Bone: Out from Boneville Review

When I heard that former LucasArts employees (easily some of the best in the industry) founded a new company called TellTale Games and that they were making an adventure game off of Bone, one my favorite comic series, my heart was screaming with joy. I was thinking that it was going to be the best Indy game of the year, the best licensed franchise game of the year, and maybe the game of the year. Sadly, it was none of these things.

Bone: Out from Boneville, is based on the first of ten graphic novels sharing the same name. Bone: OFB starts off when 3 unique-looking creatures (called Bones) are wandering in the desert. Everyman Fone Bone (the main character) and the goofy Smiley Bone are assisting the grouchy Phoney Bone into exile from their native land, Boneville. Unfortunately, the three cousins get lost and the adventure begins.

B: OFB is a simple adventure game that follows exactly like it does in the comic series, except it follows too strictly. The end result is a game that gives the player absolutely no freedom, leaving die-hard Bone fans bored. The game is just a string of mini-games and easy puzzles, some of which are rather creative. Again, TellTale Games went on the extreme end by making this game too easy. There are two chase scenes where the player must guide Fone Bone using the mouse. Sadly, these chase scenes are very annoying because the mouse is completely ineffective.

The graphics are above decent, and probably the games strongest point. The human characters in the game could have been much better, but everything else was fine. The music fits the mood perfectly, but the problem I found was with the voice acting. Some of the voices just didn’t fit the character, like Fone Bone and Smiley Bone.

My last problem, and the biggest problem with the game, was that it was way too short. I beat it in 2 hours. Let me repeat that. I beat a $20 game in 2 hours. If TellTale Games decides to do the same thing with the 9 other games, that’s $200 for 20 hours! On a side note, you can get the entire one-volume edition of the Bone comic series for 20 dollars. Which one would you choose, 1/10th of the series, or the entire thing?

Pairing one of the most promising new developers in the industry with one of the greatest comic series ever seemed to be a match made in heaven. Sadly, the game was unbearably short. This is easily one of the most disappointing games of the year. I can easily say that Fone Bone and gang should have just stayed in Boneville.