73 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
73 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
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THE KEYS OF MARAMON
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The events of THE KEYS OF MARAMON are contemporaneous with, but independent of,
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those of THE MAGIC CANDLE, Mindcraft's previous CRPG. Experience with THE MAGIC
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CANDLE is useful only in that the game system is very similar. (This review is
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based on the IBM-PC version.)
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KEYS is primarily an arcade-style role-playing game. While there is much
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talking, puzzle-solving, and improvement of your character's abilities, the
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prime requisites for this game are fast reflexes and a quick trigger finger.
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Fighting is plentiful. As is typical of arcade-style programs, the player only
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controls one character. There are four pre-rolled characters to choose from.
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The town of Maramon is invaded nightly by monsters. You must kill these
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monsters or suffer a penalty. Eventually, you must venture into the dungeons of
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Maramon and find the source of the monsters. The key to getting into the
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dungeons is to find the lost keys of Maramon. Fighting the nightly monsters will
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result in finding some of the keys.
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As in THE MAGIC CANDLE, there is a fair amount of housekeeping to do. For
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example, weapons need to be periodically repaired or they will break. Magic is
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done using magical mushrooms. All of this will be very familiar to veterans of
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THE MAGIC CANDLE. The town of Maramon has the necessary stores to provide your
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character with all the basic necessities. Much of the housekeeping is done
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automatically, which is an improvement from THE MAGIC CANDLE. For example,
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weapons are automatically fixed when resting at the guest houses.
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If you fail to kill all the nightly monsters, they will do some damage to the
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town. This raises the prices charged by the stores in Maramon and can close a
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store for a given time period. That is the penalty you pay for failing to sweep
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the town clear of monsters. The monsters wander around the town, so you have to
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hunt them down. However, the wandering is not completely random. There is a
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pattern to the monsters' appearances. Discovering this pattern and making use of
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it can make the game much easier to play. It is worthwhile to replay a night
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fight if any monsters escaped.
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As in THE MAGIC CANDLE, time is important. You should note which day of the
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week it is, and when sunrise and sunset occur. Since time advances continuously,
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you should make liberal use of the Escape key to pause the game.
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There is no speed adjustment available, but the program appears to
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automatically adjust for machine speed. The game played the same on an 8MHz AT
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as it did on a 12MHz AT. There is also no joystick recalibration, which is
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serious, as there are situations where the joysticks on PCs will drift. The game
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was deliberately played in one such situation and quickly became unplayable as
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the joystick drifted. The workaround is to exit the program and restart it.
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Fortunately, the game can be saved at just about any point, and the whole
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process goes quickly.
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The program is supplied on both 5-1/4" and 3-1/2" disks. The IBM version
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supports a joystick, but not a mouse. No sound cards are supported. On a VGA
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video system, the graphics are very nice and look just like those in THE MAGIC
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CANDLE. Copy protection is manual-based.
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My review copy (version 1.0) contained several bugs. However, Mindcraft is
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quite good about upgrading their programs for registered users. The serious bugs
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don't show up until later in the game, so it is possible to play while waiting
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for an update. The documentation implies you can resume play with the new
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version. The save files are KMSAVA.MCS through KMSAVD.MCS for slots A-D.
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KMSCOR.MCS is the list of high scores.
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KEYS is a good game, but it is also an arcade game; MAGIC CANDLE fans should be
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aware of this important distinction. Except for this difference, the game has
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much the look and feel of THE MAGIC CANDLE. In one sense, THE KEYS OF MARAMON
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carries the time pressure aspect of THE MAGIC CANDLE to its logical conclusion.
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THE KEYS OF MARAMON is published by Mindcraft and distributed by Electronic
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Arts.
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*****DOWNLOADED FROM P-80 SYSTEMS (304) 744-2253
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