Simon the Sorcerer 3D - Windows 95/98/ME/XP/2K CD-ROM Info from wwwadventuresoft.co.uk, www.simon3d.com and www.headfirst.co.uk/simon3d/ He's back, and this time he's 3D! Continuing on from his adventures in Simon 2, this time Simon finds himself trapped in a strange world, involved in a race against time to beat Sordid to his only route home! Featuring a highly detailed realtime 3D environments , Simon 3D sees you exploring, puzzle solving and talking to characters in the classic Simon tradition, but with total freedom of movement. Meet up with favourite characters once more such as The Swampling, Calypso and even the Woodworm! Simon 3D comes on 2CDs and contains well over 40 hours worth of gameplay. For more information and screenshots, visit the dedicated Simon 3D website at www.simon3d.com System requirements: Pentium 233mmx, 64mb RAM, 8mb Direct3D compatible graphics card, Soundblaster compatible soundcard, 460mb free disk space. Compatible with Windows 95/98/2000/ME and XP. Info: Simon The Sorcerer 3D is a graphic adventure game, featuring all the adventuring antics of the previous 2 games set in a glorious realtime 3D cartoon world. Headfirst Productions have taken a diversion from the traditional Action / Adventure games around at the moment, by including such long-forgotten gameplay elements as puzzle solving, story, and character interaction. With an estimated 3000 hours of gameplay (30 hours if you open your eyes), and over 10,000 lines of dialogue, Simon 3D is a slobbering monster of a game which will drool on your keyboard, causing your 'N' key to get randomly stuck downnnnnnnn without warnnnnnnning. At the moment, Simon 3D is coming out for the PC and Mac, with versions for other platforms a possibility for the future. Graphics: Simon 3D is set in a totally realtime 3D world, where you can explore to your heart's content and find all manner of weird and wonderful things - kind of like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, but without the Oompa-Loompas or precocious gold-digging kids. Or chocolate. Anyway, it took our team of artists over 18 months of hard toil to create all the environments, characters and animation required for the game. Only a few survived. Some are mentally scarred for life. But enough about them, because here comes the science bit... Simon 3D uses the NDL NetImmerse 3D engine, which features all kinds of cool effects and code related wizardry, which means that we can let our imaginations run wild and naked through fields of poppies, without having to worry too much about 'if our engine can handle it'. Here are some of the cool things it can do :- 32-Bit Textures Tri-Linear Filtering and MipMapping Skinned characters and skeletal animation Multi-texturing Particle systems Realtime lighting and shadows ...and loads more stuff which is too boring to list. Check out the graphics in the Screenshots section of this issue. Q&A: You loyal Simon fans have asked a lot of questions about Simon 3D over the period of its development, and we've always done our best to answer them. So if you've got a question, and no- one else can help, maybe you should hire the A-Team ! Or failing that, see if it's answered in the QAF below... * When is Simon 3D coming out ? WHEN ??? April 19th, 2002. It actually came out a few days early ... Sue * When will the demo be available to download ? Hopefully a demo will be available soon after the release date. * What's this I hear about a Macintosh version ? Yes indeed, there is going to be a Mac version. More info coming shortly. * What's the minimum spec PC I'll need ? We reckon the minimum is a P233mmx with 64mb RAM, 460mb HD space, and a 8mb Direct 3D accelerator card. * Why can't you control Simon with a mouse ? It's kind of hard to explain, but basically it is difficult to control a 3D character when viewed from a 3rd person perspective using only a mouse (imagine trying to play Tomb Raider or Mario 64 with a mouse). Using the keyboard makes things much easier. * Does the game support Direct 3D or 3dfx (Glide) ? There have been a number of compatibility issues with Glide based cards which means that officially, Simon 3D does NOT support Glide - but it will still run in Glide mode. Your best option is to run it in Direct3D. * Who is publishing the game? Crucial Entertainment are publishing the game with Vivendi Universal. * Where can I buy it if I can't find it in my local store ? It will be for sale on a number of online stores also, including Adventure Soft's own secure store. * At the end of Simon 2, Simon was trapped in Sordid's body. What does he do about that ? This problem is rectified in the intro sequence to Simon 3. * Simon 2 came out in 1995. What have you been doing since then, you slackers ? After Simon 2, we developed The Feeble Files as a bit of a change from teenage wizards. It was recently called 'The Best Adventure Game Ever' at www.gameboomers.com ! * Is there going to be a Simon 4 ? It all depends on how well Simon 3 does. We've already got an outline design ready... * Just what is 'Melissa Leg' an anagram of ? Not telling - but it's a scathing attack on the games industry. * That Swampy is a bit of a billy-no-mates isn't he ? He is indeed - but that is mostly because he spends most of his time living in or eating swamps. He did get lucky once though (the sly dog), cos all you fans will remember he had some babies in Simon 2 (But no-one knows who the mysterious Mrs. Swampy is...) * Who would win in a fight between Simon the Sorcerer and Harry Potter ? Quite obviously it would be Simon - he'd kick Harry's behind right back to his cupboard under the stairs. And as all you Simon 1 fans will remember, Simon did the whole teenage wizard / owl / evil villain thing a long time before Mr Potter ever did.... * Why is Simon 3 in 3D ? Why couldn't you have done it in 2D ? 2D adventures are much better. You are the King of Wrong. Even if God himself decided to pack in ruling the universe and made computer games instead, he'd have a job getting funding from a publisher for a 2D adventure game. Unfortunately the 2D point 'n' click genre is pretty much dead, and 3D is the way to go. We know that there have been a number of games which were 2D adventures and have had less than exciting 3D instalments, but we hope to change that by keeping all the adventuring principles of old in Simon 3D. Just because an adventure isn't in 2D, doesn't mean it'll be rubbish. Give it a try ! - o -