Video game review by ERIK LEIJON

Good news: Still Life (PC, Xbox/The Adventure Company, Microids) is the point-and-click genre at its finest. Bad news: Still Life is a point-and-click adventure. But whille passing your cursor over pre-rendered backgrounds and searching for clues may not be everyone's cup of tea, Montreal-based developer Microids (recently acquired by Ubisoft) has managed to create a capable dark and violent murder mystery, interspersed with some hair-pulling puzzles.

The point-and-click style of gaming has always been intriguing. While other games strive for increased interactivity, Still Life and its brethren are the polar opposite. That's not to say the game fails to draw you in. In the case of Still Life, the engaging storyline, the deliciously violent cutscenes, a hilarious looking top-hat-wearing killer, and the detailed pre-rendered backgrounds ensure the game looks and feels like a photo-realistic crime drama. The game's thematic pacing is also well done, especially as you travel back and forth from flashback scenes to the present.

Despite the lack of real-time environments, the graphics still look impressive. The designers perfectly captured the derelict back alleys of 1930's Prague and the ostentatious high-rises in present-day Chicago. The animation of the characters, though, looks dated by comparison. Their lips fail to synchronize with the dialogue, and their movements are jerky. The contrast between the characters and backgrounds is as striking as Marvel vs. Capcom 2's (Capcom) 3-D backgrounds and 10-year-old sprites. But the triumph of this title is the macabre death cutscenes, and without spoiling the story, it's evident the developers have a flair for the dramatic.

By its nature, Still Life is hamstrung by its archaic gameplay. There is a sense of randomness that sets in eventually, because all you do is pass your cursor over every inch of every background until you find a clue. On the other hand, frustration could set in due to the mind-boggling difficulty of the puzzles - it truly takes a special gamer to spend over an hour trying to pick a door lock. I was pleasantly surprised at the variety of puzzles present, although I could have done without the cookie baking challenge.

Not helping ease the frustration is the counterintuitive control system. Simple acts such as dusting for prints become an arduous chore, since pressing the wrong button forces you to return to the menu and select the item again. Reading passages from the item menu is also difficult, since the background pictures are inconveniently placed over the text. However, keep in mind these problems are likely present in the console version only.

For anyone who currently owns The Book of Atrus in hardcopy, Still Life will provide the puzzles and subtle literary references you require from a video game. For those who have no affection for the genre, I fail to see any new elements capable of converting the non-believer. And without divulging any details, the ending may irk those who become too emotionally invested in the story.

Dusted

Summer is the ideal time to catch up on some titles you may have missed earlier in the year. Phantom Dust (Xbox/Majesco, Microsoft Game Studios) is an inventive fighting game that blends card game elements with bright, cartoonish graphics.

The game was considered a long shot to ever hit our shores after Microsoft declined to release the game in America, even though they developed it.

Phantom Dust's controls require a lot of time to get used to, and the storyline is a 12 Monkeys-clone, but it's fast, addictive and a budget title.

Now playing: Phantom Dust (Xbox) Wishlist: Conker: Live and Reloaded (Xbox).