HALLOWEEN by Third Coast Software "A spooky interactive text game" on SynTax disk PCPD 990 Review by Bev Truter on PC Before I even begin this review, if I could send a message to the author it would run something like this: (if author under 12 years of age) - Well done! You're a clever kid! (If author over 12 years) - perhaps you should think about extending your range of hobbies beyond programming games. This game is one of those very simplistic two-word-response efforts that invite you to enter your name, then proceed to refer ceaselessly to it - I always feel tempted to enter something rather rude at this point, don't know why; but these primitive little games always manage to bring out my irritability and childishness in equal proportions. Well, to get the technical stuff over and done with, the text is in HUGE YELLOW CAPITALS on a blue background, the game must be played with CAPS LOCK ON, Save and Restore functions both available, and there is no score at all - you either finish the game or you don't - definitely the latter, for me. There appear to be about 25 to 30 locations - I discovered about 20, and the game mercifully looked like heading towards its final stages a bit further on. An annoying feature which I've found in quite a few of the more elderly text adventures, is that both `examine' and `inventory' have no abbreviations; which is a ridiculous programming oversight in a text game. Even `exa' and `inv' would have been better than the full words necessary in this game. I'll quote the Introduction, which describes briefly the aim of the game. "You are about to start an incredible adventure. You have entered a frightening land full of scary things. The object of the game is to find the haunted house, to enter it, and to destroy the ghost that has taken over the house. He is the ruler of this land." Oh really? A ghost ruling this very ordinary-looking scenery? How quaint. Well, that says it all - plod through the scenery, pick up everything in sight, solve a couple of very simple puzzles, and that's it. Ho-hum. There's even a hint system for the permanently desperate in the form of a magic book, which has a changing routine of 4 very vague hints, none of which are particularly helpful. The hint that irritated me most was .."a big bird may help you!" The only bird I saw was a seagull flying overhead in one location, and if you try to examine it, you get the reply "I don't see what you're talking about" -(THE !@#$ BIRD THAT'S FLYING OVERHEAD, DUMMY.) Location descriptions are very ordinary...no, I lie, they are very dull; and totally lacking in colour and believability. Here's the room description for the cemetery - "You are in a terrible cemetery. There are tombstones, dead people are buried here". All objects that are part of the scenery cannot be examined - the game behaves as though it's invisible, even though the room description clearly mentions it. eg. "examine tombstones" results in the reply "I don't see what you are talking about." (THE TOMBSTONES! THE TOMBSTONES! THE ONES IN THE CEMETERY!!). Same response for the tree in the orchard, the gate in the meadow and the pumpkins in the field . Most of the objects you need are simply lying around in full view on the ground, although you do have to dig in one location (the obvious one) to find something. The characters you meet are tersely described and lack any distinctive personality - a Princess, a Troll, a Wizard and a Witch. You can't interact with them at all beyond examining them - they all trot out their set piece of conversation and that's that. Some minor characters like the fawn and scarecrow can't even be examined. Why on earth describe a character as though he/she/it is in the room if there's no suitable response when the player tries to look at it, or even interact with it, heaven forbid? The sequence of locations and characters the author describes can't possibly form part of a coherent story, as that would imply some sort of underlying plot and logic, both missing from this game. It's not enough to sling a few unconnected rooms together - (hey, I know, let's have a field, a cemetery, an orchard and a beach) and then dump a few characters in the scenery - (let's see now...a witch, princess, wizard, troll and vampire sound good); then chuck in a heap of objects for the player to pick up - (ummm....a shovel, knife and shiny key should do the trick). With this haphazard method of gamewriting all you can possibly create is a very shallow, silly little game. The best (yes, best) puzzle I came across was what to feed the Hungry Sharks...now, let me think for a minute....would they want the shovel?...No. Would they eat the key??..No. Perhaps I should feed them the knife?...No. Oooh, I know, the 50 mice!! Yes!! That's the solution...gosh, glad I could solve THAT tricky problem! I finally made it as far as the haunted house , where various creatures blocked further progress. (The Vampire here isn't quite as awful as the rest of the cardboardy characters). Right, that's it, I've reached the limits of my patience with this game. Farewell Halloween, prepare to meet your fate....a swift deleting from the HDD. ENJOYMENT 1/10 ATMOSPHERE 1.5/10 DIFFICULTY 2/10 IRRITATION FACTOR 9/10 FINAL COMMENT Try one of the other games on disk 990 - none of them could possibly be this bad. - o -