Game 48: Operation Stealth - Final Rating

Written by Joe Pranevich

Drumroll, please...

Being my first game that I have reviewed for “The Adventure Gamer”, I did not know what to expect either from the game itself or the process of documenting and reporting on my experience with this game. There is also a fantastic legacy of fairness to uphold. Trickster built a site that we all loved, and I want to live up to that expectation. I started out enjoying “Operation Stealth” very much: the plot was interesting, the atmosphere was the right amount of cartoony for the subject matter, and the puzzles were challenging without my ever feeling like I did not have a lead to follow even when I did need to backtrack. By the end however, I found myself frustrated by an experience that had gone off the rails, first by adding too many minigames and then by making the final section extremely difficult. I became increasingly frustrated by the interface, the poor translation, and the bugs. I came very close to quitting this game, which is not a great start for what I hope will be a few posts for this blog. Having had a week or two to think it over, I have mellowed out a bit on the game and I am curious where this PISSED rating will take us.


Puzzles and Solvability

I suspect this will be one of the more challenging categories for me to discuss in this review. Let me start off with the good: most of the adventure game puzzles are fair. The vast majority of the time I played this game I felt like I had leads or I had avenues to explore and that the solutions to the puzzles were logical in the game world that I was playing in. This does not mean that I did not find myself insanely frustrated at more than a few points, but I chalk this up to interface over puzzles. The puzzles were well designed; the interface was crap.

Looking back at the two puzzles that stumped me, the elastic band and the distraction with the electric razor, I realize in hindsight that both were at least somewhat reasonable. For the elastic band, for example, I completely clicked through a message that would have given me the hint that I needed:

Somehow, I missed this message twice.

I suspect this was because my CPU settings were too high (an issue which also hurt in the final confrontation with Dr. Why), but I give them the benefit of the doubt. Once I knew there was something to find, I found it easily enough (barring the interface problem). The electric razor was similarly logical if I had noticed the electric socket right outside Dr. Why’s room. That would have clued me in to the only “logical” solution given the items that I had. It is still crazy because of the metal door, but maybe they left it open. So for both of these, I think I'll give the game a pass. 

The only “adventure game” puzzle which I particularly have an issue with is the fake orders. When you are given a gag item that instructs you to play more Delphine Software games, you do not expect it to be something you can use in-game. Fourth-wall breaking is fine, but how exactly did that paper get me past the guard?

The action puzzles in this game were a huge drawback for me. One or two would have been fine, but too many hours were spent in mazes, banging my head against timed sequences, or dodging sharks. This may have been fun for some, but I felt that the game overall placed too much emphasis on these sequences to the detriment of the adventure game aspects of play.

I’ll give it a 4. It would have easily be a 5 or 6, but I’m still pretty steamed about having to do the rat maze again.

Rating: 4


Interface and Inventory

Let me take the gloves off: the interface in this game is not fun. The mechanics of it are fine: right-click to open a menu or operate on inventory, left-click to select an item. But the translation is challenging and it took most of the game to work out the difference between “operate” and “use”. (For the record, “operate” implies no direct object. If you need to act on something instead of just act with something, you use “use”.) The error messages in this game are useless, the vast majority of the inventory items have no description, and some of the inventory items change names as you enter different parts of the game. Nothing you cannot figure out, but still annoying.

Then comes the pixel-hunting. Especially in the last area, you have to really search to find the objects you are looking for. The “ink pad” for example had no on screen clue, and I do not think the “glass” did, either. (But the latter was clued in the description.) Mousing around with “examine” selected in each screen became a habit, but even after I had done it for hours I was still missing things because they were so darned small. I ended up playing through some sections several times and still missed details. This aspect of the game is just no fun.

Getting new spy equipment was always a joy.

A huge bright side? The inventory. The spy gadgets that you received during the game were interesting, well-spaced within the narrative, and always fun to figure out how they could be used to solve the puzzles at hand. While they were all described in the manual, almost none of them were used in the way that was implied. You never, for example, used the “electric razor” as a recording device, nor cross between buildings using the watch cable. Even the rocket launcher was just a distraction for you to do the real damage. Some of the other items were a bit silly, such as only having enough money to buy two flowers in the beginning or the flotation device which I still do not fully understand, but overall this was a strong area for the game.

I will go with a 3 here. No matter how much I loved the inventory puzzles, the interface overall was terrible. They made the game difficult for all the wrong reasons.

