Sacra Terra: Angelic Night
Game Review

Sacra Terra: Angelic Night is a hidden object game from Alawar Games. It features a contemporary story with elements of psychological manipulation, the occult, demons, survival and abandoned towns. In that sense, it is fairly similar to games such as F.A.C.E.S. and Haunted Halls: Green Hills Sanitarium. However, this game also features the Seven Deadly Sins, and contains very interesting interpretations and references to this theological theme.

You are a patient/prisoner in a hospital (which seems to be a trend in hidden object games!), and start the game waking up all tied up in a rundown hospital room. An angelic apparition releases you from your bonds, and you escape the hospital to find an entire town abandoned and haunted by demons. It turns out that a magical ritual was attempted, but it went wrong and released the demons of the Seven Deadly Sins into the town. It now falls to you to confront these demons one by one and send them back to their prison.

Sacra Terra is a puzzle adventure game where you travel between locations solving puzzles and scouring hidden object scenes in your attempt to set things right in the haunted town. Your main objective is to obtain 14 runes that you can use to reverse the magic ritual and send the demons back where they came from. You will also be picking up various other items and tools that you will need in order to get past obstacles and progress through the game.

The artwork and graphics in the game are nothing short of astounding. Vivid pictures and haunting imagery are depicted using a rich and crisp art style. Even more impressive is the great use of animation to tell the story. Almost every scene change or major action is accompanied by short video clips that are beautifully dark and very effective at drawing you into the story. It is via these cutscenes that you discover the events that caused the demons to break loose, as well as the history and importance of your angelic benefactor.

Gameplay-wise, the game follows the standard hidden object adventure game style where you use items that you pick up throughout your adventure to get past barriers such as locked doors. Sometimes it can be as simple as finding the appropriate key and using it to unlock a door, or it can be slightly more complicated and requires a bit more ingenuity, such as finding the right item to use to obtain an object held by a crow that is tantalizingly out of reach.

In your quest to defeat the demons of the seven deadly sins, you will also encounter plenty of puzzle minigames and hidden object scenes. The puzzles are pretty interesting, and although they feature some of the more common puzzle types, they do have unique thematic variations based on the seven sins. The hidden object scenes feature the basic list of items that you need to find, some of which require you to perform some action or object manipulation before you can obtain them. Some of these hidden objects are also pretty hard to find, increasing the challenge level of the game.

As an adventure game with lots of quests which involve multiple locations, there will be plenty of moving to and fro between areas. Other than this slight inconvenience, the game is actually very interesting, with a gripping story and exciting gameplay. The almost-perfect graphics and animation don't hurt either. This is definitely a game that you should at least try. You'll like it if you enjoy games with a hint of the occult or the unexplained, such as F.A.C.E.S. or the Redemption Cemetery games.

You can get the basic version of the game, or you can get the Collector's Edition which includes exclusive extras such as bonus gameplay, an integrated strategy guide and lots of media bonuses.

Related PC Games at Big Fish Games:

Sacra Terra: Angelic Night Collector's Edition

F.A.C.E.S.

Redemption Cemetery: Children's Plight

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