Commander Blood - Cryo/Mindscape International - œ44.99
                   IBM PC CD-ROM only

                  Reviewed by Roy Sims

In the past, French computer games have been a little bit 'odd',
but "Commander Blood" takes the biscuit! I can't believe that the
French are as far removed from the rest of humanity as this weird
game suggests they are. Perhaps I'd better explain.

"Captain Blood" was a strange science fiction exploration type
game that was written by Exxos five years ago for the Atari ST and
Amiga. It had a unique graphic style (lots of Purple) and a
sampled soundtrack which was actually a small segment from the
Jean-Michel Jarre album "Zoolook". The game also included a
psychedelic warp sequence and basically involved traversing the
Galaxy, searching for clues etc. on planets (flying down vector
style mountain ranges) and talking to aliens using a comprehensive
icon based language system. You also got to detonate a large
number of planets along the way.

Five years on, and Exxos have evolved into Cryo. Recent games of
theirs include "Dune" and "KGB" for Virgin, as well as "Megarace"
for Mindscape. They now specialise in rendered graphics and CD-ROM
only games. As you might expect, "Commander Blood" is a follow on
from the original "Captain Blood" and it has a distinctly familiar
feel to it as you play.

The first surprise comes when the game loads. Most games have an
'intro' of sorts, and being CD-ROM you would expect some flashy
rendered graphics thrown in somewhere. Well, you do get that, but
in the form of what I can only describe as a sci-fi music video!
Filmed footage of aliens, spaceships and a woman dancing under
water is mixed in with rendered graphics and a music soundtrack
with a heavy modern beat. This goes on for a few mins before it
loops and starts all over again.  Left-clicking will interrupt the
intro and take you into your spaceship (the Ark), ready for the
real game to begin.


The inside of the spaceship is also strange. Your controller isn't
the usual mouse pointer. Instead, you have a disembodied
'cyberglove' hand which floats around, waiting for you to move it
with the mouse. You also soon realise that the various different
control panels are found on a wrap-around virtual screen. Move the
hand to the left and the screen scrolls left to right, revealing
another panel close by. This takes some getting used to, as the
screen often scrolls when you don't want it to. The hand is also a
bit odd to control. It's a very large polygon created object, so
it's a bit sluggish to respond to any mouse movements. It also has
to be positioned very precisely over switches, icons etc. before
it will press them. (On a very fast PC this ceases to be a
problem).

From the various panels you can access the star map, from where
you can choose your next destination. Travelling to another planet
is quite a colourful experience. There are a number of different
effects that may be shown when you make a journey and they are all
quite impressive. Imagine the light effects from the conclusion of
"2001 - A Space Odyssey", or the strange clouds from "Star Trek V
- The Final Frontier" and you'll get an idea of what they are
like.

So what is the point of the game? Well, Captain Bob Morlock is
getting old and wants to see the creation of the Universe before
he dies. Exactly who is this Captain Morlock? He's the oldest
being in the universe. He's the owner and boss of Kanary Corp., a
gigantic business that now spends colossal sums of money keeping
him alive. Your mission is to fly back through time to the Big
Bang, dealing with problems as you encounter them. To help you
reach the Big Bang, Kanary Corp.  scientists have developed a
Black Hole, codenamed Oddland.  Your ship can use this Black Hole
to travel back in time millions of years in one leap.
Incidentally, the Kanary Corp. scientists also developed you,
Commander Blood. Captain Bob is also onboard, cryonized in a
container called the Cryobox. The Cryobox is used throughout the
game as a means of storing various items that you may be allowed
to teleport to your ship.


You can talk to Captain Bob for advice and information, and the
first time you do this you're in for a shock. When you talk to
him, all you see is a close up of his eyes. This doesn't sound too
bad, but what you don't realise is that Captain Bob isn't human.
Video footage is used, so imagine someone looking not unlike a
brown Vogon from the BBC TV adaptation of "The Hitch Hiker's Guide
To The Galaxy" and you'll understand how odd it looks to get a
close up of his eyes whenever you want to talk to him! (This
technique is also used for a few other characters later on).

