Autumn E.C.T.S report

                   By Richard Hewison

Yes, it's that time of year again when all those important people
in the Games Software Industry (or Leisure Software Industry as
people call it these days) gather under one roof to discuss
business and forthcoming titles. As usual, I managed to stab
myself with the safety pin on the back of my V.I.P. ticket but
otherwise I survived another journey into London.

Virgin Interactive Entertainment have been extremely busy since
the last show. They've been bought out by Blockbuster Video for
starters (although Richard Branson will still hang on to 10% of
the company), and they've also tied up two very significant
players in the PC market, namely Lucasarts and I.D Software.

Lucasarts were showing off a number of products, including the
Steven Spielberg scripted adventure game "The Dig" (which was
supposed to be running but whilst I was there the big screen
remained ominously blank) and "Full Throttle" which is a big
cartoon style adventure game which looks visually similar to "Day
of the Tentacle" if the section I saw being played was anything to
go by. The version up and running on the Virgin stand featured
full digitised speech. It was also interesting to see that there
isn't an on-screen interface to be seen during play.
Unfortunately, neither "Full Throttle" or "The Dig" are expected
to be ready until after Christmas.

Another Lucasarts game which isn't due until next year (February
'95) is "Star Wars: Dark Forces" which could be best described as
"Doom" but set in the Star Wars universe. Certainly the section I
saw being played looked very similar to "Doom". One rather
humorous feature, (which I can only assume will be removed from
the final version) involved changing the weapons. One of the
available weapons showed a hand holding a lighted cigarette. When
the fire button was pressed the hand moved up and took a quick
drag from the fag! The game itself looked very fast and very
smooth, but then it was playing on a 90MHz Pentium! (A Star Wars


Windows screen saver was also on display. This enormous program
should be available at the end of October, if not sooner).

I.D's "Doom" is a straight forward arcade blaster, but it
impressed me when I first saw it and in multi-player death match
mode it can't be touched for sheer fun and mayhem. More of the
same is the best way to describe "Doom II". It looks exactly the
same, except for one new weapon (a double barrelled shot gun) and
a few new monsters. Otherwise, it looks and plays identical to
its predecessor. Again, the 3D system and graphics look and move
really well.

"The 11th Hour" isn't likely to be available before Christmas
either. It contains a lot more video footage than before and is
set 25 years or so after the original. There are also less logical
puzzles and more of the A.I "microscope" puzzles as found in "The
7th Guest". The graphics look cleaner and it seems to run a lot
faster too.

Westwood Studios were only showing sneak previews of their latest
titles, and most of these were identical to those that were being
shown at the last show back in April. "Command and Conquer" won't
be out this year either, which disappointed me as it looks like an
excellent strategy war game along similar lines to "Dune 2" but
with CD-ROM rendered graphics and video footage thrown in.  A
tantalising glimpse of "Kyrandia Book Three" featuring lots of
rendered graphics was also on view, with the statue of the evil
Malcolm in view, which suggests he will make a return performance
in the concluding chapter. Other Westwood Studios titles include
"Lands of Lore 2" which will look radically different from the
first game thanks to rendered graphics once again.

Away from the engrossing Virgin stand there wasn't that much to
impress. Panasonic's 3DO machine was finally launched in the U.K.
but it seems to be just an arcade console if the current batch of
titles are anything to go by. A PC board will allow you to have a
3DO inside your IBM PC but from what I saw I wouldn't bother if I
were you. It may be technically flash, but consoles just don't
cater for the discerning adventurers like you and me.

Domark had "Lords of Midnight - The Citadel" up and running on the
PC but it still looks very poor. (A less than impressive demo was
available on the cover of PC Review magazine a few months ago
which also failed to make me change my mind). I think I'll stick
to playing the two original games on my PC Spectrum emulator thank
you very much!

Sierra had "King's Quest VII" and "Space Quest VI" for the PC, but
it was so bloomin' crowded that I couldn't even get close to have
a peep at either title! The science fiction strategy game
"Outpost" was also heavily featured on the stand (despite the
copious bugs and missing game features found in the CD-ROM
version!). They were also showing glimpses of "Phantasmagoria",
which is a graphically impressive looking Gothic horror style
adventure.

Cyberdreams have a Giger Windows Screen saver for the PC (minus a
few of his more 'dodgy' airbrush paintings!), and will follow it
up with Giger II, Syd Mead and Futuristic Vehicles screen savers.
As for games, there was no sign of "Dark Seed 2" which has been
promised for quite some time (although I thought the first game
was pretty dreadful anyway). "I have no mouth and I must scream"
is another forthcoming adventure based on a book by Harlan Ellison
but this wasn't being shown on the stand when I was there.

