and only the third successfully made it back to Spain, the stone that eventually wound up in Nico and Georges possession. With this new information George returns to the treehouse with the root given to him by the shaman and gives it to Nico, shortly thereafter the two decide to separate to find the two remaining stones, George travels to Ketch's Landing, the island in the Caribbean which had been bought by the pirate 300 years previously whereas Nico travels to London, England. In London, Nico tracks the stone down to the London Museum where she first encounters Professor Oubier, but does not recognize him. After he leaves the London Museum is locked down as they find the stone has gone missing. Nico finds her way down to an abandoned underground station and finds Oubier on a boat in the Thames with Karzac - he has the stone. Nico infiltrates the boat and after seeing Karzac kill Oubier, she sneaks in and takes the stone, followed by a brief struggle with Karzac.

Meanwhile George tracks the remaining stone down to a small family run museum on Ketch's Landing, the museum is dedicated to Captain Ketch. After struggles with the two sisters running the museum, and a surveyor who has plans to refurbish it, George finally gains access to the museum. In the museum he meets a little girl (later revealed to be a ghost) who has a cross around her neck, George realizes he needs the cross to locate the stone. Following subtle clues left by Captain Ketch, George finds that the stone has been left on a nearby island named by the locals "Zombie Island". George makes a deal with a fishing boy named Rio who takes him to Zombie Island on his presumably homemade boat and George then traverses the island to find that a butchered remake of Treasure Island is being filmed. George takes advantage of this and poses as a stuntman to gain access to the place where the stone is being kept.

Next Nico travels back to Quaramonte and finds that George has been captured by Pablo and his men, and is to be used as a sacrifice to Tezcatlipoca. With help from Titipoco, Nico rescues George and they find their way into Tezcatlipoca's pyramid. After being separated, and a series of puzzles - George, Nico and Titipoco find their way into the central room where Karzac has begun the ceremony to summon the ancient God. In a tense showdown, Tezcatlipoca makes his way out of his prison and promptly kills Karzac, the President appears and attacks Titipoco, there struggle sends them over a cliff, the General appears and now aware that he is expendible to his mother, chooses to save Titipoco, who uses him as a step to reach the stone's slot. George's stone's slot is blocked by rocks which are cleared by a shockwave Tezcatlipoca himself generates. Nico has no problems and the three heroes place the stones into their respective places, which causes Tezcatlipoca to be pushed back into the mirror, George and Nico briefly celebrate and the final cut-scene fades into the credits, with a final image of Tezcatlipoca imprisoned in the mirror forever.

Development

The artwork for Broken Sword 2 was developed through a number of stages. Initially pencil drawings were made of characters which were then digitally coloured in, before being cleaned up. The locations were produced in a similar way, also starting out as pencil designs.^[3]

The music is composed by Barrington Pheloung, with Bob Sekar adding the closing score 'Happiness is an Inside Job', and Rolf Saxon returns to lead the cast, with a different actress playing Nico Collard.

Remastered Edition

On December 09, 2010, Revolution Software announced the forthcoming release of Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror - Remastered on Apple iOS devices. The new features include an exclusive interactive digital comic from Dave Gibbons. It will also feature fully animated facial expressions, enhanced graphics, high quality music, a context-sensitive hint system, and diary.

The game will also feature Dropbox integration which facilitates a unique cross-platform save-game feature, enabling players to enjoy the same adventure simultaneously on multiple devices, and full Game Center integration – including in-game achievements.

The Mac and PC versions will follow in early 2011.

Reception

The game received from mixed to positive reactions. PC Gamer US awarded the game a score of 82/100 saying that it is "more of the same solid adventure fare found in Circle of Blood". Gamespot gave the game a score of 7.9/10 and praised it for its additions that "help to streamline the adventure", but criticized the "insufficient information about Tezcatlipoca and Maya civilization altogether" when it came to the storyline.

The main criticism of the game which was pointed out by many critics was the story which seemed a bit rushed and confused and the similarity to "Circle of Blood".

References