Buzz 5/Buzz 5.adf/Articles/NewGameReviews.04/NewGameReviews.04

Text File | 1994-12-28 | 13KB | 423 lines

REVIEW 4
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«Heimdall2
·-------------------

¾    Heimdall2 for the Amiga CD32


²BRIEF DESCRIPTION

¹Heimdall2  is  an  isometric, graphic,
arcade/adventure game in the same vein
as Heimdall1.  Puzzles must be solved,
monsters  killed,  and  spells cast in
order  to restore peace finally in the
Norse Heavens.


²AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION

¹Name:        The 8th Day
Address:    Core Design Ltd
        55 Ashbourne Road
        Derby DE22 3FS
        UK

Telephone:    [phone]
Fax:        [phone]


²LIST PRICE

¹34.99 (UK).  I paid 27.95 mail order.


²HARDWARE

¹A  CD32  and  a  joypad.   A  2 button
joystick  will  NOT  be good enough as
the  two paddle buttons on the top are
used   for  combat,  and  the  'start'
button is important too.

¶A  decent  sound system will help give
you   the   full  benefit  of  the  CD
soundtrack.

I  can't  comment  on whether the game
will work with CD-ROM drives.


²COPY PROTECTION

¹    Invisible.


²MACHINE USED FOR TESTING

¹PAL  CD32.   I  ran  the game with the
machine  in  NTSC  mode,  and the game
worked   just  about  OK,  though  the
picture was slightly off the bottom of
my monitor.  You'll have to guess with
the  title  screen  though, so I'd run
this in PAL with a monitor if you can.


²REVIEW

¹There is a brief loading period before
customary credits appear on the screen
for  Core Design and The 8th Day (both
nicely drawn).  Immediately there is a
CD    soundtrack    playing   in   the
background.   There  is  a  very brief
animation  of some Norse guy (Heimdall
himself   I  presume)  before  we  are
presented  with  a  screen offering us
the  option  of starting a new game or
of using a previously saved one.

My first impressions are both good and
bad  -  the  music  is  excellent, but
there  is  no  intro  animation.  Even
Heimdall1   had   a  series  of  still
pictures  with text that described the
background  story behind the game.  An
¶opportunity  was  really  missed here.
The  intro  animation for Premiere, by
the  same  team,  was very good, and I
was  hoping  to  see something special
from them in Heimdall2.

Still,  the  music  IS  nice.   I  had
already  loaded  the CD into my normal
player  to check out the music tracks.
There  is  about  25  minutes worth of
music  -  8  or  so  tracks, all of it
nice, original, orchestral-style stuff
(though  using  excellent  samples  as
opposed to real instruments I think!).
Don't get too excited though, as there
is  one 3 minute passage that you will
get  to  know REALLY well!  (Shades of
"Liberation" here.)

The  lack  of an intro animation means
that I had to read the manual in order
to  pick  up the story.  In short, you
have  to  recover 4 pieces of a broken
amulet that, when assembled, will give
you  the  power to stop the evil Norse
God  Loki from wreaking havoc over the
mortal  world.  You play 2 characters,
Heimdall  and  a Valkyrie named Ursha.
There  seems  little need for there to
be   2   characters   as  both  behave
similarly   and  no  puzzles  seem  to
require  you  to  be one or the other.
Still,  you  have  two  inventories in
which  to  store  objects  and another
character to switch to halfway through
a  fight  when  the  other is about to
die.

There   are   three   main  levels  of
exploration  in  Heimdall2.   Firstly,
there  is a sort of heavenly area that
is  made  up  of  portals.  Entering a
portal  (you need to find the relevant
Talisman first) will teleport you to a
¶world  that  you  can  freely explore,
killing  things, solving puzzles, etc.
These worlds are explored by selecting
an  island  on a map screen, whereupon
your ship sails there.  There are also
shops  where  helpful  objects  can be
purchased and other items sold.