Rating: 3

Story and Setting

Surprisingly, this is one category where Operation Stealth really shines for me. While I am not an expert in “James Bond”, by any means, I am familiar with the tropes of the genre: the gadgets, the girls, and the somehow overly fashionable games of spy-vs-spy. Real spies, I am sure, do not go around being the center of attention. This game had all of those elements in spades, and put them together in a fairly interesting way, even being more than a bit tongue in cheek when things started to get too over the top.

Are you? Because I’m having trouble keeping track.

This game is a popcorn-entertainment scenario played out in a popcorn-entertainment setting. It was not realistic in the least, but there was something fun about having the CIA, the Russians, a homegrown resistance cell, and Spyder all playing in the same sandbox and crossing each others’ paths. The twists and turn of the story were fun, and I even forgave John getting captured so many times once I was informed (by a commenter) that this was a standard trope in James Bond films that I was unaware of.

I did at times lose track of the plot, and I had difficulty telling identifying characters on sight. We also dropped the subplot with the Russians and the resistance cell midway through the game. This is not Shakespeare, but it was never intended to be and it does very well at being what it intended.

I’ll go with a 6 for this one.

Rating: 6


Sound and Graphics

The tropical setting of Operation Stealth as well as the “colorful” world that John Glames/James Bond inhabits lends itself to a bright palette, and this game does not disappoint. I have already deducted points for pixel-hunting, so for this let me just consider the graphics themselves. Overall, I found the screens to be nice, the use of colors good, and the game appealing. There were no fancy scaling tricks or view angles, so from that perspective the game was quite vanilla, but it was still a pretty game to look at. One exception here is the design of the minigames and the underwater sequences, both of which looked very muddy and difficult to make out what was going on.

This is the most creative the game ever got with camera angles.

Sound in this was nice with a few interesting songs and the background music when it was present was not glaring. Sometimes you would get rooms where you had to turn the sound off because it was grating (and I did have to play sometimes without sound because I have a small baby), but mostly it was an addition rather than a drawback.

I’m going to go with a 5 here.

Rating: 5


Environments and Atmosphere

As I said earlier, I thought the story was great and the setting fitting for it. But when it comes down to the environments that were depicted for the game, they do tend to run rather vanilla. An airport, a town, a cave, an underwater spy base? It is not that all of these places were the same, but that there were few real stand out sets or scenes in the game. That said, the atmosphere did manage that cheesy 1980s spy-film feeling which is more or less what they intended.

I go with a 4 here. Not bad, but could have been less monotone.

Rating: 4


Dialog and Acting

This is another tough category. The actual story and dialog that supports it is pretty great. There are occasional jokes that work (the recurring one about spies using their real names when they are not supposed to comes straight out of “Get Smart”), as well as some ham-fisted fourth-wall breaking that does not work. The explanations and dialogs are clear and overall I never was distracted by the quality of the prose to get taken away from the game that I was playing.

But the interface text and error messages were terrible. From the very first post, I complained about badly written error messages and they never got better or more understandable. There were objects that would randomly be renamed or referred to in multiple ways, the duplicated “ink pad” issue, and a few other gaffes. For example, I’m still not entirely clear what the water safety device I bought in the second or third post was supposed to be.

It’s funny, right?

So once again, a mixed bag. I’ll go with a 5.

Rating: 5


Totals

Actually, not that bad. Except the ending.

4+3+6+5+4+5=29 *100/60 = 45!

But I am going to use my discretion and give the game the “You Made Me Play That Rat Maze Twice, You Bastard” award for -1 points, giving the total as 44.

This is marginally better than “Future Wars” and that seems about right. It also is a bit lower than the first “Manhunter” which I recall also hating the controls for, so that also does not seem too far off the mark. This game would have scored significantly higher if the last section had not been so terrible, but honestly the early parts were not perfect either.

And the closest guess to 44 is... Ilmari... with 44!

Also, congratulations to Laukku who bet in the introduction post that Joe "won't find the rubber band in the sea without help." So a whopping 50 points for one of the few winning bets on this blog.

Caption contest winner: Kenny
Caption contest: The sermon by the leader of the Cuban Cult Of Smuggled AK47s was just too enrapturing for James and his Bond Girl.

James Bond Trivia Results
Post 1: Laertes = 1, Canageek = 1
Post 2: No trivia
Post 3: Charles = 1
Post 4: Ilmari = 1
Post 5: Andry_Panthro = 3, Ilmari = 1, TBD = 1
Post 6: No trivia

The winner is Andry_Panthro! On the basis of poor participation! ;) And a bonus 5 CAPs for all participants!

