So I "played" this little freebie called "Serena" which turns out to be an exploration of a rather dilapidated cabin and an exploration of the narrator's sort-of mind.
I'm not entirely sure this is a game, or an adventure. It's more like an interactive movie or even book. You simply go around the cabin clicking on things. On each object you get numerous comments from the narrator. Once you've looked at everything, something changes and you start to get a different perspective, and later you learn more.
The cabin
Of course, there is some suspense. There are some decent sound effects, and the art work is really nice. The cabin has dust motes floating all around, which is a really nice effect. It's pretty easy to figure out what happened, and yet the ending didn't make much sense to me.
The voice acting from the narrator was quite good, but the Serena actress was absolutely terrible. The voice not only didn't fit the picture of the woman in the slightest, but she had no concept of trying to make her speech sound natural. She did make an effort for emotion in the second letter you find. Fortunately, we spend at least 90% of the game with the narrator, who did a very credible job.
Still, it was an intriguing and absolutely not boring way to spend an hour.
Note: you cannot save in this game. I started playing it several months ago and tried to save, but wound up back at the beginning. Ergo, don't start unless you have at least an hour to spare, and don't start unless you're pretty sure you won't be interrupted.
All in all it was a very nice effort, and worth the hour. And for free! Thanks!
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