Mini-review of Under a Killing Moon (UAKM) Introduction: Tex Murphy is a private detective that lives in an extremely bleak post-apocalyptic world. That sentence makes things sound so awful, but it doesn't begin to describe the wonderful depth that Access Software has managed to achieve in this adventure game. The world of Under a Killing Moon is populated by a panoply of characters that bring the entire world (and the game) to brilliant life. I normally try to describe a game by drawing analogies to other, well known movies or characters, but I will decline to do so in this case. Tex and his world are a detective genre unto themselves, and deserve to stand alone on their own merits. Graphics (quality, animations, cut scenes): This game has many different modes of interaction, so describing the graphics gets a bit complex. Instead of trying to describe each mode, I will limit my comments about graphics to the 3-D virtual world movement mode and to the full motion video. UAKM is a first person point of view game, and is loaded with FMV (full motion video). I have never played a FMV game before, and have heard about how they are awful. Well, UAKM isn't awful by any stretch of the imagination, and the FMV works very well in this game. The numerous video sequences are well integrated with the background graphics, and never made me look at them as separate entities. You spend much of your time in movement mode, which is a full screen 3-D virtual world where you can move around the room you are in by using your mouse and various keys. This mode allows you to crouch down, stand on tippy-toe, look down, look up, turn around, back up, and so on. The graphics in this mode suffer from some of the usual 3-D deficiencies, mostly walls getting blurry when you get too close. This mode was obviously not a true 3-D environment. This showed up as some weird behaviours, where some objects did not rotate correctly as I moved around. As an example, when looking at the terrarium in Eddy Ching's office, if I rotated my point of view, the terrarium would rotate, but the rocks inside it stayed put. In other cases, I would walk up to a garbage can and the can would become more and more two dimensional as I got closer. I eventually grew accustomed to the weird billowing effects when getting too close to some objects. Even with the "not quite 3-D" problems, I enjoyed the graphics and video sequences very much. The world was drawn well enough to immerse me completely within the game, and the video sequences were merged into the backgrounds very effectively. Sound (music, voices, special effects) The music was not overdone, and served to support the atmosphere of the current situation. Call it supportive, but never irritating. The acting was quite good on the whole, but I must admit that there were a few of the actors that weren't up to the task. Overall, I must admit to being quite impressed. The bad actors weren't all that bad, and the good ones carried the game quite well. I found Chris Jones to be just great in his portrayal of Tex Murphy; just the right amount of tongue in cheek humour to match the humour in the game. Story (plot, theme, depth): UAKM provides enough plots and sub-plots to keep you enthralled throughout. Tex is a private eye, so the plot obviously revolves around doing detective-like things, but that's about all I am going to tell you. Let's just say that you won't get bored if you play this game. Characters (depth, development, interaction): Tex Murphy is the central character, and his character is what provides the game with its depth. By the time you have finished, you feel like you really know Tex. The other characters in UAKM are all filled in with enough detail to make you feel like you are dealing with real characters, not mere obstacles or inventory holders. Overall, I would say that UAKM provides a cast of characters at least as real as many high quality movies I have watched. Puzzles (difficulty, uniqueness, suitability, ugliness, linearity): The puzzles weren't excessively difficult, nor were they boringly easy. Let's call it a moderate difficulty level. There were some unique (to me) puzzles in this game, among them were some jigsaw puzzles and a cryptogram. The game designers provided an interface for these puzzles that made them a joy to solve. The movement system itself was used as a sort of puzzle engine; since you could look under desks, then you probably should look there. Not a pixel hunt, but definitely something of a scavenger hunt. The built in hint system was very well designed. Sometimes just reading the list of things you had already done was enough of a hint to get you back on the right track. I commend Access for not forcing everyone to wait for someone else to do a walkthrough, or even worse, sell hints via phone. There were some conversation trees which could get you killed if you made the wrong choices, and sometimes those choices weren't exactly obvious. Several puzzles consisted of saving your game and making random guesses until you got it right. Definitely poor puzzle design there. And now to my favourite beef -- timed sequences. There was an entire area where there were timed sequences to avoid a security robot. It wasn't extremely difficult to stay alive, nor did it require much in the way of physical dexterity or speedy reflexes. To explain why it annoyed me so much, let me say that I had to save and die many, many times just to look at all the pictures in the boardroom and get Tex's humourous comments about each one. Why would a game designer put all those great comments in the game, and then induce the player to get out as fast as possible? Controls (user interface, save/restore, sound/video adjustments): UAKM has two main modes within the game, movement mode and interaction mode. Movement mode is full screen 3-D motion controlled by the mouse, while the interaction mode is a smaller frozen picture of where you last looked, with a control panel added and a mouse cursor enabled. It took a bit of time to get used to this split mode of game playing, but I eventually became accustomed to it. However, it is definitely more complex than the simple point and click interface, and definitely requires a bit more coordination. Now for one of the great inventions of this game: conversation tree choices. In any dialog, you get a choice of three responses, but they are described by style, rather than what is actually said. As an example, Margot Kidder offers Tex a drink ("What'll you have?"), and your choices are: Sneaky Bribe, Order Manly Drink, and Make a Pass. I was amazed at how much this system could add to the game's humour, without reducing the playability in any way. I found myself saving the game and restoring it many times just to find out what conversational bon mot was hidden behind each of the choices. This system could be used to enhance almost any game on the market. Bugs or problems: The game crashed twice and hung once on me, all at the first part of the game. After that, I encountered no more problems. 2-D bitmaps in a 3-D environment caused some strange visual effects. Pros: Great (mostly) acting and voices Great makeup Great story Great (and memorable) characters Unique and funny method for making dialog choices Enjoyable puzzles Fun hunting under desks and inside drawers Cons: Many interaction modes, quite complex game control Not-quite 3-D graphics weirdness Crashed once in a while Timed sequence when I wanted to take my time A few puzzles that couldn't be solved without dying first A few actors that could have used acting lessons Conclusion: It sounds like I have levelled quite a few criticisms at this game, but don't let that fool you. No matter what its flaws, this game draws you into its world and keeps you there. It's funny, challenging, and enthralling. This game is a winner, and an honourable entry into my top ten list.