Shadoan Review

Death to Torloc!!!

Generations ago, the Argent Kings met in Alkatesh to designate Mobus as their Archmage.

He was entrusted with the sum of their earthly power a powerful amulet called the Hand. On the

fourth night of the celebration that followed, a wave of evil forces swept through the unguarded

gates. Torlok, the evil brother of Mobus, and second most powerful mage in the Five Kingdoms,

commanded these armies. Through jealousy of Mobus and greed for dark power, Torlok charged

to take ‘the Hand’. Mobus had the presence of mind to magically ‘break’ the mystical amulet into

five powerful relics and sent them to the far corners of the Five Kingdoms.

A single girl of the race

of Argent Kings had been away from Alkatesh at the time of the great battle

and was the only survivor. She eventually married and had a son, Lathan. Magic

ran strong in his blood and he became an apprentice to Daelon, rumored to be

the last of the Great Wizards. Lathan’s destiny, as last of the Argent Kings,

is to recover the five pieces of the Hand. So far he has rescued three relics-

the Orb of Mobus, the Black Mace, and the Hunting Horn. During his adventures,

he befriended a powerful ally, Princess Grace Delight (We’ve assigned you to

watch a beautiful enemy agent with an unlikely name, Mr. Bond). Lathan helped

her to gain back her throne from one of Torlok’s henchmen. Now he must find

the remaining two relics, the Dagger of Arne and the Crown of Malric, to complete

the Hand and save his Kingdom. As Lathan, you must venture forth into the land

of shadows and the home of Torloc, Shadoan.

After 20 years of creative thinking, 300 animators and nine months of hard work, the dream of Rich Dyer

(president of Virtual Image Productions), has come true. Shadoan features more than 70,000 hand-painted animation cells,

30 original music tracks, over 60 medieval locations, and 70 minutes of high-resolution full-motion

animation and dialogue. Even on the minimum requirements the animation runs so smoothly it’s amazing. VIP

did good work on this one and deserve a ton of credit! You may remember VIP from their award winning classic: Dragon’s Lair (Odd trivia: One of only two games displayed at the

Smithsonian Institute). They were also the first company to create a holographic coin-operated game,

Time Traveler

The characters were so lively

that Shadoan took me back to my earlier days of Saturday morning cartoon

greats like the animated Dungeons and Dragons series in the 80’s. The soundtrack

for this animated-adventure is top notch as well. All 30 tracks were arranged

by musicians who worked on Disney’s Beauty And The Beast and Pocahontas.

They’re perfect for the storyline and add a rich touch to the already fantastic

animation.

The game controls are relatively simple. The game screen is a large window with two

dragons on the sides, three books on the bottom left of the screen, a map scroll, an hourglass,

Life-roses, a Scrying Glass, the Dragon Eye Ruby, the Stormlight Sapphire, and a pouch. The

dragons do not effect the gameplay, they just look pretty. The books on the side are for reference

during gameplay. The first book contains the history of the land. The second book is Lathan’s

journal where you may take notes for future puzzle solving. The third book is the difficult to pronounce Shadoanomicon. It

contains the closing credits for the game with great drawings that morph into the game’s creators. The

map scroll allows access to the area map. Or you can right click the mouse and the map will also

appear. On the map screen, you can move the mouse pointer around and see any other available

locations to move to. Just by clicking on the location, the map changes back to the game screen and

you will see an animation of Lathan entering the area. The hourglass (Sands of Time) is used when

Lathan is faced with a time-based decision. When the sands run out, one of your Life-roses withers a

little or disappears depending on how crucial the mistake was. The Scrying Glass allows Lathan to

see into his pouch showing the possible items needed to solve a puzzle or save his butt. The Dragon

Eye Ruby will allow you to skip forward to the end of an animation or to replay the last. The

Stormlight Sapphire is used to access the options menu.

When actually playing the

game, fans of Dragon’s Lair may be disappointed. Unlike Dragon’s Lair,

you do not move the character forward, backward, side to side, or press an attack

button. Shadoan is much more of an adventure game and much less of an

action game. When Lathan needs to make an extremely quick decision, the player

must slide the mouse pointer and click the item needed. Make the wrong choice

and your a gonner. Some of these decisions are FAST and moving the mouse to

the item can become a burden rather than a pleasure. That is, if you actually

have the item you need. Players will wind up wandering around on the map from

area to area to get one item. Then you may have to get another item in order

to find the main item you were looking for. During all this seeking, I found

myself clicking past all those once-fantastic animations and finding myself

more and more annoyed with each replay.

However, those are my only

two problems with the game. Shadoan is an awesome idea for a game: mixing

animation with adventure gaming. I’d suggest being patient for the first few

games to get a feel for the action. When you learn to save before possible danger

strikes, it’s not as much of a nuisance. Knowing what the items in your pouch

do will also be helpful. That way your quick decisions won’t be random ones.

The puzzles range from easy to hard with the option of playing on the Apprentice

or Wizard levels. However, it’s still the same “save the homeland” from evil

story with few alterations. So if you think you’ve seen it all in adventure

gaming, think again… Shadoan promises to challenge your dexterity as well

as your wits.