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Archipelago
by Fairygdmther
July 27, 2004
Developer:
Streko Graphics
There
are many independent game developers who are making some very creative
games for adventure gamers. One such is Jonathan May, developer of Archipelago,
a free online game. This little game can take you as little as an
hour or several days to complete. Unfortunately, since there isn’t
a save feature, you’ll have to start over each time, but you’ll do so
with the gained knowledge of your previous attempts.
The game begins with the intro scene that shows your ship sinking, and you
awaken to find yourself facing an archipelago of tropical islands.
There are more than 30 islands you can and must swim to, to complete the
puzzles to enable you to escape the group of islands. At the base of
a volcano is a tiny island which rises like an elevator – this will give
you a bird’s eye view of the area, and enable you to make a map, or you
can use the map
that I made. While it is possible to complete the game without a
map, it will shorten the time taken to make it to each of the many
islands, since you’ll know better which direction to take.
The islands are all tiny, and you can see beyond each to the next one
quite easily. The perspective in this game is perfectly done, and
necessary for you to complete a certain puzzle, since you must view
something from a certain viewpoint to find an object needed. There is no
inventory, per se, but you must move items from one island to another, so
this is done by collecting and swimming to the correct island with the
desired object. While there are no “red herrings”, there are a
number of puzzles requiring you to recognize patterns, all of which are
given to you, but with no clue given as to which applies to which.
Jonathan has thankfully provided us with a helpful hints file, which can
be viewed mid-game, by minimizing the game and clicking on the
hints. There is also a log book, where others’ comments may help
you. Walkthrough
is here if you need further help.
The game is played as a first person, point and click, node-to-node
movement adventure game, with 3D panning. The story is minimal, but
adequate for the type of game this is. The puzzles range from find item A
and put into slot A, to the dreaded floating pyramid puzzle. This
puzzle has five floating pyramids, which you need to click in the correct
order to achieve the solution. Mathematics tells us this gives us
120 possible solutions, but Jon wasn’t happy with that, and made it even
more confounding. Once you’ve found the right order, some of the
pyramids move. You must track where they’ve gone to, to continue
to solve it. This makes this an exceedingly difficult puzzle to
solve, even when you know what to do. (For me this required an email to
Jon.)
This was a fun game to play, and Jon has done a very good job with
it. He is currently working on a part two, which I’m definitely
waiting to try. He assures me that the second part will be longer
and will have a save feature. One of the best features of this game,
since navigation around from island to island is necessary, is the
individual island views. It doesn’t matter which side of the
island you approach from, it will always look the same to you, avoiding
your need to walk to the opposite side to do anything. Jon May has
shown himself to be an avid adventure gamer, and devious puzzle
creator. I look forward to future work from this fine young man, as
he has proved his mettle on this one.
Score: 9.5/10
With the expert editorial assistance of Bacardi Jim - Thanks
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