Each  island  consists  of a series of
locations  with  exits  at the edge of
the   screen.    There   is  a  forced
perspective  (as  in  "D-Generation"),
meaning  that pushing up on the joypad
actually  makes your guy move up-left.
You  get  used  to  it  very  quickly.
Unlike  in  D-Generation,  you  cannot
move diagonally in Heimdall2, and this
helps  to  makes things less confusing
in  my  opinion.  You will soon notice
that   both   the   graphics  and  the
animation are of a very high standard.
This  is presumably a straight port of
the A1200 version of the game, with an
added  CD  soundtrack.  Still, I'm not
complaining.  Loading is for once well
organised,   never  taking  more  than
10-15   seconds.    Most  islands  are
loaded in their entirety in that time,
so  there  is  no more loading for the
immediate  future, and it makes a real
difference.

You  will  soon  find  yourself  in  a
fight,  and  this  is  a  good time to
start  drawing  comparisons  with  the
original   Heimdall.   Fights  in  the
first game happened almost by surprise
-  there was no monster visible on the
screen,  and  suddenly  you would find
yourself  having  to  kill  something.
This involved clicking on one of three
buttons   with  the  mouse  -  Attack,
Defend  or Spell.  Heimdall2 is little
different  except  that  the  fighting
¶takes  place in the normal environment
and  you can run away from monsters as
a  result.   The  fights  are  just as
unsophisticated,  but  the  two paddle
buttons are used for attack and defend
and  the  red  button for spells.  The
game can be paused at any time and the
inventory  screen entered - from here,
objects  can be shuffled about, things
eaten/dropped, and spells mixed.  As a
result,  no-one  will  find themselves
dying desperately quickly, so the game
is   more  accessible  to  the  casual
adventurer.

The   puzzles   involve  the  standard
moving of one object from one place to
another,   along  with  more  physical
things  such as having to get from "A"
to  "B"  without  touching  the spikey
ball.   The  solutions  are  generally
obvious after a little bit of thought,
but  some things are a little obscure.
The  gameplay  is  not  totally linear
either,  and  the  islands  and indeed
worlds  can  be  explored in any order
within reason.  Herein lies one of the
major quirks (see BUGS).

Spell  casting is achieved in a manner
similar  to  Dungeon  Master in that a
spell  is  assembled  from a series of
runes  and then cast.  Stronger spells
use   up   more  'mana'  that  can  be
replenished using potions.  Spells are
discovered on parchments that are left
here and there.

I  have  been playing the game quite a
lot  for  a  few  days now, and I feel
that  I  am well towards finishing it.
So, don't expect a life-long challenge
(like  Dungeon Master and other RPGs),
though  I  guess I could be pleasantly
¶surprised and find that there is a lot
more.  I was hoping that at some point
the background music would change once
I  made  it  to  an  new world, but it
seems  that  was  a little too much to
ask.   There  is  no option to turn it
off  of  course,  though  without it I
would  imagine  the  game  would sound
sparse,  as  sound effects are few and
far  between.   Speech would have been
nice   too,  instead  of  having  text
appearing  on  the screen, but I would
rather  have  no  speech than have the
atmosphere ruined by some poor quality
acting!

²DOCUMENTATION

¹There  is  a  hefty book that explains
the  use of a double CD case, but this
is  in  4 languages.  The instructions
are  clear and not too serious either,
which   is   nice.    The  game  feels
reasonably  intuitive  anyway.   There
are  some spaces left for you to write
in  the  spells that you will discover
during  the  games.  However, there is
not    enough   space   to   do   this
successfully,  which  is  a  shame.  I
needed    to   refer   back   to   the
instructions  only  a few times, and I
found  it  easier  to  note  down  the
spells on a bit of paper.

²LIKES

¹I   like   a   lot  about  this  game.
Heimdall1 infuriated me in that it was
wonderful  graphically,  but  accessed
the disk a lot and would not hard disk
install.   The  gameplay was exciting,
but  the  puzzles  were often obscure,
and  it was too easy to make a mistake
that  would require you to start again
¶from   your   last   saved   position.
Heimdall2  feels  much  more polished,
and   I   feel   confident  in  trying
different  things as I know that it is
unlikely  that I will die instantly or
without  warning.   Dropped objects do
not vanish into thin air - they remain
where you leave them.  Objects sold at
shops will be available for you to buy
again  later, so these places also act
as pawnbrokers!

