Missed Classic: Alice in Wonderland - Won and Final Rating

 By Morpheus Kitami

It could be said very easily that I don't care for this game. This is true. But as I finished the game, that apathy turned into hatred. Remember that gryphon I mentioned, then went past? I thought I exhausted my dialog options and he did nothing. No, turns out the gryphon has a cricket bat he wants to give me. I feel like I have to take such extensive notes the game ceases to be any fun just to have a chance of winning. The three M objects I was supposed give one of Alice's many, many clones? Yeah, one of them is just supposed to be a mushroom. The game straight-up lied to me there.

Alice jumps in a well

Missed Classic: Alice in Wonderland - Turning into Malice

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

It's been a while. I mean, this wasn't exactly a long hiatus, especially for this blog at this point...but it wasn't a worthy one. I have no real excuse. It's one thing if the game was bad, but it's not really. I could handle a bad adventure game, I don't have a problem with that, outside of extraordinary player hatred on the game's part. I just can't motivate myself to play a mediocre adventure game attached to a bad platformer. Mediocre platformers aren't my cup of tea, especially ones where the only challenge is around jumping. I like my platformers with big guns and big guns. Unfortunately I do not think that this will continue my trend of playing the rare adventure games involving machine guns and dumdum bullets.

I think that's the answer to any question regarding this game

To the game, I didn't figure out that riddle. If it's important, it's important, if it isn't, it isn't. Continuing right, I meet the Cheshire Cat again. Nothing new, but he does tell me I can use a whisker to save a baby. That's...informative and very subtle foreshadowing. The next room over has Alice's doppelganger, the secretary, say I need to enter a building to save a baby from jumping. The baby? The duchess that tries to find morals in every tale. Nothing seems to do anything with her. Maybe, I can't access a specific area since I have no way of reaching it. I do find an ancient muffin. This isn't as random as it sounds.

What's in the box? I think you know the answer to that question!

Outside I don't find much more, but I would like to point out that swimming is just so slow. Water causes basically a dead stop. The right eventually comes to a dead end by a town hall. I do get a memo by arguing with a card, a bureaucracy joke. Which raises questions if this actually is for children. It's possible, but boring adult topics just bore children. The answer to where to go next is in a fireplace. I missed it because I have to jump, walking goes below it. This is a one-way path, because a flying bug is blocking a vital path. I'm glad I'm not making a map anymore, because this is just a mess of bizarre one-way pathways. Writing down what time characters appear is only relevant if you tick a character off.

Missed Classic - Alice in Wonderland - Let Them Eat Cake

By Morpheus Kitami

Who could have possibly foreseen this course of events?

The area I left off in is definitely unpassable. Alice can't jump onto ropes, nor can Alice float onto a nearby platform. The doors definitely link back on each other, no trickery like last time. The only doors, which don't really look like small doors, but we'll go with that, are ones Alice is too big to fit into. What can Alice do? What can Alice do? She won't starve to death yet, since she has cakes. Its probably been 24 hours at this point, so she's probably hungry anyway...

Missed Classic: Alice in Wonderland - Time and Place

Written by Morpheus Kitami

I do not often make maps. Most of the time, I am capable of orienting myself in a video game perfectly well. My memory is all that I need. Perhaps years of playing '90s FPS games and classic survival horror titles have given me that talent or it was one I was born with, the world will never know. Usually if I need a map I just hope one is online. Having to make a map is something I don't consider a mark in the game's favor, perhaps that's why I've never committed to playing Dungeon Master or any other map-needed game titles. I've only made one map before, and that was for Isle of the Dead, and I won't spoil the reason for that since it has yet to be played on this blog. 

But I decided to do a map for this game based on one reasoning, the game expects me to write down the times and locations of characters. There's a chart that comes with the game, where you're expected to do just that. Because I don't do this often, I'm not using some fancy software or anything. I'm just using my usual graphical software, adding various marks where something is, and writing down the characters schedules.

I don't have a choice here

Missed Classic 97: Alice in Wonderland (1985) - Introduction

Written by Morpheus Kitami

A long time ago, Trickster did the opening game on this blog, Below the Root. It was an interesting experiment at a time when graphic adventure games were finding their feet. Some time later, Kenny McCormick did another little known game called The Scoop, this one more mundane in style. What do those and today's title have in common? They were all made by the same company, Dale Disharoon, inc., after the head honcho, Dale Disharoon. (Its a French name) This all comes to a head with today's game, the middle child of Disharoon's PC adventure games, Alice in Wonderland.

If you were to make a list of the top 10 most influential works of English literature, Alice in Wonderland would be one of those works. If you had a wheelbarrow worth of Papiermarks for each reference that has been made, you'd have enough to buy a house on Mars. Its been interpreted, retold, reimagined so many times that I'm sure anything I could say would be unintentionally parroting someone. And I also can't really say I'm that much of an expert on the subject, I'm just an enthusiast. I just like the aesthetic.

So, instead let me tell you about John Tenniel, the illustrator for both original books. Tenniel originally worked as a political cartoonist for the magazine Punch, where he developed his signature grotesque style. A sort of precursor to the surrealists who would appear a few decades after his death. His work consists of the very real projected onto the not so real, i.e., human faces on animal heads. In comparison to those who would come after him, Tenniel had a very good eye for detail, which makes this much more effective than a lot of people who do similar styles. Further, I don't feel like I'm reading the work of a serial killer like in modern political cartoons. If you can find them, his cartoons provide a very interesting look back at 19th century politics.