Review of Shadoan

Introduction

From Rick Dyer the creator of Dragons lair comes the interactive adventure “Shadoan”, which is apparently based on the arcade game “Thayers Quest”. (although i`ve never heard of it)

You are Lathan, the hero of the story and you must find five lost pieces of an ancient amulet so that its magical powers will be available to you. The quest is stretched across five different kingdoms in which you must finally confront the evil wizard Torlock and only in defeating the wizard will you be able to reunite Prince Kandor with Princess delight.

Basically you start the game with three lives and you must move through the game using the DVD remote or PC mouse by using certain items you find along the way. You are equipped with “the scrying glass”, “farsight window” and “the map of journey” which in English means you can move around the maps you collect and are able to use certain spells and suchlike you find to aid you in your quest. This is all done by the use of a simple interface where you just highlight what you need and click, or maybe on occasion scroll to the desired item. Doorways or other things of interest appear in the main window where you must choose the correct procedure to use, usually just selecting or maybe using a spell so that you can move on to the next animated scene.
Choose the wrong procedure and you could end up drowned or eaten by a dragon. Some puzzles are also time limited but unlike the dragons lair games Shadoan isn’t based on these and allows for more interaction.


The puzzles are simplistic and some times random so you have to just pick and hope. Repeatedly going over the same ground and watching the same animation again and again soon becomes tiring and there just isn’t enough here to keep you coming back for more. You could argue that it was kept simplistic for kids but can you see little Billy from the flats putting up with this kind of repetition when he has his spanking Playstation at hand?
No I didn’t think so.

Even dragons lair and space ace when they first appeared in the arcade, which lets face it were only tarted up simple simon games where you have to remember a particular sequence, were more playable. At least you could feel satisfaction when you finally recalled the exact 150 odd sequences which allowed you to rescue the princess. And lets not forget the animation sequences which were worth watching and always entertaining especially as a spectator. Sure they were never great games but at least they were mildly entertaining for a little while.

Although shadoan appears as a less linear game allowing you to choose certain routes and spells etc, it just ends up being more of a hassle to play. Even on a PC this game is awkward to control it always feels slugish and to be honest a waste of time.

Video

The cover claims “In development for over 15 years and it shows”. Oh yes it really does. If you like the distinct eighties animation, (you know the stuff that was shown on Saturday morning kids shows) then this throwback may appeal to you.

The video is adequate I suppose, there’s some dust and dirt now and again and some evidence of its cel background shows its head occasionally. As I’ve said the animation is 80’s cartoonish so don’t expect wonderful visuals and cgi animation here. The compression is fine with no nasty artefacts that I could see and colours are adequatly rendered . If I seem a bit unenthusiastic forgive me, its just the whole thing is very mediocre and as about as interesting as the show "five to one". Its not so much the animations fault that makes this game such a chore to play (animation I forgive thee), its just the same old turgid Tolkienesque fantasy/adventure story which unlike its inspiration never forms into anything resembling interesting or involving on any level. Even kids would find this story simple and dull. Basically its just plain boring and together with the awkward control system (depends I suppose on the type of remote you have on your dvd) is the final nail in the coffin. Just when you think you’ve escaped the interactive cd travesty of years past it rears its ugly head and slaps you in the mush, albeit with better quality video.

Audio

Audio is presented in Dolby digital 2.0 and Dts. Now here comes the big question. WHY?
Why would you bother mixing this soundtrack into Dts. Out of all the films that would benefit from a Dts soundtrack why pick this. They actually bothered to..…….WHY?
Unbelievable.

I’m sorry for the rant but when US dvds are getting the Dts treatment over the plain Dolby digital of region 2, it just seems a cruel joke that this should be in Dts.

Well after all that I shall continue calmly. Audio is handled cleanly with no distortion and dialogue always remains intelligible. It suits this type of animation down to the ground and is exactly what you would expect from this type of game. There are a few sickly sweet songs here, al la Disney and needless to say are best left forgotten. Voice casting is adequate with no real complaints although the guy doing the intro voice-over sounds as bored as you will be playing this. It also contains all those magic type sound effects found in cartoons that we’ve all grown up with, but there’s nothing new here or inspiring.

Overall nothing particularly exciting and not worthy of a Dts mix. The same can be said for the Dolby surround mix which although acceptable, never really takes off.

Features

Well you get a little free booklet which contains a quick tour and strategy tips.

No extras on the disc that I could see but I did manage a crafty peak at the recording of the theme song by the artist. I suppose it’s a bonus bit at the completion of the game but you can watch it using the title search. There may be other bits of making of video here but I just couldn’t be bothered searching through the whole of the disc.

Conclusion

Overall a sad attempt at an interactive game for DVD by Mr Dyer. Maybe without the awkward control system and interface this game may have been worth a couple of hours gamplay, but sadly even ignoring this you cannot help but feel that this game should have been put down out of its misery in the 80’s, where it belongs.
I’m afraid Dyer by name, dire by nature. (come on you knew that was coming)

It’s a shame that a real adventure game, maybe in the mould of the old Lucasarts games (Full throttle/Indy/monkey island etc) couldn’t be made into a nice DVD version. I suppose that with the remote and the limited highlight and click interface it would end up just as tedious as this, but at least it would have an entertaining storyline and have some lasting interest. Oh well, maybe one day something along those lines will appear. (I’m not holding my breath though)


Note: This DVD although claiming to be compatible with DVD Rom drives and standalones has randomly crashed on every system that I played it on including two PC players (software and hardware) and standalone players. (It is region free by the way).