S.S.I have a compilation CD-ROM for the PC lined up, featuring no
less than the entire S.S.I AD&D Gold box range (I didn't count
them but it looks like at least 12 titles are in the compilation
if not more!). You would certainly get value for money even if the
engine used to produce the games isn't everyone's cup of tea (or
coffee, mine's white with one sugar). The compilation should be
available now.

Microprose were showing bits of their PC CD-ROM graphic adventure
"Star Trek - The Next Generation - A Final Unity" but when I say
bits, I mean bits. Lots of separate sections were being loaded up
individually on a PC which doesn't auger well for a release date
in the near future. The ray-traced and rendered characterisations
of the bridge crew looked interesting, but then they also looked
artificial. The game itself is a graphic adventure of sorts, but
don't expect its release until next year (or after the new movie
"Star Trek - Generations" has been premiered in the U.S. anyway).

Award for the most p***ed off person at the show goes to the poor
bloke who had to plod around the swelteringly hot Business Design
Centre dressed up in full Knight's armour with "Lords of the
Realm" leaflets sellotaped to his breast plate! The game is from
Impressions and involves medieval feudal land conquering and
plenty of strategy.

Maxis were showing off "Sim Tower" which has an interesting
feature allowing you to include your own tower in a "Sim City
2000" scenario if you want to. Also lined up is an Urban Renewal
Kit. "Rain Forest" will involve urban development and balancing
that with the surrounding environment. There is also an imminent
compilation of "Sim Classics" featuring Sim City, Sim Life and Sim
Ant in one pack.


U.S. Gold are making a big song and dance about "Under a Killing
Moon" which should be available to buy for the PC (CD-ROM only) by
now. Having seen a demo and watched it running at the show, I have
to admit that I don't like the look of it. The quality of the
digitised sequences is probably the best I've seen on a PC to
date, but that doesn't make it a great game. The acting looks to
be pretty dire and the gameplay is a matter of clicking on objects
and people all the time. Oh, and it will retail at around sixty
quid!

Renegade (who will have been bought by the giant multi-media Time
Warner company by the time you read this) were showing "Flight of
the Amazon Queen" for the second show running. This adventure is
very much influenced by the Lucasarts "Monkey Island" graphic
adventures in both graphic style and humorous content. It will be
available on the PC (both floppy and talkie CD-ROM) and Amiga this
side of Christmas. From what I've seen from other publishers, it
might be about the only title that makes it!


Once again it proved to be almost impossible to reach the
Interplay stand to have a look at "Dungeon Master 2" or progress
on "Stonekeep". I'm now of the opinion that neither game can be
(a) in a finished state, or (b) good enough to show at all.
Surely the idea of a Trade show is to show off your new titles to
the trade? Why then do they choose the most inaccessible areas to
present them only behind closed doors? Are they ashamed of them?
Only time will tell...

Mindscape were another publisher who decided to hide themselves
away and show little new except behind closed doors. The only
title of interest to us discerning adventure types is "Dragon
Lore" by Cryo. Unfortunately their last game for Mindscape was the
awful CD-ROM racing shoot 'em up "Mega Race" so we can only hope
that "Dragon Lore - The Legend Begins" turns out much better. The
publicity blurb contains the most cliched fantasy plot I've ever
read. Visually it looks very nice and according to the blurb it
will contain "Spectacular full screen 3D graphics and animation",
"Dynamic first-person view and sampled atmospheric effects",
"Intuitive interface with dynamic cursor", "Character interaction
with full speech" and "Cinematic story- setting introduction". If
it plays as good as it looks it could be something to watch out
for, but we've all been bitten once too often on that score
before.

Psygnosis didn't have a proper stand at the Business Design
Centre, but they did have a small set up showing a video of their
Terry Pratchett "Disc World" adventure game, and the animation
looked very good. The characters were suitably humorous and the
animation seemed close to cartoon film quality. How playable the
game turns out to be is another thing all together, but I suspect
"Disc World" fans are at the very least going to be pleased with
the look of the game. (They also showed a Whole New World of
Lemmings, which looked exactly the same as the previous
incarnations but with an even simpler interface. I thought the new
Lemmings was supposed to be in 3D...)

Overall, the best looking titles at the show where probably those
on the Virgin stand (for the second show running). There aren't
many R.P.G, adventure and strategy games out there at the moment
but those in the pipeline are looking very promising. PC CD-ROM
seems to be the focus of all the major publishers, with the Amiga
now beginning to be nothing but a distant memory (with the
exception of a few choice conversions).

The only problem I could see at the show is that most of the
titles I've reported here look likely to miss Christmas '94.
CD-ROM software takes much more time to develop and the gap
between development versions is significantly longer than it used
to be.  Once again I have to question whether software is getting
better or worse as the years go by. They certainly look and sound
much better than before, but the content and 'playability' seems
to be left behind.






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