Jack Keane 2: The Fire Within

« While the picky controls and fixed camera angle can be annoying at times, Jack Keane 2 provides witty writing and attractive art combined with sensibly logical puzzles to provide a pretty good adventure. »

« Jack Keane 2 might not be the smashing excellence in the genre that The Walking Dead was praised for last year, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give Jack Keane 2 a try if you like a bit of delightful comedy in your adventure games. »

« And so, overall, there’s little to recommend about Jack Keane 2: The Fire Within. The puzzles are varied and competent, but everything else needs a lot of work, and adventure games don’t usually receive much in the way of patches (of course, for most they’re not needed). »

« With an old-fashioned point-and-click adventure filled to the brim with references to beloved classics, Deck13 manages to appeal to the nostalgic gamer. Unfortunately the quality is second to the source material. »

« If you’re not as patient as a saint, multitude of bugs and defects make playing Jack Keane 2 a tough experience. [CD-Action 09/2013, p.66] »

« While its well-crafted array of puzzles are fun whether you’re new to the games or not, its controls and technical hiccups take away from wanting to play the game. Jack Keane may have what it takes to be your next daring adventurer, but Fire Within may not be your next go-to adventure. »

« Jack Keane 2 is a fun action-packed journey at times, made far more frustrating than it needed to be due to its clumsy interface and obtuse, pace-killing puzzles. »

« Jack Keane 2 will do nothing to convert people to the adventure genre and it's difficult to recommend it to adventure fans. It appears to be designed to appeal more to casual players given the relative lack of depth to the whole experience, and the colourful but cardboard-cutout characters aimed at a younger audience. »

« Can't seem to figure out how to delete my review. Wrote a bad joke of one during the gog sale where Keane stalled the show. Now I'm hopeful that I've enough text marks. I *guess* the game could be an 8. Maybe. »

« Great game. Even though I'm not usually a fan of point and clicks, I loved every second of this game. Charming visuals, and very neat puzzles that challenge your mind in various ways. Worth the price tag, whatever it may be. »

« Nice and funny game with awkward controls; single clicks don't often register, the fixed camera and jumping is sometimes annoying. The dialogs and jokes are okay but the audio quality is strange (a slightly noisy). The 3D world is beautiful, but often hides items that should be picked up. There is a highlight option for these items, but I like the hotspot mechanics of other games more. There are the 3-5 seconds before an item is picked up or a character is talked to, so took me 10 hours for the first run and 3 hours on the second speed run. Crashed a few times, mostly when I skipped a cutscene. The puzzles are relatively easy, I got stuck usually by not noticing an item. »

« This game is a giggle-fest mixed with a dogeared copy of King Solomon's Mines. Jack Keane 2: The Fire Within is the sequel to the original, though I did not play the original so I'm evaluating it on it's face. The game is a 3D action adventure/point-and-click puzzle game. You play the titular role and combine forces with several companions most notable of which is the adventurous, blue-eyed femme Amanda. The plot of the story revolves around Jack's quest to find a) a lost treasure that he learns about from a dying shaman, and b) a path through his own subconscious to becoming a better man who can commit to anything. Throughout the game, you are confronted by puzzles. While most are interesting yet easy to work out, there are a few times where it takes you a minute to find all the oddly-placed pieces you need. There is also a fast and rudimentary card-based combat mechanic where you have to counter enemy attacks with the proper defense and then counter-attack with your own moves. Most important are the setting and characters, who are rich and entertaining. Pros include nice graphics, very funny quips, a nice mix of action and puzzle solving, the use of WASD to move (as opposed to click-to-move), and the ability to alter companion opinions using dialog. Cons include three bugs that required restart or reload, poor inflection in the voice acting, trouble jumping because of camera skew, and a ridiculous dialog tree that will end the game if you accept money from a bad guy for an object you're going to lose anyway. While the game at launch is plagued by bugs (so you might want to play after the first patch) and I stand firmly resolute in my condemnation of using flashbulbs to frighten bats, finishing this game is one of my top priorities. The characters are fascinating, the humor is infectious, and the graphics are sweet. Full video review on my blog and YouTube channel. »