Truberbrook: A Nerd Saves the World

 PC
User Score
5.0

Mixed or average reviews- based on 32 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 7 out of 32
  2. Mixed: 12 out of 32
  3. Negative: 13 out of 32

Review this game

  1. Your Score
    0 out of 10
    Rate this:
    • 10
    • 9
    • 8
    • 7
    • 6
    • 5
    • 4
    • 3
    • 2
    • 1
    • 0
    • 0
  1. Submit
  2. Check Spelling
view
per page
  1. Fuz
    Apr 1, 2019
    6
    Oh boy, what a mess.
    The good: the art style is really cool. The photogrammetry is spectacular. I love the characters and their goofy animations (they don't have many, though). But you can see how underfunded the developers were. The locations aren't many and the backgrounds are kind of simple. Lots of rocks and other objects that don't take much to model, I guess. Everything screams,    Oh boy, what a mess.
    The good: the art style is really cool. The photogrammetry is spectacular. I love the characters and their goofy animations (they don't have many, though). But you can see how underfunded the developers were. The locations aren't many and the backgrounds are kind of simple. Lots of rocks and other objects that don't take much to model, I guess. Everything screams, "cheap". Beautiful, though.

    Mechanically, it's kind of bad. There's no real inventory, just a reminder on "i" key (which is also not rebindable... seriously guys?) which means that sometimes you don't know exactly what you're carrying (due to no item description in the reminder) and it means no manual item combination, which happens automatically when you click on the puzzle spot. So, there are a few puzzles that are gonna be solved before you can even think about them.
    The puzzles are pretty much all "meh", quite simple but more than that they're just uninteresting.
    By the way... the telegram "puzzle". Are you **** serious?

    And here's the main point. Well, it's not true that there's no story, it starts interesting too, but it's heavily underdeveloped and fastworwarded a lot, leaving the player just assuming and filling the gaps by himself. The exposition and storytelling are atrocious and there are quite a lot of plot holes and unexplicable writing errors. It's also pretty short.
    I am absolutely sure they started with a way bigger idea and wanted to develop much more of the game's world (and the sanitarium is proof of this), but they ran out of cash much faster than they anticipated.

    The scene after the credits is pretty cool.

    Also the concert is kind of cool and sonds like a Tom Waits song, but it's way too long and unskippable.    … Expand
  2. Penc
    Jun 4, 2019
    4
    "This bucket seems to be hung here for purely decorative reasons" If any piece of dialogue sums up Trüberbrook, it's this one. I desparately wanted to enjoy this game, as a fan of stop motion and interesting art styles, as a fan of sci-fi and a fan of story driven games. Unfortunately, I can't recommend it. As a game I would score it 3, but I added an extra point for the exceptional art"This bucket seems to be hung here for purely decorative reasons" If any piece of dialogue sums up Trüberbrook, it's this one. I desparately wanted to enjoy this game, as a fan of stop motion and interesting art styles, as a fan of sci-fi and a fan of story driven games. Unfortunately, I can't recommend it. As a game I would score it 3, but I added an extra point for the exceptional art style and lighting.

    However, underneath the beautiful visuals there is zero substance. The "puzzles" feel like they belong more in a free to play escape room game, than £35 worth of "Suspence! Mystery! Thrills!" as advertised, and while it claims 7-10 hours of gameplay, really it is closer to 6. And if you manage to get 7+, those extra hours are spent wandering through locations until you click the right thing at the right time. In terms of gameplay, it's tedious guesswork of what click will move the action forward. Ultimately though, the biggest disappointment with this game is the story. Trüberbrook feels like the ambitious project that got rushed to completion, or given up on. While many characters are interesting, relatable and humorous, the plot points and stages feel unfinished, isolated and don't gel together in a believable way. It is as if each location, it's objects and it's NPCs were created before the story was completed, with no idea how they would intertwine. The result is, they don't. The idea and concept was fresh and exciting, the visuals are stunning throughout, however the execution of this as a game failed drastically and made for a overall disappointing experience.    … Expand
  3. kraenk
    Mar 17, 2019
    7
    A solid experience with beautiful graphics and nice atmosphere, but nothing to write home about story wise.
  4. joschimitsu
    Mar 28, 2019
    2
    Incredibly disappointed. Had really really high hopes for this game because I love point&click adventures and read a lot about the art style and the real models behind it all. Also I am from Germany and it is a German production. All of this should be a match made in heaven right?

