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Lifestream is an Adventure game creation of Christopher M. Brendel

of Unimatrix Productions. The game was released in 2004 and was the

first commercially available Adventure game made by Christopher Brendel.

Since then Christopher has gone on to make the highly acclaimed

Adventures 'Shady Brook' and 'The Filmmaker'.

The basic premise of the game is as follows – John Holton's father has

disappeared some three weeks past. John sets out to try to discover the cause

of his dad's mysterious disappearance. Being the son of a priest, something

that he knows would be severely frowned upon and which would damage

his father's reputation should it be publicly known, John chooses to take on

the investigation himself, privately, rather than risk harming his father's

standing within the community and the church. What ensues is a mystery

which reveals far more sinister goings on than John could ever have

envisaged in his search for his dad.

In the course of the game the player takes on the role of both John and his

father, Randolph. Information included with game stipulates that 'Lifestream'

is suitable for players aged 13 years and above, mainly due to the fact that it

includes one or two violent scenes, but more especially an impressively

eerie atmosphere.

Is 'Lifestream' any good? Well, here's a little information encompassing

my ‘take’ on the game.

Story

To say the story is intriguing would not be an overstatement. If, like

me, you enjoy playing Adventure games where the only thing obvious is that

the developer of said game has put in a tremendous amount of thought and

effort to come up with a gripping and quite original plot premise then

this Adventure could well leave you very satisfied indeed.

Graphics

‘Lifestream’ was made using Adventure Maker software and, on the

plus side, whereas the graphics are certainly not top notch by today’s standards,

they’re certainly good enough to make the enthusiastic player feel convinced

by the game environments presented. Transitions between scenes were a

little hazy, but that can certainly be overlooked when all things are

considered. After all, amazingly jaw-dropping graphics are not everything;

as most devout point and click veterans of Sierra’s and LucaArts’ halcyon

days will tell you. Character body movements, expressions and gestures

are all quite impressive considering this was Mr Brendel’s first venture into

game design. One character’s smile, however, that of a young lady, did at one

point in the game give me a bit of a start. I’d not have wanted to meet her

in a dark alley, I can tell you. The only real down point is that many of the

scenes are very dark indeed and, even with monitor brightness turned up to

maximum, some scenes and inventory objects (one in particular), are a little

unclear. This did not, however, affect my overall enjoyment of the game.

Interface

With few, if any as I recall, exceptions, ‘Lifestream’ is a simple and

straightforward mouse-controlled Adventure with on-screen arrows and

object-interaction indicator icons pointing the player toward entrances, exits,

lefts, rights, ups, downs, etc.. Pixel hunting is none too arduous.

Sound and Music

Ambient sounds add to the eerie atmosphere evoked by the game and,

coupled with the extremely pleasant, though frequently sombre (and

spooky), soundtrack, which was composed, though not I believe specifically

for the game, by Justin R. Durban of Edgen Animations, fit very well with

the tension filled nature of the game narrative.

Voice Acting

One of the most impressive aspects of this game. Dialogue is clear, well

voiced and thoroughly convincing throughout.

Puzzles

The puzzles of ‘Lifestream’ are varied, quite original in many instances,

and, for the most part, fit quite well within the game narrative. None are

too taxing and, with the exception of one relatively small maze sequence,

are of easy-to-moderate difficulty for the majority of experienced Adventure

game aficionados.

System used

I played ‘Lifestream’ on my trusty old ‘Windows 98SE’ PC, but I’m told

the game will run well on ‘Windows XP’ as well. I failed to get it to run

on ‘Windows 7’. I think it best to assume it will not run in a ‘Vista’ nor

a ‘Windows 7’ environment. I believe Chris’s Unimatrix website may well

indeed say that is the case.

One point worth noting

Christopher Brendel has been very approachable and extremely helpful

regarding all questions I’ve had the occasion to ask about his game/s.

Final Summing Up

‘Lifestream’ is a very enjoyable, plot-driven Adventure and one that, if

you’re prepared to forsake sun-bursting graphics and, instead, partake in a

cracking good story with a thrilling climax, will give you ten or so hours of

thoroughly engrossing entertainment. Most certainly a ‘thumbs-up’ as far

as this intrepid Adventurer is concerned.

Gelert