Manhunter: San Francisco - Sierra On-Line RRP œ29.99

It was with great surprise that I heard that Manhunter: San
Francisco had been released as it wasn't due out till next year.
What was an even greater shock was the price - almost œ30.00 - so
I would recommend that you shop around for a cheaper price. I
bought it for œ19.95 from Byteware in Tyne and Wear.

MHSF follows on from the previous game Manhunter: New York. In
MHNY, an alien race, the Orbs, had taken over the city of New
York, subjugating the populace who must henceforth not talk to
each other. All humans must wear brown robes and keep their 
faces covered - on pain of death.

In order to make sure these rules are obeyed, certain humans have
been enlisted as Manhunters. Armed with a portable computer known
as MAD, they can track members of the population, watching their
movements (subject to a few conditions) and ensure they obey
their new masters. This tracking is possible because all the
people have tracking disks surgically implanted in their necks.
But all the trackers show is a person, not his/her identity. It is
up to the Manhunter to work out who he is watching.

In MHNY, you had just started work as a Manhunter and by the end
of the game, you had turned against your "masters" and stolen an
alien space craft in which you were in hot pursuit of a vicious
killer, Phil, who was allied with the Orbs and who you aimed to
capture.

If you have previously played MHNY, all this will make sense to
you. If like me, you haven't, you will soon get the hang of
it, though the start of the game may be a bit confusing.

So, there you are, flying your craft over a new city, San
Francisco, not knowing what you will find there. Have the Orbs
also taken over San Francisco? If so, can you manage to work
against them in the same way as you did in New York and will you
catch the killer?


Being unable to control your machine too well, when you land you
crash on top of a building - and on top of another Manhunter
..... oops! Oh well, there's something useful to be gained out of
it as the Manhunter won't be needing his MAD any more so you can
grab it. If you are observant, you'll also find his identity card
and using MAD will furnish you with his address. Together with
the data on his MAD which shows what he was up to at the time 
of his unfortunate demise, these bits of information will give 
you a starting point for your investigations.

Using MAD, you can follow the movements of the people the dead
Manhunter had been tracking. As with MHNY, after watching the
actions of the target subject and being told his (or her)
location, the display will pan out to an overall map of the San
Francisco area and from there you can follow the target to
subsequent locations visited until the signal is lost. It is then
up to you to visit the locations yourself and have a close look
round, picking up further clues.


During your investigations you will discover that the Orbs are
indeed as active in San Francisco as they were in New York. But
there are other factors involved in this game. Some of the
skyscrapers are covered with a strange growth and smoke stacks
emit gases from the top of the Coit Tower. It also looks as
though a secret society is involved in some way but I didn't get
very far with this line during the time I was playing.

MHSF can be played without any text input at all which will
infuriate some people. It can be a bit annoying at times when
you feel you know what you want to do but can't think how to 
do it without resorting to typing. One of the main criticisms 
levelled at MHNY was the tough arcade sequences which some 
people found so hard that they were forced to give up. In MHSF,
there is a choice of difficulty level when you enter an
arcade sequence and this is such a help to people like me with
poor reflexes - I selected "easy" like a shot!

MHSF is a hard game to get into as it is so different from all
the other Sierra games and I must admit I got stuck pretty
quickly. However, I would not let my thickness put you off trying
it! With no scoring to the game, it is hard to know how you are
progressing, your only yardstick is whether or not you know what
to try next.

The graphics are excellent, though a touch gory in places and I
especially like the use of the tracker and overhead map display.
Once again, MHSF is on double-sided disks and there is an option
to exchange your disks for single-sided disks - at a price and
(seemingly) only through Sierra in the States. One would assume
the same service is offered over here though one would expect the
relevant form to replaced in packages for export.

                                            Sue