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Second, unlike any other home-brew game, it really uses
the disk to give you lengthy text descriptions.
Third,
the descriptions are pretty good, and the atmosphere
of the game is much enhanced as a result. There are
also some pictures, some of which are very attractive.
The
game is the first of a two-part series, and as Herakles
you must complete a number of tasks drawn from Greek
mythology, including grabbing wild boars, cleaning stables
and killing hydras. There's obviously been a good deal
of research carried out here, with both place-names
and individuals carefully created with a view to their
legendary counterparts.
Unfortunately,
for some reason I wasn't really grabbed by this game.
The parser is pretty primitive -- it only accepts two
word inputs, examines the first four letters only and
is slightly quirky in other respects. For example, while
you can enter certain words (WAIT, for example) in some
locations, in other locations they are not understood.
Furthermore, the parser does not specify which word
it doesn't understand -- a small point, but as readers
know, it's one that helps maintain interest when trying
to solve difficult puzzles.
I
suppose it may have been this that dampened my ardour
somewhat -- in what is for the most part a text-only
game, I like to have pretty comprehensive interaction
and input facilities. But in this case I think I ought
to make an exception and set my personal feelings apart,
for the following reasons . . .
First,
the text descriptions, which are highly detailed and
very nicely written. Some of them run to almost an entire
screenful and are most atmospheric. Obviously, they
are too long to reside in memory and to call them up
you enter the special command T. This loads in a text
file relevant to that location and to others in the
neighbourhood; you can then get the full description
of your whereabouts. The default descriptions are very
short -- usually only a few words on the top line of
the screen.
Second,
the gameplay. There's quite a lot involved, with far
more puzzles to solve than the average home-brew game.
Some of them are quite original, and I've yet to discover
any that are seriously lacking in logic.
Third,
the graphics, which although few and far between are
attractive full-screen hi-res efforts.
And
lastly, the price -- £5.95 can't be all that bad, when
Tunstallsoft have obviously put in so much effort. Apparently
the game is part-Quilled, which explains the
limitations of the parser, but extra bits have obviously
been tacked on to expand the presentation. Despite my
own reservations, I can't help feeling that this is
a good deal that should not be passed over by disk drive
owners, and certainly not by anyone with an interest
in Ancient Greece.
Tunstallsoft
can be contacted at 17 Victoria Park Road, Tunstall,
Stoke on Trend ST6 6DX
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