    This might be one of the worst point&click adventures I have ever played. The puzzles are embarrassing, all    Incredibly disappointed. Had really really high hopes for this game because I love point&click adventures and read a lot about the art style and the real models behind it all. Also I am from Germany and it is a German production. All of this should be a match made in heaven right?

    This might be one of the worst point&click adventures I have ever played. The puzzles are embarrassing, all solutions are right there in front of you because the game right out shows you only possible combinations, some dialogues are unskippable (don't even mention the horrible band that is unskippable), the whole story makes no sense and is uninspired, there are soooo many plot holes and the backgrounds are so heavily photoshopped that you would never guess they are real models if you wouldn't know in the first place. Looks like a crappy collage.

    All in all i am just really disappointed in what should have been a beautiful game. Don't buy it, it unfortunately doesn't deserve it.    … Expand
  5. irinagreskia
    Mar 13, 2019
    3
    I was really hyped by this game. The visuals are spectacular, but the story is empty and sometimes a non-sense. Not worth $30
  6. XerCrox
    Mar 16, 2019
    0
    Graphics are fine, but otherwise its just garbage. one of the worst game i played so far
  7. Grageon
    Mar 19, 2019
    8
    Finally something fresh in this genre, unfortunately, the story is quite... dumb. But everything else seems good, so it's worth a try.
  8. Kunray
    Mar 25, 2022
    10
    The main appeal of the game is it is rather beautiful.
    Everything about this game perfect.
    I recommend giving it a try.
  9. TwoEars
    Feb 23, 2020
    6
    The pace is slow, maybe extremely slow, and the story is incoherent and jumps all over the place. Small problems become large... but some big tasks are completed in an instance and with no explanation. The game can't seem to decide if it wants to be a logical sci-fi game, or an esoteric dream sequence game with fuzzy logic. The player can be dumped in completely new locations, via instantThe pace is slow, maybe extremely slow, and the story is incoherent and jumps all over the place. Small problems become large... but some big tasks are completed in an instance and with no explanation. The game can't seem to decide if it wants to be a logical sci-fi game, or an esoteric dream sequence game with fuzzy logic. The player can be dumped in completely new locations, via instant fast travel, and our protagonist doesn't even seem to react or care.

    There is a good game in there somewhere; it has beautiful graphics, good animation, nice ambient music, occasional fun humor, colorful voice acting and not a bad plot premise overall. Sadly it just doesn't add up all that well in the end, it's too incoherent and just doesn't flow that well. This game should have gone through a few more iterations of storyboard drawings before being green-lit for production. And definitely more play-testing.

    One of the main characters also has a bit of a schizophrenic event towards the end. To have one of the main characters so completely shift personality, and without any foreshadowing, is pretty bad writing. I think for some adventure game fans this can be a score 7 type game, maybe even a strong 7. But you have to want to play a somewhat original and slow paced game and be prepared to not think too much and just "go with the flow".

    I would only recommend this game to hardcore adventure game fans who have already played most games on the market, and are looking for something unusual. I believe the game can be somewhat interesting and original to hardcore adventure game fans. But if you don't normally play that many adventure games there are probably 100 adventure games your time would be better spent on than this one.    … Expand
  10. emrahcey
    Nov 7, 2019
    3
    Don't waste time and don't waste money. Story isn't good, The graphics are good but not everything about graphics.
  11. Biberattacke
    May 1, 2020
    4
    Oh Mann!
    Trüberbrook! Ein "German Adventure"! Deutscher Videospielpreis gewonnen!
    Humoristisch begleitet von Böhmermann und Team! Hochkarätige deutsche Schauspieler als Sprecher (Nora Tschirner) Eigentlich kann man da nicht so viel falsch machen. So dachte ich... vor allem weil ich dem ZDF Neo Format Neo Magazin Royal viel abgewinnen kann. Und dann das; Von Anfang bis Ende gähnende    Oh Mann!
    Trüberbrook! Ein "German Adventure"! Deutscher Videospielpreis gewonnen!
    Humoristisch begleitet von Böhmermann und Team! Hochkarätige deutsche Schauspieler als Sprecher (Nora Tschirner)

    Eigentlich kann man da nicht so viel falsch machen.
    So dachte ich... vor allem weil ich dem ZDF Neo Format Neo Magazin Royal viel abgewinnen kann.
    Und dann das;
    Von Anfang bis Ende gähnende Langeweile!
    Aber der Reihe nach:

    Story:
    In Schulnoten allenfalls eine 3.
    Sie hat mich nicht gerade gefesselt, aber ganz schlecht war sie auch nicht. Also Durchschnittskost!
    Humor fehlt aber fast völlig. Allenfalls hier und da gibt es einen Schmunzler, der mir abgerungen wird.
    Da hatte ich einfach mehr erwartet.