CAP Distribution

190 CAPs for Joe Pranevich

• Blogger Award – 100 CAPs – For blogging his way through the game for our enjoyment
• Classic Blogger Award - 50 CAPs - For blogging his way through Mystery House for our enjoyment
• WYS Award - 20 CAPs - For sending his What's Your Story? -answers
• Sponsor Award - 20 CAPs - For sponsoring the blog with a free DVD!

25 CAPs for Andy Panthro

• Clue Award - 20 CAPs - For answering Request for Assistance
• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPS - For contributing James Bond trivia

20 CAPs for Corey Cole

• "Would You Like to Work with Adventure Games?" Award - 20 CAPs - For sharing with us how people were employed in Sierra

65 CAPs for Laukku

• Delphine Historian Award - 5 CAPs - For pointing out the reference to Future Wars
• Frustration in the Seaweed Award - 50 CAPs - For successfully betting that Joe would not find the elastic band
• "Go for the eyes" Award - 5 CAPs - For continuing to look at the screen shots after the initial shock
• It's Good to be the King Award - 5 CAPs - For announcing a trailer for a new King's Quest game

15 CAPs for Ilmari

• Psychic Prediction Award - 10 CAPs - For having the closest guess of the final score
• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPs - For contributing James Bond trivia

10 CAPs for TBD

• Genre Support Award – 5 CAPs – For announcing a new sale on GOG
• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPs - For contributing James Bond trivia

10 CAPs for Kenny McCormick

• Cuban Cult Leader Award - 10 CAPs - For winning the caption contest

5 CAPs for Novacek

• Genre Support Award – 5 CAPs – For announcing a new adventure game on GOG

10 CAPs for Fry

• Psychic (Mystery House) Prediction Award - 10 CAPs - For having the closest guess to Mystery House's final rating

5 CAPs for Rowan Lipkovits

• Mystery House Award - 5 CAPs - For sharing a link to Mystery House Taken Over

5 CAPs for Charles

• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPs - For contributing James Bond trivia

5 CAPs for Canageek

• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPs - For contributing James Bond trivia

5 CAPs for Laertes

• Shaken but not stirred Award - 5 CAPs - For contributing James Bond trivia

5 CAPs for Tymoguin

• "Go for the eyes" Award - 5 CAPs - For continuing to look at the screen shots after the initial shock

Game 48: Operation Stealth - Won!

Written by Joe Pranevich

James Bond's Mission Log #6: Victory! I have successfully foiled the evil Dr. Why’s fiendish plot. The world is safe for me to go spend some quality time with the lovely Julia Manigua. I know where there is some fantastic deep-sea diving, as long as you don’t mind a few sharks... and I don’t mean that as some sort of double entendre. The diving off Santa Paragua really is fantastic...

Aren’t you a little short for a Spyder agent?

In last week’s post, John Glames had just managed to escape from another of Spyder’s death traps by crawling through a rat-infested system of air ducts then stealing a uniform. Now safely disguised, we can finally explore the rest of the Spyder base properly!

My first tentative steps outside of the Spyder bathroom are into a hallway which curves around to the south and east. I came out of one door and there was a second door to the right. I try that door first, but it it locked, so I head south instead. That section of the hall is curving north and east except with a little alcove off to the south. I think I remember that door from one of the times that I died escaping the piranhas, so I expect that goes back there, but the other door is new. I try the piranha door anyway and it does not open, so I guess the point is moot. Fortunately, the other door opens revealing a storage room with lots of filing cabinets, a refrigerator, a fuse box, and other odds and ends. I find a case of guns, but it seems that I cannot do anything with them. Does the game think I might not want a gun? Would a gun be a giveaway as long as I am disguised in a Spyder jumpsuit? I personally would feel a bit better with a gun while exploring an enemy base, wouldn’t you? But sadly, it is not to be. I search the room and find two items in the filing cabinets: a pair of laces and a blank rubber stamp. What are they for? I have no idea, but if there is one thing that I have learned it is “pick up everything not nailed down”.

The next room to the east seems to confirm my suspicions: the Spyder base is arranged in a circle. There the hallway curves to the west and north with only a single door in the middle. That door leads into a computer room, but there is no computer operator present. Is that the guy that is currently on the floor in the bathroom? Who can tell? I try to use my virus-laden CD-ROM here, but it appears that this computer either does not have a CD drive or it is not the right one. I will keep looking. There’s also a bed in the room (why exactly?) and some clothes on the bed. I rifle through the clothes and find a “mission”, but it seems to be another Delphine gag item-- either that or Spyder really does have a mission to buy all of the terrific games made by Delphine Software. The only other item of note is a water cooler in the corner where Spyder agents certainly have their water cooler conversations.

Caution: This item breaks the fourth wall.