You start the game with just two planets on your star map, and you
are forced to make a quick exit from the one you begin at.
Whenever you reach a new planet, you should send the Orxx (a
dolphin like creature) to fly down and make contact with any life
forms on the surface. The music used to accompany your journey
down to a planet changes for each planet, and the style and sample
quality is high. (I'd go as far as saying that I'd be surprised if
Cryo didn't release a CD of the music, as they did with the "Dune"
music they wrote a few years ago). The music changes from the
weird (try visiting the planet Magnus, and you are treated to the
kind of background sound heard in the classic 50s movie
"Forbidden Planet") to the Ethereal (visit Corpo).

You are also treated to impressive ray-traced graphics as the Orxx
flies in. All the alien life forms (except for those that are
robots) are pulled off the CD as video footage. It looks rather
tacky the first few times but you get used to it after a while. No
attempt has been made to make the footage flow together.  The
aliens will suddenly leap from one side of the screen to the
other, and the viewing angle and backdrop will change at the same
time, only to switch back seconds later!

Communication has been simplified from the original "Captain
Blood" game. Instead of an icon system, you wait and read what the
life form has to say (accompanied by a generic sound for the
aliens 'voice') then make a response from a list of options. The
whole thing is conducted in a very broken up, 'pigeon' English
manner which is a bit off putting. You have to ask the right
questions, and give (teleport) items to aliens at the right time.
Each time you do this, new clues or new locations are revealed.
Unfortunately, you don't even have to work out what to do with
which object, as your on-board computer (Honk) will suggest you
use the correct item as long as you have it with you. This reduces
the amount of real puzzle solving to practically zero. As long as
you keep travelling between the planets and exhaust all of the
multiple choice questions on offer, you will always reach the
correct conclusion in the end!

There's also an obligatory 'cyberspace' section where you have to
collect items that are floating or moving around in cyberspace,
then feed them to some creatures that look a bit like Manta Rays.
In return, you are given Bionium, a substance which is used to
power 'droids. There are other flying creatures in the cyberspace
that get in your way, including a large 'Pacman' style creature
that is also trying to gobble up the items you are collecting. As
the game progresses, more flying obstacles (creatures and ships)
try to get in your way.  The main use for the Bionium is to feed
Honk, so he can give you clues as to what to do next. You'll find
that you need to consult Honk a few times because at various
points in the game you are left wondering what you're supposed to
do next. Most of the time it's because you haven't revisited a
planet for a while and someone has now appeared there who wasn't
there before.

It's difficult to say whether I really like the game. It has a
style all of its own, and the excess of video footage takes some
getting used to. Unfortunately, the manual is next to hopeless.
It's very thin, light on real content, and it's obviously been
translated into English by someone who doesn't quite grasp all the
nuances of the language. Why the publisher couldn't make the
necessary amendments to make it read properly is anyone's guess.
It also completely omits any technical assistance to get the game
to run. I found one problem very early on. When I sent the Orxx
down to my first planet, the game just locked up on me. After two
days I discovered what was causing the problem (or at least, I
think I've discovered it!). If you don't have your device drivers
set up to load in an English keyboard, or have the country flag
set for 044, it will lock up at that point. Hardly obvious is it?


Unfortunately the game also has the feel of a product that has
been rushed out for a Christmas release without the necessary
testing or tweaking being made. Quite often you can go back to a
planet and talk to a creature you've already met, yet they speak
to you as if you've never met before. The game also has a habit of
locking up on you during play. Usually a re-boot solves the
problem, but there's one fatal bug which (I suspect) is currently
stopping me from making more progress. One of the topics of
conversation with Captain Bob is obviously unfinished.  It says
"Good_" and if you select it, Bob starts to talk and then the game
locks up every time! (This might make the game incompletable. If
it does, then Mindscape and Cryo have committed the worst possible
crime a software house can, i.e.  released a game that can't be
finished due to a bug). For those of you who are interested, the
version I've been playing is version 1.0, just in case an updated
version is released in the future.

If you liked Captain Blood, and you want a game that really
utilises CD-ROM with lots of video, rendered graphics and sampled
music then this may be right up your street. However, don't expect
the game to be much more than a journey round the Galaxy and
choosing from lots of multiple choice responses.  You are pushed
in the right direction, and the game ends up being a little bit
too simple (but still large enough to take a while to complete).
That's not to say that "Commander Blood" isn't worth a look. Just
be prepared to find it a bit weird...













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