    Die Spielmechanik:
    Echt jetzt?°?° Das ist ein Witz.
    Das spiel ist auf dem Niveau eines C64 Point and Klicks Adventures. Nur mit deutlich weniger Tiefgang.
    Man wird permanent an die Hand genommen. Es kommt keine Rätselfreude auf. Wirklich überhaupt keine...
    So richtig gar keine... Nada!
    Boooooring!

    Technische Umsetzung
    Schöne Musik, tolle Optik. Wirklich sehr schöne Grafik mit viel Charme.

    Aber das reicht eben nicht!!!

    Deshalb mein Fazit.
    Nicht kaufen, zumindest nicht wenn ihr ein gutes Point and Klick Adventure sucht.
    Dann lieber "Geheimakte Tunguska"!!
    Dieses Spiel hat seine Vorschusslorbeeren nicht verdient. Leider!

    Ich hatte mir so gewünscht, dass es gut wird.

    Liebes Team von BildundTonFabrik!
    Gebt nicht auf, bitte versucht es nochmal.
    Aber dann bitte ein Spiel, dass den Namen "Spiel" auch verdient.

    Danke

    P. S. Nachtreten: Ich habe das Spiel nicht mal durchgespielt. Bei ca 75 % ist mir die Luft ausgegangen. Das soll schon was heißen!!!    … Expand
  12. Brathahn1984
    Jan 4, 2022
    8
    Ich hatte gerade (2021) die Deponia-Reihe durchgespielt und wollte mal ein anderes Point-and-Click-Adventure spielen. Auf der Suche stieß ich auf dieses Spiel. Nach kurzem googeln wusste ich, dass mich kein Monkeys Island erwarten wird, sondern eher ein "Das Erbe" (falls das noch jemand kennt). Die Synchronisation hat mich gereizt und so kaufte ich das Spiel.
    Ja, das Spiel ist kurz. Aber    Ich hatte gerade (2021) die Deponia-Reihe durchgespielt und wollte mal ein anderes Point-and-Click-Adventure spielen. Auf der Suche stieß ich auf dieses Spiel. Nach kurzem googeln wusste ich, dass mich kein Monkeys Island erwarten wird, sondern eher ein "Das Erbe" (falls das noch jemand kennt). Die Synchronisation hat mich gereizt und so kaufte ich das Spiel.
    Ja, das Spiel ist kurz. Aber es hat irgendwie so seinen Charme und ich habe es auch an 3 aufeinander folgenden Abenden durchgespielt.
    Man darf bei meiner Bewertung nicht vergessen, dass ich das Genre mag. Ich hätte eigentlich eine 6 oder 7 vergeben, doch irgendwie hallt das Spiel Positiv nach und eine 4,8 hat es in meinen Augen nicht verdient.

    PS Dirk klingt wirklich wie aus einer anderen Dimension :-)    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

10
#10 Most Shared PC Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
66

Mixed or average reviews - based on 25 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 8 out of 25
  2. Mixed: 15 out of 25
  3. Negative: 2 out of 25
  1. DarkZero
    Oct 18, 2019
    40
    Generally, unless you’re incredibly interested in the spectacular visuals, I can’t recommend Trüberbrook. It feels half-made with large sections being completely disjointed from the plot and rooms, that no doubt took someone a ridiculous amount of time to design, build-out, and paint, having nothing in them, even when it’s abundantly clear that they should have. Perhaps cuts were made to meet a budget or tight Kickstarter deadlines but instead of having a lean 3-4 hour game that shows off what it does best, it drags on for around 6 with a lot of stiff backtracking and filler.
    Read full review
  2. GameGrin
    Jun 24, 2019
    50
    Unless you’re a die-hard point and click aficionado, it’s difficult to recommend this adventure. One thing is for certain though: It’s not worth its RRP of £24.99.
    Read full review
  3. PLAY! Zine
    May 13, 2019
    70
    Truberbrook is a fine example of interesting design, craftsmanship, and dedication of the developer. But as an adventure game, it does not do anything overly to new and exciting. The story is fine, characters are interesting and the puzzles can be relaxingly easy or frustratingly unintuitive.
    Read full review
See all critic reviews »