Leaving the computer behind, I head to the north-east hall section and run across a few Spyder agents having a conversation. Before I can get close enough to spy on them, I am recognized as a fraud and killed-- all because my boots were not tied. I restore and use the laces that I found in the storage room and this time they know that I am the real deal. In fact, I am such a real deal that the officer there orders me to fetch him a glass of water. Not wanting to reveal myself, I did not tell him where he could stick his glass of water and instead headed back south with a new goal in mind. I’m not sure how to give him the water, but it probably involves the water fountain in the computer room and the glass that I was hinted about in the bathroom, but was unable to find. Time to recheck every room and see what I have missed.

I start back from the beginning again and check the door next to the bathroom. This time, it opens! The room appears to be the the officer’s office, the guy that I am supposed to deliver the glass of water to. (I guess he could just walk west to get here, while I had to walk around the whole circle.) I cannot get him to talk to me, but I do notice that there is a real rubber stamp on his desk, much like the blank one that I found in the filing cabinet. Obviously, that will be important later. I try to take it, but the officer opens a trap door underneath me and I am very quickly dead again. I restore back and check the rest of the room, but there does not appear to be anything I can interact with. Again, the bank of computer monitors do not have a CD-ROM drive and the filing cabinets in the room cannot be opened by me. It seems, at least for now, like a waste of time.

Because even evil spy organizations need bureaucratic middle-managers.

The next room I search again is the bathroom, and I make a stupidly slow sweep of the entire room pixel by pixel. Not surprisingly, I manage to find the glass I was looking for earlier-- right in the sink where you would expect to find it. How the heck did I miss it before? I have no idea. Either I was not trying the right pixels or it only appears after I need it. Either way, I have it and return to the computer room to fill it with water. My stupid fetch-quest nearly over, time to deliver it to the officer.

On my way back, I pass through the north-east hallway now that the crowd of agents and officers are gone. This hall also has a door, but unlike the others has a fingerprint scanner. A ha! I know exactly where this is leading! I give the glass of water to the officer and I can get his fingerprint, right? I am so clever. I also know from the manual that some of my spy-cigarettes are used to save fingerprints for subsequent analysis. Not exactly the same as using it to crack a security door, but worth a shot. I deliver the full glass to the officer, wait patiently for him to drink, and then I retreat back to the hall with the empty glass. I know from the manual that the fingerprint cigarettes are the ones with the blue bands, so I select the right one and “operate” it to get just the cigarette paper. I “use” that on the glass and now I have a fingerprint! Time to try it out on the door.

Using the fingerprint on the scanner is easy and the door opens into another hall. At the end of the hall is another problem: a second security door, this one guarded by laser bars and a Spyder agent behind a pane of glass. Seems a bit pointless to have two security doors in a row, but obviously I am approaching a sensitive part of the base. Besides, a door guarded by lasers is pretty cool.

It’s like “limbo”, but with more death.

I search this room, but I may have hit a dead end again. Trying to interact with the lasers kills you, just as you’d expect. The guard window has a mail slot next to it and I bet I will need to stick something in there, but what? A Spyder ID? The closest I have is my gag mission orders, but that does not do the trick. I check the hallway, but all I see is a keycard reader and another fuse box. There are a ton of fuse boxes scattered around the base-- is there a puzzle that connects them? If so, I have not found it yet, but I will keep looking. Deactivating the power seems like a great approach to deal with lasers, but also not the most subtle one.

For the second time in an hour, I backtrack again to look for even more pixels that I might have missed. And of course, I find something: in the computer room, there is a black area on the right of the screen that turns out to be a garbage chute. Inside the chute is a liferaft. Why was it being thrown away? What use is it against a laser door? No idea, but it is bound to come in handy later. I do head back and try it against the door just in case, but no dice.

Since I did not find anything useful, I restore back further and replay the entire section since coming out of the bathroom grate. This time, when I hand the officer a glass of water, I notice that he turns his back for just a moment. I use that opening to try to grab the stamp off his desk. It fails the first couple of times, but I am pretty sure I am on the right track so I restore until I can get the timing just right and now I have a proper stamp! I wonder how long it will take him to notice his is blank? Now what am I supposed to stamp with it? I try the fake orders, but that does not work. I guess I have to keep searching.

Do you see the stamp pad in this picture? No, and neither does anyone else.

