Nikolai's Pirates
Reviewed by Anise Hollingshead
Published by I Hoffman & Associates

Age Group: Age 4 to 8 Type: Puzzles/Memory Price: $29.99 US

PC version requires:
P90, 8MB RAM (16MB RAM recommended).

Mac version requires:
Power Macintosh, system 7.0.1 with Sound Manager 3.0.

Description:

Avast there, ye mateys! Captain Blood's map is missing, and it is up to Nikolai and his cat, Neow-Neow, to find the pieces and put them together! Sound like a swashbuckling adventure, me heartys? Sigh, if only we knew!

Actually, the game started out very promisingly, with beautiful scenes and gorgeous colors. Nikolai and his cat, Neow-Neow were cute and engaging characters, and the pirate storyline was interesting and informative. However, early on into the game we started to run into problems with the puzzles interspersed throughout. Several of these puzzles had a set number of misses, then you had to start over. A matching game that ended after three wrong matches and a Pirate captain's room that only allowed you to have a certain number of clicks before you had to leave the cabin without the map piece are examples. The captain's room was particularly frustrating, and I had to email I.Hoffman to find out what to do. (They were prompt in replying with help, though.) According to their answer, there are 6 potential hiding places for the pegleg. That particular hotspot has to be clicked on twice before the pegleg will appear. Well, after I went back, it still took me 12 clicks because of course, the last item I clicked on was the right spot! I had tried 3 times previously before I called them and was getting frustrated. Given the randomness and the set number of clicks allowed before being kicked out of the scene, children unlucky enough to not find the pegleg soon will probably get tired of the Captain's room. Then after all this we met our Waterloo, a maze. When the maze started, it was fun! Only the immediate area surrounding Nikolai was lit by a torch, and you discovered parts of the maze as you traveled. Pulling levers, going through trap doors, crashing rocks through closed gates was neat! But, after being repeatedly sent back to the beginning of the maze after a wrong move, we gave up! This was the last obstacle before getting the last piece of the map, and it was hard to give up so close to the end, but the maze beat us. If it had just sent you back to where you made the mistake, then it would have been fine, but we just got tired of starting all over again!

Features:

Wonderfully illustrated scenes
• Interesting story with pirates
• Puzzles

Technical Aspects:

The game installed easily on my P100, 32MB RAM. The (Windows 95) minimum requirements are for a P90, 8MB RAM (16MB RAM recommended). (Mac) requirements are for a power Macintosh, system 7.0.1 with Sound Manager 3.0. The only thing I really noticed was that the game ran a little slowly, but not enough to impede game play.

Reactions: My almost 8 yr. old couldn't get into this game, but she is getting a little old for interactive stories. Her 6 yr. old friend was willing, but gave up after she couldn't figure out the puzzles. And, of course, you know what happened to me. Patience is not my strongest point, admittedly, but this is the first game I have reviewed where I just got tired and quit. Nikolai and Neow-Neow were fun companions and there were many interesting facts to learn about pirate life, but the puzzles defeated this promising adventure before it had a chance.

(Editor's Note: This review was updated 3-27-98 to reflect additional information provided by the game's developers. - C. Sorrels)

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