Meet Rusty, a fearless knight and hunter of precious relics,
searching for the Idol Lamp in the cursed Realm of Manzasun. As a hunt
for a relic should be, nothing is simple, and the seemingly mundane will
likely require some convoluted activity.
MADieval is a light hearted romp, with a sense of humour that won’t
always hit the mark but will likely generate a chuckle or three. The
game pokes fun at itself, and other things as well. It’s colourful, 3D
and point and click, and while there are limited locations in this first
episode there is a fair bit to do. All of it involves finding and using
items to solve conundrums in order to be able to find and use more
things to solve more conundrums.
As you would expect, not everything can be done before you have e.g.
had certain conversations, or examined certain objects. I suspect there
are more trigger points than I was aware of, simply because I had
already done whatever the necessary action was. Nonetheless, while I
scratched my head at times, it wasn’t particularly hard, and moved
along at a good pace as a result.
Much of the episode takes place in or around the most idiosyncratic
cemetery you are likely to find. Being dead doesn’t stop the occupants
being involved in various ways, or at least their graves. The one with a
fridge of ice cream sundaes is probably my favourite, and all have an
interesting tale to tell.
The paladin Macho Turtle is guardian of the cemetery, and will be a
source of information and assistance, all the more so once you fix his
vision problems. So too Roy, who appears seemingly from nowhere and
about whom you can find out more yourself. Ye Ole Toilet requires some
careful examination, and there are a range of (seemingly) unrelated
fantastical events going on in the background (and even the foreground)
as the game goes on.
The visual approach to the game is excellent. You don’t have a
fixed perspective, rather the “camera” swoops and soars to create a
sense of space and an almost cinematic feel. It might be behind you,
alongside you, or even below you looking up. Occasionally you will have
to move a small distance to get the camera to swing to enable you to see
and therefore access another part of the scene, but it is in no way
inhibiting. I liked it a lot.
There is a musical score to pretty much the entire episode, changing
as the mood and activity requires. Ambient sound is also present,
characters (and non) are all voiced, and it all comes together to
admirably accompany the excellent visuals.
The opening sequence functions as a tongue in cheek tutorial to the
game play. Point and click to move, double click to run, and left click
an item of interest to bring up the action icons. The inventory is top
of screen, right click to examine and left click to use. You can save at
will, and it autosaves as you exit. It’s all very straightforward.
There is a lot to like in the two or so hours it took me. When I left
Rusty, he was lying seemingly unconscious on the ground as a result of a
misfiring helm. There was still a fair bit left to do (I haven’t yet
figured out the ice cream sundaes). I hope Episode 2 is not far behind.
I played on:
OS: Windows 10, 64 Bit
Processor: Intel i7-9700k 3.7 GHz