Another hour of pixel hunting later, I find the solution: there is a stamp pad in the computer room. It is completely invisible, without even a change in the screen when you “take” it. I find these pixel-searching puzzles to be just unfair and a waste of time. This is the third item that I’ve missed since entering the lair because I did not find the right pixels to click on, and this is even after I’d started to do slow and careful sweeps. I want to throw my mouse after just a few minutes of this. The answer to the puzzle at least is obvious: I can use the stamp with the ink pad. I use them together and… trigger a small bug. Now I have two “ink pads”, but one of them is actually the inked stamp. I try that out on the fake mission and now I have an “authorized mission”. But stop for a second: those mission orders just said to buy Delphine games. Why the heck would a mission like that, even one stamped by the officer, get me through the guard room? I know how adventure game puzzles work, but I am still disappointed with this one.

I am frankly amazed that the red carnation has lasted this long.

I return to the security room and put my authorized orders in the mail slot. As I suspected, it works! I am both pleased and swearing under my breath, but at least I can get into the next room. That happens to be another hallway, pretty much identical to the last except for a trash can. I do not see anything to do with the can, and I still do not have an ID badge for the scanner, so I press forward-- straight into the master control room of the evil Dr. Why.

Dr. Why sits on a large swiveling chair in the center of a room filled with agents and large monitors. Julia is here as well, which is a bit of a relief that I did not miss saving her back in the palace. Otto is also here, so it is even more of a reunion! Unfortunately, they see through my disguise and I change back into my handsome spy clothes. If I am going to have to listen to an evil plan monologue, then I might as well be dressed for it.

Couldn’t you have spared me the piranhas and rats?

Before we can get into Dr. Why’s plans and how I am not going to foil them, the good (evil?) doctor reveals a great secret: this is not an underwater base at all! In fact, it is a base cleverly disguised as a volcanic island which can be submerged when the evil mastermind needs his privacy. This leads to all sorts of questions that I just know the game will not answer: did they sink a real island? were the palm trees real or plastic? if they built the whole thing, how did no one notice? But at least I sense that I am near the end. The island base reaches the surface and the Stealth is launched. When Dr. Why’s counter reaches 346, Washington, D.C. will be no more. (Why 346? Is this a James Bond or Delphine Studios in-joke?)

When the cut scene ends, I can see what I can do. Otto, Julia, and Dr. Why are here and all interactable, as are several of the Spyder agents, the computer in the middle of the room (with a CD-ROM slot), and some of the computers on the sides of the room. While I am exploring, the game tells me that I must have forgotten something and while fourth-wall breaking, it is at least helpful. A few moments later, I die-- either because Otto shoots me for trying something that I should not be attempting, or because Washington, D.C. is destroyed. I try the scenario over and over again, using the classic adventure game trick of using every object with every other object to see if anything happens. Finally, I find a clue: when I use the rocket-launcher cigarettes on one of the computers on the side of the room (not the one with the CD drive), I get an error that says that I cannot do it while Otto is watching. Aha! Obviously, now I just need a distraction. But what?

How did they keep the hoards of construction workers and suppliers that would have been required to build a base like this quiet? This would be one of the great engineering marvels of the 20th century!

I will not bore you with the next part. I spent a few more hours replaying the whole sequence over again, searching every pixel and driving myself bonkers. I really wanted to beat my first TAG game without assistance, but I gave up and asked for a hint. (You may have seen the request as a comment on an earlier post.)

I actually was given two hints:

1. I missed an item earlier in the game required to win. (Is this why I get the “forgot something” message?)
2. I have everything I need to solve this puzzle already.

Damn and blast. So I can solve the puzzle of Dr. Why’s room, but not the game because I missed something a ways back. I hate dead ends in adventure games. I read further into the hint and discover that I missed an “elastic band” which was hidden somewhere in the shark-infested waters. That means that I need to restore all the way back there, find it, and then replay the whole base section for a fourth time. It also means that I have to beat the rat maze again, which I am not looking forward to. I considered giving up at this point, writing a genuinely PISSED rating, and leaving for good.

Instead, I took a break, beat “Mystery House”, and felt a lot better. You have probably read that review by now!

Much more fun than stupid rat mazes.

After my break, I take a deep breath and dive in again. I restore back to the sharks and explore the underwater environment in more detail. This is really tough, much tougher than the base, because you cannot pixel-hunt and dodge sharks at the same time. Even worse, you are always swimming so you cannot easily sit in one place to do the exploration. Eventually, I find a patch of seaweed whose description says that there is something on the bottom. Eureka! But even though I am on the right path, I struggle to work it out. I cannot just “take” the seaweed, or “operate” it. There are no pixels at the bottom to manipulate separately. Eventually, I discover that you need to “examine” it while in exactly the right spot. Since you are constantly moving when you swim, this was harder than it sounds-- especially since I did not know the trick. I replay the rest of the sequence again, up through to where I was before. On the bright side, the rat maze was not quite as bad as the first pass. Before long, I am back in front of Dr. Why, except with an elastic band.

