My Take: Dracula Series, Path of the Dragon

Perhaps I'm not doing something right. Perhaps my computer is screwing with me. Perhaps I should do a reinstall. Perhaps the evil nature of vampires has corrupted my computer and my very SOUL!

Whatever the problem, I can't seem to get The Dracula Series to work properly for me.
And that's a shame, because I enjoy suffering through really crap games.

It's not that I didn't take pleasure in these games. I did! I was truly entertained with scoffing at the nonexistent plot, wailing through the excruciating monotony, and laughing hysterically at the voice acting. They games are just so glitched out that I cannot complete them.

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The Kheops / Microids trilogy is horror adventure game Dracula 3: Path of the Dragon. Part 3 is divided into three episodes, (totally unnecessarily in my view):

Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part I: The Strange Case of Martha
Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part II:  The Myth of the Vampire
Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part III: The Destruction of the Evil

You know what, it doesn't really matter what they're called, because they all involved the same characters repeating the same dialogue and doing the same puzzles in the same shitty little town!

You play Father Arno Morianai, Devil's Advocate sent from the Vatican to investigate and debunk the myth of vampires. Well, you call him Arno Morianai, I call him hottie Keanu Reeves.

You hear that Mr. Anderson?... That is the sound of inevitability...

Actually, to be fair Arno's voice actor expresses more emotion and range in his work than Reeves ever could, but whatever.

Upon arriving in the small village of Vladoviste, Arno learns there's something not quite right going on.
Eventually.

I really wanted more from this game, but it takes a LONG while to warm up.  Fully 3/4 of the games are spent endlessly walking through screens.
The peasants from the Transylvanian countryside immediately ruin your immersion by all speaking like loud Americans (for the love of god, can't you just fake a really bad clichéd Transylvanian accent? We won't know the difference, trust us.)

The plot is slow, and the incredible stretches of boredom are punctuated by long sessions of dialogue. Sometimes a wild cut-scene will appear in an attempt to liven things up and give you hope of a better future, but they only titillate players with Arno sitting on a train, Arno walking, or Arno washing his hands. Seriously. :/

If you're hoping to catch a glimpse of a vampire in Part I, forget about it.
I got half way through Part II and still never had a brush with anything nearing danger.

Admittedly, one time I was gawked at menacingly by a dark stranger, and a dog DID bark at me, but that's it.

The 'score' is just one typically cryptic song looped over and over. I think the point is to drive you insane so you won't be able to vocalize to future potential victims that the game stagnates somewhere near the opening credits.

I don't know if I got crap copies, or what, but I found both first and second parts to be ultimately un-finishable (I'm sticking with that word).  In Part 1 I could only progress the game so far before a necessary item was missing and I couldn't proceed. In Part 2 some puzzles either wouldn't allow me to solve them, or if I clicked on them they'd do themselves for me. Hm. Self-completing puzzles aren't really what I'm looking for in a video game.
I can only imagine Part 3 shares the same integrity. Yet even without glitches, the game is a bit of a bore. If anyone has played Part 3 successfully, lemme know how it ends. >.<
I think it's fair to say that the games are 'good enough' if you can get them to work.

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If I have something complimentary to say about The Path of the Dragon, it's that it gets 9/10 for moodiness and scene-setting.
The graphics, though not groundbreaking, are quite beautiful. The artwork is dramatic and chilling and atmospheric. I didn't mind looking around because it was all so darkly pretty. I did learn quite a bit about the Dracula mythos in particular, and about Bram Stoker in general.
The NPCs, on the other hand, were quite derpy. Voices aside, they often were glitchy in hilarious ways; They would twitch and blink incessantly, and spawn/despawn randomly.

I really wanted to play the hell out of this game. The idea is compelling, and with the gorgeous backdrop, who wouldn't want to pilot Father Keanu Reeves into Transylvania to experience forbidden romance with beautiful women (in a totally pious way, naturally) and to kick the shit out the nasty, evil, bloodsucking vampires?

Alas.

Man... this trailer makes it look really good.
Well, it's not.