The  music  is  wonderful, and that is
always an important factor for me.  At
present,  the  only  real advantage of
owning  a  CD32  is  in  order to play
games  with  great  soundtracks, so it
annoys  when  companies  rush releases
and  don't  bother  to make one (e.g.,
James  Pond  3, Frontier).  Hopefully,
it  means  more  work  for  unemployed
musicians like myself too!

The  graphics  are  of a high standard
too,  and  the  general  atmosphere is
very...   well...  viking-like.  Ursha
does walk a bit strangely though....

²DISLIKES AND SUGGESTIONS

¹One  thing that annoyed me slightly is
that  unlike  the  floppy version, the
game  does  not support a mouse in the
other  controller  port.   This  meant
that  all  inventory  operations/spell
mixing   had   to  be  done  with  the
controller.   This  seems a ridiculous
thing  to  have taken out of the game,
especially  when  so  many CD32 owners
must  have  mice  hanging  around  (in
order to play Diggers and Liberation),
and  even if they haven't, there seems
no harm in leaving the code to support
it in place.
¶
In  practice,  you  don't have to move
the  cursor  either very accurately or
over  large  distances  so  it doesn't
really   affect   the  gameplay  much.
You'll get used to it.


²COMPARISON TO SIMILAR PRODUCTS

¹For  the  CD32,  there  are only a few
adventure   games  available  of  this
type,   Liberation  being  an  obvious
choice,  though  in  reality  they are
very  different  games.   Heimdall2 is
cartoony  in nature, and the action is
never  desperately  fast  and furious.
You will have plenty of time to gently
wander  about,  scratching  your head.
The  forced  perspective  viewpoint is
reminiscent  of the old Ultimate games
such  as  Knightlore  and  Alien8 (and
Nightshade too I suppose) and it works
well,  as  it  did  in the first game.
This  viewpoint  avoids the problem of
having  exits 'out of the screen' such
as  you  might have had in a game such
as  Monkey  Island 2.  In reality, the
game  is  quite close superficially to
its  predecessor, though it feels much
more tightened up and polished.  There
are  few  games  that  can  touch  it,
really.    Easily   one  of  the  best
adventures ever on the Amiga.


²BUGS

¹I   did   manage  to  crash  the  game
consistently  at  a  particular  point
with  an  'unable  to  allocate enough
memory' error, though I was attempting
to  do something that most sane people
would  not (dropping all my belongings
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¹in  one  location).   It  also crashed
unprovoked  when  I attempted to slash
the  bars  in the prison in the King's
Dungeon with my sword.

One  thing  I haven't mentioned yet is
the saving system, and this is my main
gripe  in  this  area.   When you have
completed  a  world, you return to the
heavens  and  the  entry  portals, and
there is a 'restart book' that you can
pick  up.   This  allows the save game
option  to  work.  The problem is that
when  you  reload  the  game, the save
game  book  reappears  leading  you to
believe  you  are now free to save the
game   whenever  you  want  simply  by
returning  to  the heavens and picking
up  the  book, etc.  In practice, this
only starts to confuse the game and it
loses track of where you have been and
where  you  haven't.  Thus, you end up
picking  up  the same objects twice by
revisiting areas that you have already
visited.   In  general, this save game
system  feels  a  bit loose and buggy.
Nothing too scary though -- just watch
out for it.


²VENDOR SUPPORT

¹None mentioned - presumably they don't
want  you  ringing  them up asking for
tips!


²WARRANTY

¹None mentioned.


²CONCLUSIONS
¶¹Well,  I  had hoped to finish the game
before I wrote this review, but I have
got    stuck    again   unfortunately.
However,  I  don't  imagine  I will be
stuck for long, because really this is
quite   a   straightforward  adventure
game.   A  walk-through would not take
too  long  to write.  You will delight
in    the   general   atmosphere   and
hopefully   whistle   along  with  the
really  rather  nice  music.   If  you
enjoy   a   pleasant   adventure-style
ramble  in a well-drawn, cartoony sort
of way, then you'll love this game.  I
was  very  impressed.   It was a shame
Heimdall1  wasn't packaged in with it,
especially  given the relatively hefty
price-tag,  but then CD32 releases are
not  known for their generosity at the
moment.   I say buy it, though try and
get it for less than the full price if
you can through mail order.

¢I give Heimdall2 for the CD32 ...
     4 stars out of five.¹

                        Ç03