I still do not get why 346. Does anyone know?

Having just replayed this whole sequence again, I admit that I did not have much patience for trial and error or more pixel-searching. I know that I have all of the objects I need to solve this puzzle, but I just cannot do it. I check the next hint: the answer is the “electric razor” and it has something to do with the trash can in the hallway. How would that even work since there is a metal door between us and that trash can? I have no idea. I restore back to the hallway and try using the razor, then remember that this is the 90s and rechargeables must not have been invented yet. Just like in the beginning of the game, I search around for a power outlet and find one in the hall. Yeah, I missed this somehow in all of my pixel-hunting-- no idea how, but I’m pretty disappointed. I plug in the razor, turn it on, pop it in the trash, and head back to talk to Dr. Why. I do not know why I do these things, but they seem like the first thing to try.

Back in Dr. Why’s room, I still get the “forgot something” message-- is there something else that I am missing? I am about to restore again when the rest of the fake “self destruct” message from the airport starts to play. Dr. Why and Otto panic, giving me the perfect chance to shoot the rocket cigarette at the computer. It blows up and the island starts to become unstable. Before I can celebrate much, Otto shoots me. I restore and do it again, except this time “operate” on Otto as soon as I can. That works! I attack him and knock him out. Dr. Why escapes with Julia, but before I can follow I stick the CD-ROM into the computer and infect the Stealth. Now that it can no longer be cloaked, the US military should have no difficulty shooting it down. But before I can go save Julia again, the base explodes. I restore again, this time trying to shave seconds off my time. I keep getting closer, but the constant interruption by text boxes makes it almost impossible to get too much faster. Eventually, I decide that my DosBox settings might be wrong and slow down the game. That helps and I am able to perform all the actions and get the heck out of there before the base explodes. I make it to the door just in time to see Dr. Why abandon Julia and fly away in a helicopter. She and I both grab the bottom of the helicopter and we all fly off together.

You have to admire any non-super spy willing to grab onto the bottom of a flying helicopter.

We ascend into the air, but even action heroes such as ourselves cannot hold on forever and we drop. On the way down, I deploy the liferaft that I found in the garbage and we survive! Just as I think we are about to win, Dr. Why circles back around and drops a bomb on us. Game Over.

I restore, this time knowing exactly what I need the “elastic band” for! While we are hanging, I attach the band to the bomb. This breaks pretty much all logic if a water-logged elastic has the tensile strength to hold and pull back a bomb, but whatever. It’s a game! When he tries to drop the bomb again, it flies back up and destroys the helicopter. We won! I won my first game for “The Adventure Gamer”!

The ending scene depicts a brief awards ceremony where I am given the “Republic Order of the Banana” and then, and perhaps most importantly, I get the girl. Julia and I retire back to some privacy and the game ends.

So this means the revolution is cancelled?

Excuse me, I have nookie I need to attend to.

Shockingly, there is no “John Glames will return in…” tag at the end. I really expected one.

As far as Delphine games is concerned, one of their “next adventures” will be “Out of this World” (called “Another World” outside the US), considered one of the greatest games of its era and a defining piece of 1990s software. I am completely incapable of understanding how the studio that did this game could have done that one. Their next adventure game will be “Cruise for a Corpse”, which we will get to in 1990. I am considering volunteering for it-- am I a masochist or what?

Up next will be a PISSED rating! I cannot wait to see how it will do!

Session time: 6 hours 30 minutes
Total time: 16 hours 30 minutes

New Contest - James Bond References & Trivia

As I indicated in my review post, I am not a James Bond expert - but you might be. As I play through the game each week, please post comments with all of the James Bond trivia and references that I am missing for the portion of the game that I have played. At the end of the postings on "Operation Stealth", I will tally up the unique comments and the contributor that finds the most references will receive a "Dr. No" DVD provided by me (or an Amazon gift card equivalent if shipping or region locking is prohibitive.)

Joe Pranevich blogs about random geekiness at Kniggit.net and about religion at Coat of Many Colors.

Game 48: Operation Stealth - Welcome to My Underwater Lair

Written by Joe Pranevich

James Bond's Mission Log #5: The secret and evil (secretly evil?) organization, Spyder, has a plan for world domination! And I am the only agent who can stop their evil schemes. But first, I had to penetrate their hidden lair deep under the ocean near Santa Paragua, survive a piranha-filled death trap, a maze of air vents filled with rats, and a poor user interface to emerge into Spyder’s employee bathroom. Using my ninja-skills, I have knocked out an unsuspecting soldier and disguised myself in his uniform. I’m ready to take on the evil Dr. Why and destroy the STEALTH-- now all I have to do is find him.

