If you're looking for the review of Discworld Noir (i.e. from following a link), click here. This review is of the first Discworld game.
If that's what you want, please read on...
There are some old adventure games out there that are still worth playing that maybe arent quite as well known as the Monkey Island series. Ive decided to try to review as many of them as humanly possible (well at least it keeps me off the streets). Reviewing older games can of course be a bit tricky as far as objectivity goes, but Ill do my best.
Overview
The first on my list is the original Discworld game. You play as the incompetent wizard Rincewind, on a mission to save the city from a dragon
which turns into a mission to save the dragon from
youll find out.
First Impressions
Starting out in Unseen University, Rincewind must visit the Arch-Chancellor to receive a mission. Then he has to complete the mission
by doing, of course, implausible and unlikely things. Well it is a game - and it is Discworld, so what do you expect? All the old favourite characters are there and the humour bombards you straight away. It all looks great fun, but quickly starts to give the impression that the difficulty level has been pitched a bit too high for it to continue being great fun.
Interface
The usual point-and-click interface is used in Discworld and for conversation handling you can either choose a question, exclamation, joke, or insult. Occasionally one or two conversation topics will show up as well. This works okay but I didnt really feel in charge of the conversations. Right clicking on an object will make Rincewind look at it, left-click and you will walk to it, while using the item is achieved by double-clicking it. Inventory handling is also fully mouse-driven and you have your old friend the Luggage to hold your stuff.
(Oh yeah some puzzles require that Rincewind have a particular item in his own extremely limited inventory very annoying at times.)
Difficulty
I found a lot of the puzzles in Discworld to be more frustrating than challenging. Itll take you quite a while to beat this game, but the balance between enjoyment and pulling your hair out isnt quite right!
Aesthetics
Dont expect too much from the graphics on a game os old as them there hills. It looks very dated, but its also very colourful, has decent animation (a little jerky at times but due to the complexity of some of the animations thats forgivable - absolutely everything Rincewind does is animated, theres no cop-outs at all in that area), and nice backgrounds. Okay so its not up to modern standards, but that doesnt really detract from the game. The animations are also very funny at times - for the right reason, I mean! It all looks very cartoony, which fits in with the style perfectly.
I cant really comment much on the sound. Using VDMSound (available for free at http://www.ece.mcgill.ca/~vromas/vdmsound/) I could get the music to work (not bad actually), but whatever settings I tried it was impossible to get the sound effects and speech working. This is unfortunately a problem with nearly all older games (including all of the older adventure games Im planning to review) that run in the DOSbox mode.
Will You Still Be Playing it in 6 Months Time?
Probably not. If you cant solve the puzzles you will, I suspect, either get hold of a walthrough or just give up.
Is it Worth the Money?
Depends how much you pay for it
If youre a fan of either Discworld or graphical adventure games (or, like me, both), youll enjoy playing this first attempt to make a game out of Terry Pratchetts fantasy world. Its not brilliant, and in some ways it hasnt dated too well, but there are still a lot of laughs to be had and some good old-fashioned problem-solving fun. I enjoyed it, but its certainly not one of the best adventure games Ive ever played.
*****************
Final Ratings
Graphics: - 68% - dated but colourful with the added bonus of some funny animation.
Sound: - N/A I cant really comment on this as I couldnt get the speech or sound FX to work.
Playability: - 74% - easy to play but fiddly handling sometimes.
Longevity: - 71% - youll get bored or us a walkthrough, either way it wont last you forever but is of a pretty decent length nonetheless.
Replay Value: - 66% - for the jokes you might be tempted to play it again
Value For Money: - 75% - if you can get it at all itll be very cheap, so pretty good VFM.
Overall Rating: - 68% - worth getting your hands on if you see it cheap.
Links
The Monkey Island Archives (MI1-3)
Escape from Monkey Island (MI4)
Bladerunner
Discworld: Noir
Grim Fandango
Law & Order 2: Double or Nothing
Broken Sword: Sahdow of the Templars
Broken Sword 2: The Smoking Mirror
Recommended: Yes
Version Played: Released
Operating System: Windows
CPU: Other
CPU Speed (MHz): over 600
RAM (MB): More than 256
Best Played With/Intended For: Single Player
Graphics Card Family: Other
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