Mission Critical review by Al Giovetti

 

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By Al Giovetti
Price: $40
Genre: graphic animated adventure (cinematic)
Release:
Developer: Legend
Lead Artist:
Programmer:
Producer: Mike Verdu
Publisher: Random Soft
Phone: (800) 788-8815
Website:
Requirements: 486/66, 8 MB RAM, SVGA, DOS 5, Win95, 2x CD ROM, 4 to 54 MB hard disk space.


Mission Critical

History

History: Legend Entertainment has been known for having text adventures combined with graphics that it did not want you to call text adventures. Legend felt that to call a game a text adventure was to kill the game sales. Well finally we can say that Legend has made a break from text adventures and finally jumped into the arena of today's graphic animated adventures and the results are being well received in product sales and critical acclaim.

Company Line

Game Play

Game play: The game runs like most of this ilk with directions to travel in given by the time proven Legend compass navigator. Conversations bring up special screens that allow you to see something of what you are interacting with. As fate will have it, you will meet others in your explorations, others that can help you with your quest.

With over 120 locations to explore and over 400 different views of those locations, you will not become bored with the game. The movement between sites is by a rail similar to 7th Guest and other games of this type. When you are moving from one location to another you can skip the animation and tedium by right clicking to jump to the next place.

Puzzles: Many of the puzzles are of the treasure hunt variety where you collect items and use them later at the appropriate time and place. Other puzzles require the right word be used to progress the plot of the game. The most involved puzzle in the early part of the game involves repairing a bused bulkhead

Plot

In 2134, a war of succession is heating up between Colonial Worlds and the original Earth confederacy. The World government ship in deep space attacks the Colonial coalition ship Lexington. As fate would have it, and the game engine, you are the only living survivor. You need to explore your crippled ship to discover a way to surmount the current obsticles. Eventually, you find some alien intelligence that leads you into the far future and gives you the powers to return and bring peace and prosperity to the two warring factions.

Graphics

The graphics are beautifully rendered backgrounds for 120 locations.

Animation

The full motion video is extensive, including a 30 minute video introduction that sets the scene.

Voice Actors

There are several full motion video scenes with Michael Dorn (Star Trek: The Next Generation) and Patricia Charbonneau (Robocop II) who bring in excellent performances as the Lexington's comander and Jennifer Tran, the second in command, respectively. The digital speech was well transmitted by the AWE 32 board that it was designed for.

Music Score

Sound Effects

Every interactive item has a commensurate sound effect to go along. Nicely done.

Utilities

You really need to use the full install to get the game to run correctly.

Multi-player Features

No multiplayer features.

Cheats, Hints, Walkthrough

Strategy Guide $20

Journalists

Put your review right here by emailing us the text.

References

Mission Critical Web Site
Scorpia, Computer Gaming World, number 146, September, 1996, pg. 124-128. Steve Honeywell, http://www.nuke.com/cgr/reviews/9601/misscrit/misscrit.htm, 92, 94, 93. Barry Bresnell, http://204.162.101.7/games/Feb96/mission296.html, B (85%). Bernard Yee, http://www.gamespot.com/adventure/missionc/. (86%). Steve Woods, www.gamepen.com/softwarepen/pc/mission_critical.html, 85% Martin Cirulis, www.zdnet.com/gaming/content/960716/mission/mission.html Byte Magazine, Game of the Year.

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