Step on Spyder!

Last week, I had successfully infiltrated the palace of General Manigua, tracked down the secret documents that the CIA had been looking for, and capped it off with a jet ski race against a group of Russian spies. As I ended the post, I had arrived at a US submarine and was awaiting further orders.

I am summoned into my boss’s office on the submarine for a briefing. Spyder has the STEALTH and are threatening to bomb many of the world’s capitals to oblivion if they do not get a ransom. But thanks to the capture of the documents from the palace, we now know where the STEALTH is being hidden: in a base 300 feet under the sea. This would be a problem except we a) have a submarine and b) I am an expert swimmer. Once the briefing is done, I am also given the last of my spy equipment including a wetsuit, a case filled with spy cigarettes (rocket launchers and fingerprint readers), as well as a CD-ROM containing a computer virus that will be able to cripple the plane’s land-based control equipment. Time is of the essence; I put on my wetsuit and start on my mission.

Well, this looks promising.

I exit the sub and find myself swimming. This game really enjoys swimming sequences, but this one is different from the others. As John is wearing scuba equipment, there is no need for an oxygen meter, so I can explore at leisure. Instead, I am completely surrounded by sharks that move faster than I can swim and kill me, sometimes at the rate of several times before I can cross the screen. Even though they only travel horizontally across the screen, they pop out so fast it is frequently impossible to get out of their way. Why did I not get shark repellent in my latest cache of spy equipment? I end up needing to save and restore constantly to stay alive-- let alone do any exploring-- but fortunately the area is pretty empty overall.

If this message were true, you’d have fewer minigames.

What I find is a region two screens high and four or five screens wide. The upper screens appear to be empty except for a message in a bottle. I immediately think it is important, but then I open it and realize it is an in-joke from the developers. Thanks guys! The lower screens contain patches of seaweed, the occasional palm tree (!!), and on the far lower-right a rock formation that clearly has an “entrance”, but no obvious way to open it. I search around on that screen and find that one of the palm trees has an opening in its trunk which contains a button. When I push the button, I get a nasty electric shock… but also the entrance opens up and I can swim into a small cave. I hope that I was not supposed to do something about that electrical shock, but I and my inventory do not seem worse for wear.

Palm trees underwater? Are they plastic?

Inside the cave, I emerge into a pressurized area and can remove my wetsuit. I must be in some sort of service entrance into the base as I see one of those screw-in hatches like you have on submarines. Behind that hatch is a ladder which I climb up. I pop out the top and I am finally in Spyder’s base! The STEALTH is here! My mission is nearly at an end! Regretfully, I am also surrounded and captured again. Seriously, am I the worst spy ever because it seems that I am getting captured all the time? Has anyone else noticed this? Maybe if I wore camouflage instead of a suit, do you think that would help? Does the real James Bond get captured this much?

What use are an airplane and helicopters in an underwater base?

The best thing about being captured when you are a spy is that you get plenty of chances to escape. Unlike the relatively quick death that Spyder offered me the last time, this one was a real gem: I get suspended in a cage above a pool of hungry piranhas! Even better, I am also introduced to the madman behind this scheme, Dr. Why, and he has a chance to tell me his entire plan before throwing the switch and causing the cage to descend. Apparently the ransom bit is a diversion because he plans nothing short of the destruction of the “rampant and stupid vermin” of the world. Honestly, I do not know if he’s planning to kill everyone or just the people he does not like, but he seems to be quite fixated on it. As my cage descends into the deadly water, Dr. Why and his guards leave so that I can try to escape in peace.

So, the clock is ticking-- time to search! I find that I can manipulate the cage, the door, and the lock on the door. Is that a good use for my spy pen? Yes! I am able to use the spy pen to dissolve the look and open the door. On the other hand, I did not think this plan through completely because I am still descending into piranhas, but now I also have an open cage door. If I had ninja skills, I could jump out of the cage to safety but that is not the way cool John Glames needs to solve this problem.

When not used to kill spies, this room doubles as a disco.

