Mini-review of Salammbo
Copyright Murray Peterson, 2003

Introduction:

	Salammbo is a game based upon a comic book by Phillipe
	Druillet, which in turn is based upon the novel written by
	Gustave Flaubert.  The problem is, this ancestry appears to
	have produced a game that looks more like a mongrel, instead
	of the hoped-for purebred.

Graphics (quality, animations, cut scenes):

	The graphics are very much in the "Heavy Metal" style, with
	decorative chains, hooks and spikes applied to every
	available surface, and characters that look more like
	something from a Star Wars tavern than human.  If you want a
	game with bright scenes and "pretty" graphics, this one won't
	be to your taste.

	The cutscenes came in two styles; some were "normal" movie
	clips, and others were a comic book slide show with
	narration.  Both styles worked very well.

	The game developers had little knowledge of physics.  As one
	example, they had a catapult that was being loaded every 2
	seconds, and it threw huge rocks in an arc that happily
	ignored gravity.

	Overall, I'll give the graphics credit for being artistic,
	even though it wasn't (entirely) to my taste.

Sound (music, voices, special effects)

	There weren't all that many special effects (e.g. no
	footsteps when moving), but the ones used were well done.
	The voice acting was pedestrian, but acceptable throughout.
	The game contained a lot of narration, and the female
	narrator performed well.

	The music (orchestral) was a perfect match for the graphic
	style of the game.  It was well chosen for effect, changing
	to match the emotional overtones of the current situation.

Story (plot, theme, depth):

	When the game starts, you are given the impression that this
	is a love story between the characters Mathos and Salammbo,
	with the gamer's character Spendius acting as some sort of
	go-between.  I was disappointed to find the story was really
	all about Spendius, with Salammbo and Mathos being nothing
	more than props.  I found the story to be hard to swallow,
	with its mixture of real Carthaginian history and wild
	fantasy elements.  I almost wish that the references to real
	places and events had been removed; the cognitive dissonance
	would have been less.

Characters (depth, development, interaction):

	The characters in this game don't really live and breath.  In
	general, they plot their plots, make their heroic
	pronouncements, and perform their heroic (or cowardly) deeds.
	To be snide, I suppose I could accuse everything of being a
	bit too targeted for an adolescent comic-book reader.

Puzzles (difficulty, uniqueness, suitability, ugliness, linearity):

	Salammbo has a very large collection of timed sequences.
	Almost all of them were generous enough with time that I only
	had to die once or twice before being able to solve the
	problem and continue.  However, there is one timed sequence
	from hell in this game; it is extnded across many actions,
	and takes a long time (minutes) to complete.  If you get it
	wrong, you are banged right back to the beginning to do it
	all over again -- you can spend an entire evening working
	to get throught this one "puzzle".

	There is one arcade sequence, but it is very easy once you
	pay attention and look around a bit.

	There are no mazes, but the organic nature of the environment
	makes it easy to lose your bearings and get lost.

	There are battles to be won, but they are all turn-based.
	You make your choices and then watch the battle unfold before
	your eyes.  If you lose, then you restore from the autosave
	and repeat until you get it right.

	Many of the puzzles were very poorly designed.  The worst
	offenders were the "wrong door" puzzles, where you are
	instantly killed if you choose the wrong path (or door, or
	dialog), but are given no hint that this might be the case.
	At least the game's autosave feature made this less of an
	annoyance than it might have been.


Controls (user interface, save/restore, sound/video adjustments):

	Salammbo has an very complete collection of "mystery meat"
	menus; you get presented with strange graphic medallions or
	buttons that require you to hover your mouse before an
	explanatory pop-up tells you what they do.  In one case (the
	exit button), the meaning changes depending on where you are,
	causing us to exit the game unintentionally.  The game
	displayed two fewer save slots than were available, forcing
	you to scroll up and down for the remaining two.  The
	Salammbo menu system was about as bad as it gets.

	The inventory display was also irritating; a right click
	brought it up, but you had to wait for an animation of it
	"scrolling" across the screen before being allowed to use it.
	The same animation occured in reverse when closing up the
	inventory.  Normally, I wouldn't have minded, but this
	mechanism slowed you down noticeably on some of the timed
	sequences.

	Saving games was a mixed bag.  Normal game saves required
	many mouse clicks to get to the right screen, save the game,
	and then get back to play mode.  On the other hand, there was
	and autosave feature that was accessible by hitting F5, which
	was fast and easy.  In addition, the game would automatically
	save for you in this slot when you died or exited the game.

	If you turn on "hints", you get a subtitled bit of text that
	comes and goes too fast to be readable.  If you work at
	reading very fast, it turns out that the hints almost always
	tell you something useless or obvious (e.g. "read your
	logbook").

	Dialog choices were hard to read depending on the background.
	In addition, your character (Spendius) never spoke a word, so
	the conversation ended up feeling a bit disconnected.

	Sometimes a dialog choice would disappear when used, other
	times it stuck around, albeit for no purpose.

	You could adjust the colour depth, resolution, and sound
	levels.

	The cursors were large, easy to understand, and never
	confusing.  However, there were a few spots in the game where
	a movement cursor showed up in the middle of a wall (I assume
	due to a single pixel gap in the scenery).


Bugs or problems:

	None

Install/Uninstall:

	No full install option was given.  The game copies the first
	CD to disk, and then requires that you play with the second
	CD in the drive.

	Install/uninstall was clean.

Pros:
	"interesting" graphics
	Acceptable voice acting
	Good narration (voice and visuals)
	Clear story line
	Very clear cursor system
	Well chosen music

Cons:
	"interesting" graphics
	"mystery meat" menus
	Useless hints
	Inventory scroll animation
	Many timed sequences, one horrible one
	Poorly designed puzzles (must die to learn solution)
	Hard to read dialog choices
	Gamer's character (Spendius) never spoke
	Easy to get lost in some areas
	Impossible physics

Conclusion:

	My final score for Salammbo would be "playable"; it has
	annoying features, but the overall experience was acceptable
	enough to finish the game, and actually enjoy it in a few
	places.

	Since Salammbo relied so heavily on timed sequences, I do
	feel the need to comment on their use in adventure games.
	For me, they end up being a repeated (and tedious) sequence
	of "save game", "race around trying things", "die", "restore
	game", etc.  Any game-related tension has disappeared after
	the first run through, and all subsequent attempts are mere
	tedium -- I might as well be mapping a maze at that point.

	My request to game designers and devlopers is simple: If you
	must include timed sequences, please provide a "cheat" that
	allows me to reset the timer with a simple keystroke.  I will
	try to solve the puzzle with your chosen time period on the
	first try, but after that, I just want to avoid repeating the
	same damn actions over and over again until I am ready to
	scream.