Dungeon Adventure

Où sont les neiges d'antan? It must be said that I had many a Proustian moment replaying this excellent Level 9 offering. It is 42 years since I purchased it for my Atari 800 amidst my 'A' levels at school back in 1983. Back in those distant days of The Tube on Channel Four and Gabichi golfing sweaters as the iconic fashion statement of the time I loaded up this game on my dodgy Atari tape recorder. It took about a quarter of an hour to load, if it loaded at all (about half the time it crashed) and I spent many an evening battling against carnivorous jellies when I should have been studying. Chivers give you shivers.

The DOS version essayed here is an enhanced one on the old Middle Earth offering e.g. it understands EXAMINE and UNDO but the Tolkien references are gone in the repackaged game so no Minas Tirith; this does not affect immersion in a detrimental fashion. Dungeon Adventure proffers a massive map of over 200 locations, cleverly crafted puzzles and as Gunness from CASA has noted, an eerily evocative and claustrophobic feel is engendered - steps and skeletal hands crumble; rats, corpses and slime proliferate the dungeons; there are no friendly faces (with one exception) to share the burden here and the oppressiveness and sense of isolated choice works extremely well. The descriptions are broodingly evocative and there is barely a typo to wince at as you pick your way through the Dantesque devastation, although in one location a statue may only be recognised as a sculpture. Occasional shafts of dry humour pierce the oppressive prose. What do rats flee?

Having just completed the game again I think I would taxonomise it as a game of medium difficulty. At the time it was probably the hardest game I had played but subsequent sufferings at the hands of the Phoenix authors have made me reassess its difficulty quotient. Some puzzles have multiple solutions too and there are a few outrageous puns as well as a handful of sudden death locations as well as an appearance by Zorro.

There is a very clever set piece section of the game in the central dungeon which comprises a huge spiral ramp, down upon which the Demon Lord used to watch the Middle Earth equivalent of the Christians versus the lions battle a series of life or death puzzles; all this from the vicarious comforts of his Viewing Gallery. Collect 9 gems and escape. In all there are 35 treasures to ransack from the ruins all around you and many have a more than monetary worth. There is also a very useful teleportation system employing a hierarchical structure of coloured collars which save a lot of backtracking. If only the Epic games had this facility! Another user-friendly factor is the rematerialisation of your temporary light source when it expires. A more permananent source of illumination can be found deeper into the game.

The parser is an improvement on the original 1982 release. TAKE ALL, UNDO and EXAMINE all work as does RAMSAVE. Multiple commands may be entered and most items may be referred to.

The puzzles contained herein vary from the obvious to more laterally challenging set pieces and it is commendable that there is little repetition involved in puzzle solving.

There is much about the game which is even more user friendly in the repackaged version than the original 1982 offering as explained above. One particularly friendly feature is the fact that your entire inventory can be ported about with you inside a magical object. Add this to the teleportation system together with no solitary lamp timer and you have a very user friendly experience all round.

Four decades cannot wither the game, nor Twine stale its infinite variety. This remains one of the very best puzzlefests ever created.