Charles Cecil has cited Herge as the reference point for Broken Sword's look and shape, and the game's Paris is drawn in ligne claire: flat colour, clean uniform outlines, carefully researched real locations. The story is a Tintin story. An ordinary young man with no special skills stumbles into a conspiracy in a European capital, follows it through a secret order with medieval roots, and travels between real countries solving it by asking questions and paying attention. Filed MEDIUM: a stated visual and tonal debt rather than borrowed material.