Review: Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock

Okay, let’s just get it out of the way – Doctor Who has not had a great history when it comes to video game adaptations. The Adventure Game tie-ins from the Beeb were fairly simplistic, but at least they were free – if you lived in the UK. Then there were the Wii and DS titles, Return to Earth and Evacuation Earth respectively; hoo boy, they were pretty tragic. It’s the curse of the licensed game after all, right? Well, the good news is the franchise has taken a step in the right direction this time around with Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock. The studio behind this outing is Supermassive Games, perhaps best known for their PlayStation Move titles Tumble and Start the Party, or their contribution to LittleBigPlanet 2‘s level packs. Their previous experience really shines through in the polish that the look and feel of this game has received.

This review assumes you have knowledge of the recent seasons and concepts of Doctor Who, so beware: SPOILERS ARE AHEAD!

The story of The Eternity Clock is energetic and timey-wimey, much like the show itself. The Doctor finds himself  cut off from the TARDIS after yet another bumpy landing. Strange time distortions are afoot and after a bit of flailing on his own, the TARDIS calls in reinforcements for the Doctor in the form of River Song, eternal flirt and the Doctor’s sassy copilot-slash-wife. What follows is a co-op adventure through multiple locations and time zones to figure out what’s wrong with time and fix it.

Co-operative play is the keystone of this adventure, and will see you either playing online or split-screen with a second player, or relying on AI River to chip in as needed. In the case of the latter, you’ll be playing River’s half of the puzzles after the Doctor’s. An interesting mechanic has been introduced here, where time is consistently a factor in co-op sections. For instance, the Doctor might have to rewire a console by solving a puzzle, whilst River has to defend him from incoming enemies. In co-op mode this is done in real time – River’s player has to keep the Doctor’s player safe for as long as it takes to get the job done, be it 10 seconds or five minutes. In single-player mode your puzzle-solving is timed, and you’re then required to defend the Doctor afterwards for as long as you took. It’s a fun little tactic that lets you play to your strengths in co-op, giving both the shooter afficionado and the puzzle genius time to shine.

Unfortunately, it’s not always a smooth ride. Single-player’s AI River can be, quite frankly, a doofus. At one point early on I needed her assistance to pull a heavy crate into position for use as a jumping platform. After pushing it into place I jumped up and continued on, assuming she would follow me as normal. When I reached the next co-op choke point however, I realised I was still alone. Backtracking I found her standing next to the crate still, jumping up and down on the spot like an excited cheerleader. Apparently she’d gotten stuck in the edge of the crate. Unfortunately with no way to move the crate to dislodge her without having her unstuck to move the crate in the first place, I was forced to back track to the last checkpoint.

And there’s another point where this game can strain the player – the checkpoints. Basically, there are none. Oh, you’ll reach regular restore points you’ll return to if you get taken down by a Cyberman or Dalek, but if you exit the game entirely you’ll be forced to replay the entire chapter from the beginning. For a downloadable game it’s generally not a big deal, but it’s a nasty surprise that we shouldn’t really be expected to face. If the programming’s good enough to have in-game checkpoints it can’t be that hard to make them save checkpoints as well.

Those issues aside, the game is definitely a strong title overall. The visuals in particular are very high-quality, both for a branded tie-in game and a downloadable game. The whole adventure is presented in ‘2.5D’ – a 2D platformer with full three-dimensional depth for the scenery and characters. This has been taken advantage of by the developers by having you turn corners or enter buildings that will rotate the world 90 degrees – preserving the 2D play style but making it feel less like you just have a fancy background to run past.

River and the Doctor each have their own special tool for use in the game as well – River has her blaster for knocking enemies out or taking out obstacles, and eternal pacifist the Doctor has his sonic screwdriver. The screwdriver introduces a fun little minigame when opening locks and doors, requiring you to match the sonic waveform presented for each one using the right analog stick. It’s a cute inclusion with the wavering sound of the screwdriver as you do so, echoing the Doctor’s need to find the right pitch for the screwdriver when it’s used in the show. You’ll also find hidden collectibles throughout the game in the form of hats for the Doctor (of course) and pages from River’s diary. The diaries are an interesting read, although the ability to zoom in and read them more clearly would have been appreciated. The Doctor’s hats are a gem, with extra snippets of dialogue recorded for each, many of them having nods to the prior history or Doctors of the show.

The audio quality is also excellent, with much of the backing music taken straight from the show or built up around the musical cues of commonly used tracks. There’s also full voice acting from the Doctor, River and the monsters – all performed by their actual actors and not soundalikes. It adds a lot to the game to hear Matt Smith and Alex Kingston themselves spouting one-liners and chatty dialogue, and the Silence are kept at their standard creepiness level with their raspy voices intact. All character movement in cutscenes (and assumably gameplay) was motion-captured by the actors as well, with the Doctor careening around the TARDIS controls just as you’d expect. A lot of effort has been put in to keep this game feeling authentic, and it hasn’t gone to waste.

It’s pretty clear from the ‘to be continued’ favour of The Eternity Clock‘s closing scenes that this is intended to be the first of multiple titles by Supermassive. If the quality is kept at this same high standard (and River’s AI gets improved so she doesn’t RUN AWAY WHEN I NEED HER HELP DAMMIT RIVER) I’ll definitely be coming back for seconds. So all you Whovians, go ahead with your Geronimo’s and Allons-y’s and give this title a crack.