Tsk! Tsk! by James Judge Hah! At last. Tell you what, I think there's a loose cable in my computer. Why's that? Every now and again the floppy fails to work or the CD-ROM isn't recognised. The solution? Pick up the CPU and give it a damn good shake. How that for the height of technical prowess?... Anyway, onto the article. When I finished writing my Top Ten for this year, I realised that, yes, a lot of games have come out this year and I actually liked a couple of them. After I recovered from that shock I then had another realisation - why did I only like a very limited choice of the games that have arrived. I think the answer is simple, but it makes me both annoyed and wary of the future game releases that may be gracing our screens over the next couple of years. The reason why I didn't like the majority of game releases this year is that (a) most of them were arcade games and (b) those that were of an adventure leaning had huge failings, from what I could ascertain. I have nothing against arcade games in and of themselves. They do what they set out to do in the biggest, brightest and noisiest fashion possible. There are some true shining stars such as the racing game Pod and Screamer 2, as well as the more traditional games such as Tomb Raider and, of course, Quake. I'll probably always be playing a couple of these gems as I like to test out my reflexes and know that I can take on four of the best Artificially Intelligent computer players in a deathmatch and still come out well on top. But, probably because of overdosing on these simple pleasures at a young age on the Speccy and ST (all be it in a monochrome 2D atmosphere), I won't be able to sit down for a couple of hours each night plugging away at these games. They just don't have the variation that I need, or the depth of play that I love. So, I can't criticise this lucrative part of the games industry. However, the adventure side of things is a whole different kettle of fish. When I say adventure I'm talking about the whole caboodle here - graphical adventures, FMV games, RPGs and the like. Looking back over the past year there has been NOTHING that has warranted me going out and spending œ30 on a set of shiny new CDs. OK, I did buy Diablo, but that was in the hope that I get into multiplayer RPG heaven. Oh yeah, and I bought Magic The Gathering, but that was it. Before I buy a game I need to see a review of it in one of the glossy mags that I trust (PC Format or Gamer) and then see either a review in SynTax by someone I know or have one of my friends thoroughly recommend the game to me. Even then, I'll see if I can beg, borrow or steal it from a different source before I hand over my hard-earned cash. If a game passes all of these tests then I'll go out and buy it. Soooo, looking at the two full-priced games that I bought last year you can see that only a very small majority of the released games actually made it through my tests. And thank God I've only paid out œ60 this year, as the games that I have managed to beg, borrow or steal have proven to me that the good adventure game is dead, well and truly. What do I class as a good adventure? Well, one that has a good plot, good character development and oodles of puzzles. One that has the elusive 'one more go' syndrome. Best of all, one that has you start playing at ten in the evening and before you know it the three music CDs you'd lined up for play have been played and you've only got five hours to go before work the next day. Most importantly of all, though, is one that is non-linear and gives you plenty of choices as to what to do (so you won't be stuck on one puzzle and be unable to go anywhere else until you look at the solution) as well as offering up a LOT to do. If a game is totally linear or is completed in under ten hours (as Diablo was) then I feel that it doesn't warrant playing as paying œ3 an hour is a mug's game (and while I might be ugly, I'm not at all mug-shaped ). So, when I look back at the past year I become very disheartened. The number of graphical adventures, while not being great, that I've either played myself or seen my mum plough through in a matter of a couple of days leaves me thankful that I didn't spend any money on them to begin with. The FMV offerings have been even worse with games such as Phantasmagoria 2 and Voyeur 2 defying description (although I'm sure Mongoose will try his best - spitting and frothing all the way). To sum up, in these two genres I haven't seen a noteworthy game, apart from a couple of graphical adventures which I'll pick up when they come out on budget (such as Toonstruck). That leaves me with RPGs and what a complete and utter lack of games there have been in this category. Thinking back we've had, erm, Daggerfall, erm, Realms Of The Haunting, eeerrrr, Diablo, ummmn, oh yes, and Wizardry Nemesis has just come out. Ignoring Diablo Realms seemed a bland attempt at an RPG by Tony Crowther (which surprised me) and watching mum complete it in just over a week (and this was her first 'RPG'), which included a complete restart near the end of the game due to a bug, didn't give me much confidence that Mr Crowther had made a good step after the brilliant Captive. Daggerfall seemed, on the surface, to be good but the reports I've had of it suggests that it is heavily bugged, as its predecessor was (Arena) and, because of that fact, I haven't touched it with a barge pole. The final game is the only hope, as Mongoose seems to be thoroughly enjoying it and I loved the previous game in the series, but even then it still sounds easy and will, undoubtedly, be just a flash in the pan. So, looking at all of this I'm worried. Game companies seem to be opting for releasing either big, empty games that will take a little while, but be completely linear (ultimately) and devoid of anything that would make a game interesting, or they are going for the plush, multi-million dollar efforts that are over in twelve minutes, literally! If this is the current state of thing, what does the future hold? Will we be completing games even before we buy them? I hope not. In the face of this I've found myself turning more and more to the strategy side of things. Here we have a genre that continues to blossom with excellent releases regularly. It is the only genre to heavily support multiplayer games and, most importantly for me, the realms of possibilities in these games are limitless. No two games of Civilization 2 will be the same - ever, and two skirmish missions in Red Alert will throw up new and interesting possibilities without fail. Even a game such as Magic The Gathering has no real RPG elements and is, in fact, a different type of strategy game. Maybe I'm just having a bad year and have completely missed the real gems that have graced everyone else's screens this year, but I really do feel that the true adventure side of the computer games industry is wallowing in some kind of torpid rut, continually feeding us with second rate drivel that keeps only people devoid of a head happy for more than a day or so. I can't wait until the outlook changes, 'cos I can't wait to get my teeth stuck into a good RPG... - o -