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It's
a strange world, as I said.
Strange
worlds are invariably inhabited by strange people. Meet
Rincewind. Rincewind is nearly a wizard. Unfortunately,
he has a spell permanently stuck inside his brain as
a result of a training accident. He can't even pronounce
it, so the spell isn't exactly useful. He's permanently
down on his luck. But as life would have it, things
are to change for Rincewind. The change comes in the
form of the world's first tourist, Twoflower.
Twoflower
is the kind of guy who drags minor disasters around
with him as if some kind of repertoire is required.
The recipients of these disasters are usually unsuspecting
innocents, like Rincewind. He also has a chest full
of luggage -- with legs on. Well, hundreds of little
feet actually. Still, it makes a change from the usual
castors. Twoflower hires Rincewind to be his guide.
Twoflower is also quite well off . . .
You
play Rincewind. You receive a brief from the ruler of
the city of Ankh-Morpork to look after this 'politically
important' person and the adventure proper begins. It's
a Quilled game in several parts that has you
hopelessly wrapped up in circumstances which are either
out of control to start with or become so in a disturbingly
short space of time. It has graphics on the top third
of the screen display, but these add little to the adventure.
In fact the visuals are the weakest part of the game.
Trendy they may be but their unsuitability for this
game stands out like a sore thumb.
[this screenshot was not in the original
review]
Authors
McNeill, Child and Buckett do their usual best to overcome
both the limitations of the vocabulary and the parser.
Rarely does the player have to resort to guessing the
syntax, though perhaps some of the response messages
could have been a little more helpful. Limited character
interaction is possible with the 'Talk to . . . ' command.
Otherwise the game plays in a very similar fashion to
its predecessors, The Boggit and Robin of
Sherlock. In other words, single command input (preferably
two-word) is called for.
The
various explorations, despite being intrinsically hazardous
anyway, are further complicated by the best feature
of the game, Death. Death has actually bumped into our
heroes anyway due to a cock up in his timetable. As
a result, he's extremely upset and you know it's only
a matter of time before he returns to settle things
once and for all. In fact, the game lives up to the
reputation of Terry Pratchett's novel very well. Those
who aren't familiar with the novel will probably find
themselves rushing out to buy it after playing the game.
Funny as it is, you will want more.
[this screenshot was not in the original
review]
More
importantly, it's a good adventure in spite of (and
not just because of) the gimmickery. It takes fantasy
adventuring into the hitherto little explored regions
of Discworld and I think most people will enjoy the
trip. The price is right. Though as a parting thought,
my criticism of Delta 4 is similar to that of St Brides
last issue. They should really leave The Quill behind
along with its limitations and go for a more sophisticated
system. Adventures written on that aging utility cannot
expect to survive full pricing for much longer.
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