Barrow Hill: The Dark Path is a Horror Point and Click style game created by Shadow Tor Studios and published by Iceberg Interactive. It’s a sequel to their previous title Barrow Hill: Curse of the Ancient Circle, which was released ten years ago. Fortunately for those of you interested in the game but would like to know the story for the first game you’re in luck!
The Dark Path explains the first story by introducing a character from the previous title, who summarizes the first short and simple for you… throughout the game. In The Dark Path, Three children who mysteriously disappear while exploring Barrow Hill’s abandoned campsite and rumors of Old Druid ruins, devil worshiping and Rituals are mentioned by the local radio station’s DJ. You play as a silent unnamed protagonist who is searching for the missing children, eh the whole silent protagonist cliche is a little played out in most video games in my opinion but it still works. Honestly it could have been a bit better by including more dialogue from the characters and the protagonist, mainly due to the style of the game being a point and click. Games that follow this style but in a more modern interpretation such as Tell Tales Games’ The walking dead series tend to grab the attention of players by maintaining a balance of story progression and building a relationship with the characters.
Barrow Hill’s story progress is quick and lacking a bit more substance to keep the player interested story wise, which necessarily isn’t a bad thing due to their challenging puzzles being the core focus. The style of how you must solve the puzzles remind me of titles such as Resident Evil and Silent Hill, which gives the player a series of items that will either be used now or later on in the game to keep the player aware of areas that may need certain items to progress. One could argue that backtracking through a game is a little tedious and a “cheap” way to increase the amount of game play time, Barrow Hill doesn’t really feel like that mainly because it allows the player to explore at their own pace, while discovering pieces of information to further your understanding of what is unfolding at the abandoned campsite.
It took me roughly around seven hours to complete the game and maintained an eerie feeling throughout the game that you are being watched. I would recommend Barrow Hill: The Dark Path to those who love challenging puzzles with a Horror theme.
Barrow Hill: The Dark Path is available for Windows PC platforms on Steam for $14.99 with a Mostly Positive Review Status. https://store.steampowered.com/app/520990/
