Path: menudo.uh.edu!usenet From: osiddi1@gl.umbc.edu (Omar Siddique) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews Subject: REVIEW: Eye of the Beholder 2: The Legend of Darkmoon Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.games Date: 3 Feb 1994 01:01:14 GMT Organization: The Amiga Online Review Column - ed. Daniel Barrett Lines: 286 Sender: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu (comp.sys.amiga.reviews moderator) Distribution: world Message-ID: <2ipicq$9dg@menudo.uh.edu> Reply-To: osiddi1@gl.umbc.edu (Omar Siddique) NNTP-Posting-Host: karazm.math.uh.edu Keywords: game, dungeon, adventure, role-playing, commercial PRODUCT NAME Eye of the Beholder 2: The Legend of Darkmoon BRIEF DESCRIPTION Eye of the Beholder 2 (or "EOB2") is a first-person perspective, multiple character, real-time, fantasy role-playing game with an intuitive, mouse-based playing interface. It is part of Strategic Simulations Inc's Advanced Dungeons & Dragons ("AD&D") product line. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Strategic Simulations Inc. Address: 675 Almanor Avenue, Suite 201 Sunnyvale, CA 94086 USA Telephone: (408) 737-6800 LIST PRICE EOB2 lists for $59.95 (US), but since SSI is no longer in the Amiga software market, a number of mail-order retailers have discounted it. I purchased it from Creative Computers (in California, USA) for $14.95 (US). SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE 1 MB of RAM is required. If installed on a hard drive, EOB2 requires 3.5 megabytes of free drive space. It seems to work fine with accelerated machines, at least with the 68030. I did not test it on a stock 68000 machine. SOFTWARE It works beautifully with Workbench 2.1 and Kickstart 2.04. EOB2 even multitasks, although it uses so much processor power, it's unlikely that anything could be done in the background (e.g., I couldn't do a 14400 baud download while running EOB2). The game also exits cleanly. COPY PROTECTION The copy protection is of the "look up a word in the manual" type, and is encountered only once during the game. I would rate the copy protection as virtually invisible. MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Amiga 3000/25, 4 MB Fast RAM, 1 MB Chip RAM. 1 internal 880K floppy, 1 external 880K floppy. Maxtor 120MB internal hard drive. Quantum 1.2GB external hard drive (EOB2 was installed here). NEC 3FGx multisync monitor. Workbench 2.1, Kickstart 2.04. INSTALLATION Eye of the Beholder 2 installs easily and quickly onto a hard drive. Simply drag the "Install" icon from disk 1 onto the hard drive where the game should be installed, and double-click on the icon. I had no problem with this method of installation. EOB2 has no trouble with saving and loading games in progress from the hard drive. REVIEW Well, to begin with, I will assume that the reader is somewhat familiar with the world of AD&D gaming. There are many scenarios set in this world, and EOB2 is one. Parties of adventurers journey through this world on quests; some for good causes, some for evil causes, and some for no particular reason. In EOB2, You control one such party of four characters, and possibly one or two non-player characters. The story begins with the party (which can either be created from scratch or imported from the original "Eye of The Beholder", or "EOB1") having been advised of new trouble to the north of Waterdeep, the town that the intrepid adventurers saved in EOB1. The party is transported by the mage Khelben, advisor to the Lords of Waterdeep, to the troubled area, and the adventure begins. The party arrives in a small forested region, and soon finds its way into the Temple Darkmoon, which appears to be a peaceful sanctuary run by divinely-inspired priests. Alas, as often happens, appearances are deceiving, and the party must fight its way through the temple, the catacombs that lie below, and three towers that rise above the temple in search of the evil that has taken control of the temple. The party must face giant ants, vicious basilisks, spirits of the dead, and many other minions of evil along the way. The screen is laid out in an attractive, functional manner. A large viewing window takes up over 1/3 of the screen, displaying whatever your party is facing at the moment. The right-hand side of the screen is occupied by a display for each of the party's characters, showing their names, faces, and the objects currently in their hands. In addition, the color of the border around each display indicates if any characters are under the influence of magic. Below the viewing window is a compass rose and an array of arrow gadgets for movement. At the bottom of the screen is a narrow window in which text messages are displayed. The player interacts with the game primarily through the mouse, although the keyboard can be used for moving the party (and is actually better than the mouse for moving quickly). Various small objects can be picked up, dropped, and thrown by simply clicking in the appropriate location in the viewing window. Spells are cast and weapons swung by clicking on the items in the characters' hands in the character display. Clicking on a character's face replaces the character display with an inventory or statistics for that character. Inventory is also managed by using the mouse, by clicking on the object to be moved, and then clicking on its destination. Overall, I found the player interface to be exceptionally easy to use. Creating the characters for your party is easy and also mouse-based. Here, EOB2 does something that I particularly like, and many games of this type (those not by SSI) don't do. The program allows the player to modify the attributes of the newly created characters without having to go through the rigmarole of rolling random characters hundreds of times, trying to get the perfect combination of attributes. This saved me quite a bit of the setup frustration usually encountered in this kind of game. The number of monsters is just right -- not so many as to overwhelm the player, but not so few as to make the game boring. Most of the monsters are encountered only once, but some locations have randomly generate monsters, such as the wolves in the forest. Some monsters can turn players to stone or kill them with a single swipe -- however, I didn't find any that were exceptionally difficult to defeat (although the beholders were fairly tough). The graphics are well done. They are smooth and aesthetically pleasing. Most of the artistic talent was applied to the monsters: there's only so much, after all, that one can do with hallways and tunnels! Most of the creatures perform some kind of action when they attack the party; for example, the beholder's eyes distend and its mouth opens. The one thing missing, however, is true animation of monsters. Although they are animated when attacking the party, monsters simply move from one spot to the next in a single motion -- they don't actually use their legs to walk from one place to the next. This is the only weakness in an otherwise visually pleasing work. The sound is acceptable for this type of game, and includes the footsteps of monsters, the sound of doors opening and closing, the clicks of switches and buttons, the growls of monsters, and the screams of your characters as they die. Some faint, ominous background music might have been appropriate, but its lack is never really felt when the party is busy trying to hack a monster to pieces. Finally, the plot is both acceptable and cohesive. It carries itself forward through "story screens" which contain information, graphics, and often choices for the party to make, as well as through occasional scrolls and plaques found in the party's wanderings. The puzzles are relatively simple, and often rely upon finding a particular secret door, pressing a certain button, or finding a specific object. They key to playing this game well is paying attention to all the details. There are things tucked away almost everywhere. DOCUMENTATION The documentation consists of a data card containing Amiga-specific installation instructions, and a rule book. The data card contains all the information I needed to get going. The rule book contains material to set the scene, instructions on how to choose party members, material describing the different kinds of characters available, spell lists, tables showing when characters advance in level, and a bestiary with pictures and descriptions of monsters. The documentation should be clear even to a beginner -- more experienced players will only need to skim the rule book. LIKES AND DISLIKES LIKES Basically, I liked how playable the game was. I never felt overwhelmed by the monsters or puzzles I came across, but I was challenged enough to keep playing. The game is also a good length -- it doesn't seem to drag on forever like some dungeon games can, but neither does it end before it really seems to have begun. DISLIKES I didn't really have any dislikes. However, I did think that some of the items in the game, such as the six polished shields the player has to have before entering one of the tower levels, were a little hard to find. The inexperienced player, upon discovering that he or she has to go back and re-search several levels of dungeon, might be discouraged at this point. This, however, is why the experienced player searches every nook and cranny along the way. :-) The only missing feature thing that I think the game could use is auto-mapping. However, the dungeons weren't quite complex enough to require auto-mapping, and as such I don't fault the game for lacking this feature. COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS Eye of the Beholder 2 is similar to several other products available for the Amiga, including Eye of the Beholder 1, Black Crypt, Dungeon Master, and Might & Magic 3. Briefly, I'll describe the differences and similarities between those products and EOB2. Eye of the Beholder 1 is very similar to EOB2, though some of the levels in EOB1 are more complex and convoluted than any in EOB2. EOB1's graphics and sound are similar to EOB2's, although EOB2 has more "story screens" to forward its stronger plot. The monsters are different between the two games, as well. If you thought EOB1 was good, then run -- don't walk -- to the phone (or your local dealer) and order EOB2. Black Crypt is another comparable product, with a similar look and feel. Its sound quality is somewhat higher than EOB2's, but its plot is slightly weaker. Basically, if you liked Black Crypt, you should like EOB2. Dungeon Master is an older game which was one of the first mouse-driven, first-person perspective dungeon games. It is similar, but has relatively primitive graphics in comparison to EOB2. Since Dungeon Master has trouble running under Workbench 2.x, I haven't played this game, but I would imagine players who enjoyed it would like EOB2. [MODERATOR'S NOTE: Faster Than Light, the makers of Dungeon Master, have an updated version of the game that works under AmigaDOS 2.0. Contact FTL at the address in your manual for upgrade information. Mine was free -- I just wrote FTL a letter asking for the update. - Dan] Might & Magic 3 ("M&M3") is somewhat different from EOB2, in that its game world is much larger, with many dungeons and continents to explore. M&M3's graphics also look somewhat more primitive than EOB2's, and M&M3 takes quite a while longer to complete. However, the gameplay perspectives are similar (first person), and the combat system, while physically presented differently in each game, is based on the same concept of clicking on characters' weapons and spells to activate them. M&M3 players might consider EOB2 too short a game, but will enjoy it anyway. There are other games of the same genre that also use a first-person perspective that I won't go into (so this section doesn't end up being as long as the rest of the review!), but these include Dragon Wars, the three Bard's Tale games, the dungeons in the Ultima series, and others. BUGS I did not notice any bugs. WARRANTY Standard 30 day warranty on the media (disks) only. CONCLUSIONS I liked EOB2 a great deal. Anybody who likes dungeon-oriented fantasy games will like this one. The game is nicely balanced, with enough puzzles and dungeons to sate the explorer's appetite, but not so many as to frustrate the game player. While it is real-time, at no point do you feel as if you're being rushed, and there is no time limit on gameplay. If you've ever enjoyed hacking your way through mobs of slavering monsters or appreciated the pleasures of exploring twisting dungeon passageways in search of evil-doers, you definitely should give this game a look. COPYRIGHT NOTICE Copyright 1994 Omar Siddique. All rights reserved. --- Daniel Barrett, Moderator, comp.sys.amiga.reviews Send reviews to: amiga-reviews-submissions@math.uh.edu Request information: amiga-reviews-requests@math.uh.edu Moderator mail: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu Anonymous ftp site: math.uh.edu, in /pub/Amiga/comp.sys.amiga.reviews