|
 he
Official Secrets adventure club has been running a few
months now and is apparently doing very well. For £19.95
you get six bi-monthly issues of the club magazine:
Confidential, Gnome Ranger by Level 9 (or a special
surprise alternative), use of The Adventure Helpline
and Adventure Contacts, automatic membership of the
Special Reserve Software Club (giving discounts on loads
of games), and of course the exclusive mini-adventure
reviewed here -- Myth, specially written for
the club by Magnetic Scrolls.
In
this light-hearted look at the Greek mythological world,
you play the Sea God, Poseidon, and, guess what, you
can't swim!
Mucking
about in heaven is an easy life and you have a great
time going to riotous parties. So when your brother
Zeus invites you to his temple-warming party, you accept
on the spot. When you arrive everything seems to be
normal, with lots of food and drink to indulge in, but
then Zeus decides to make a very serious speech about
the rise of Christianity and how the Greek gods should
prove their superiority by each performing a difficult
task.
He
hands you a piece of paper with your task on it: to
find Hades' fabled Helmet Of Invisibility. With a flash
you're transported to the gates of hell. Looking around
you spot your first problem -- a huge nine-headed Hydra
guards the gates and isn't going to let you past. Armed
only with a shield and trident (unfortunately not of
the nuclear variety) you decide not to rile him and
instead explore a garden to the east where a frolicking
lamb and marble altar are to be found (I wonder what
must be done here?!).
The
only other route takes you into a deep swamp (aw no,
you can't swim!) where an old James Bond trick can help
you survive. Get through this and you reach the infamous
River Styx, full of dead souls making the journey to
hell. A ferryman and Death himself make an appearance
here, along with a perplexing puzzle concerning transporting
six keys over the river.
It
didn't take me too long to make a fair bit of progress
in Myth, as the puzzles aren't that difficult
to solve, although fine for beginners. Experienced adventurers
will probably find it a bit easy, although they'll have
plenty of fun reading the humorous text and admiring
the beautiful graphics which appear every few locations
(these can be swapped for small mono cameos to quicken
play). Then there's a typically refined Magnetic Scrolls
parser which accepts multi-command sentences. One thing
missing (although most won't need it) is HELP -- as
members can always phone the Official Secrets Helpline!
Although
I wouldn't exactly recommend forking out 20 quid just
for the game, Myth is a great freebie incentive
for those interested in joining the only professional
adventure club in Britain.
|
