Hugo's House of Horrors 3 - By David Gray on SynTax Disk 436
          (Text 'n' graphic adventure for the PC )

                Reviewed by Charlotte Wolle

It's got style! It's got fast-paced action! It's got a dying
heroine!  It's got pretty darn good graphics! It's got Hugo!
Unfortunately it hasn't got a House of Horrors but let's not hold
that against it.

If you've played the other Hugos you'll see number three has got
better in graphics and sound departments, although Penelope still
hasn't been killed off yet.  For those of you who haven't
encountered the joys of Hugo's adventures, they are basically
spent rescuing his accident-prone girlfriend from life threatening
situations. Anyway, about this game.

The title screen pops up, a catchy little tune starts up, and the
story begins.  Hugo is flying home from his last adventure in
Great Uncle Horace's cottage in Britain when a freak magnetic
storm upsets his little plane and forces him to crash land in the
South American jungle.  As soon as they've landed Penelope orders
Hugo to change his threads and he returns done out in his jungle
gear. Penelope naively toddles off and gets bitten by a tree
spider, which leaves Hugo the rest of the game to find the
antidote.

There are about 20ish locations and quite a few people, but you
can't really talk to them properly, like, ask them any questions.
The puzzles aren't too taxing, but I didn't realise that I'd have
to use voodoo in it to get rid of the witch doctor, and I can't
even spell bouillon cubes let alone know what they are! Something
that makes this an easier game is that the total points needed is
128, a lot less than the other Hugo's.  However, the bright colour
schemes keep novice adventurers like myself entertained for as
long as it takes to complete, but pro-gamers will probably finish
it in a couple of hours.  Size isn't everything mind, and I think
it would lose its 'cuteness qualities' if it was longer.  Loads of
people I've talked to seem to be under the impression that it's a
classic; as far as I can make out it was made in '92.

An easy adventure with style?  I guess you have to have seen it to
appreciate the pretty colours, tacky music and stylised storyline.

Still, I enjoyed it, and maybe I feel like a better person for
helping Penelope, (again), pleasing the natives in the jungle, and
getting some old geezer his crystal ball back.

I got my copy on an adventure compilation, (before I'd heard of
SynTax) but I see you can get it in the library on disk 436.  Try
it; you might like it.








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