As the cage descends further, I keep exploring. I can see the winch control on the far right of the screen and a door on my left. I look for ways to rock the cage first, but that does not seem to do any good. Running out of ideas, I consult my inventory. I am carrying a cigarette case which I suspect contains both my fingerprint cigarettes as well as the ones which are secretly a mini-rocket launcher. Neither of those seem pertinent right now. I have my watch which I was expecting to use to travel between buildings, as described in the manual, but it does say that it can fire a cable at a wall. Is there a “wall” here? Yes! In each corner of the room there is something labeled “wall”. I use my watch and it fires a line to the wall, connecting it. I am still descending, so I fire at the other wall and it creates a tight line that I am able to grab onto. I move hand over hand to the left and jump down and stroll out the door… right into the waiting hands of some guards. Unlike their boss, they do not mess around and just throw me into the piranha tank. I die.

Best death scene of the game so far!

I restore back and run through the sequence again, this time I hand-over-hand my way to the right where there is an iron grate. I have some difficulty lining myself up, but eventually I am able to “operate” it and John Glames escapes into the ducts of the Spyder base.

Oh God, no. The same moron that designed General Manigua’s palace also designed the duct system for the Spyder base because this is a maze. But unlike at the palace, this maze is dark and all I can see are the red glowing eyes of some vicious-looking rats. Just like at the palace, I can move along the vent system and turn certain walls to open up or block off passages. This allows me to work through the hordes of rats and provides a few moments of respite. Unlike the palace, not being able to see very far ahead means that I have only a limited ability to plan a route and it takes many saves and restores to find paths that lead me to the “key” (a wrench) and the exit on each of the four levels.

I hate you. I hate you so much.

The most annoying part of this minigame is that the hallways that you have to traverse are much longer and more winding than the previous ones, meaning that you can be walking for quite a while before you realize you have a rat in front of you and have to run like hell back the way you came, figure out a way to block off or get in front of that rat, then try again. Dead ends are much more of a problem because you cannot see them coming and many lives of John Glames were lost before I was able to traverse all four levels and emerge once again into the light.

 
But I do have a question. The creatures that you are running from are clearly described as rats. So, how is it that they become spiders when they kill you?

Spider-rat?

Finally, I make it through the maze and emerge into a bathroom. A soldier is shaving and it looks like he just finished a shower-- his clothes are on a bench. I tiptoe over to his clothes, but he catches a glimpse of me in the mirror and attacks. A few moments later, I am again piranha food. Perhaps, he was also a ninja.

 
I restore and try again. This time I “operate” on the soldier to attack him. My ninja skills work and I emerge victorious! I put on the clothes and the interface gives me a zoomed in view of my boots and laces. Why? I have no idea, but I take the laces as well. I also search the room and find a “napkin” (their word for hand towel, clearly). When I examine the sink, it tells me that there is a glass in the “lavatory”, but no end of pixel hunting is causing it to appear. I will have to puzzle that out later. I confidently walk out into the hall in my enemy uniform… and my now-awake soldier friend cries out from inside the bathroom. Seconds later, I am again thrown to the fishes.

Lavatory, noun. “A room or compartment with a toilet and washbasin; a bathroom.” Not helpful

I restore again. This time I realize why I found the laces: I was supposed to tie him up! I do so and stick the “napkin” in his mouth as a gag for good measure. For the second time, I confidently stride out into the hallway and find it deserted. Finally, I can explore the Spyder base in peace. That seems like a great place to stop for this post. We are almost there!

What do you think of this new “Dr. Why” fellow? Do you think he is a take off of “Dr. No” or another Bond villain? Or is his name just a stupid take-off of Britain’s other 50-year old famous series, “Dr. Who”?

Session time: 2 hours 30 minutes
Total time: 10 hours

Note regarding spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There's a set of rules regarding spoilers and companion assist points. Please read it here before making any comments that could be considered a spoiler in any way. The short of it is that no points will be given for hints or spoilers given in advance of me requiring one. Please... try not to spoil any part of the game for me... unless I really obviously need the help... or I specifically request assistance. In this instance, I've not made any requests for assistance. Thanks!

New Contest - James Bond References & Trivia

As I indicated in my review post, I am not a James Bond expert - but you might be. As I play through the game each week, please post comments with all of the James Bond trivia and references that I am missing for the portion of the game that I have played. At the end of the postings on "Operation Stealth", I will tally up the unique comments and the contributor that finds the most references will receive a "Dr. No" DVD provided by me (or an Amazon gift card equivalent if shipping or region locking is prohibitive.)

Joe Pranevich blogs about random geekiness at Kniggit.net and about religion at Coat of Many Colors.

Game 48: Operation Stealth - Magic, Mazes, and Minigames

Written by Joe Pranevich

James Bond's Mission Log #4: I have made some new allies with the local resistance movement and together we stormed the palace of General Manigua. All I can say is that I hope the General had his architect shot after building this place-- it is like a maze! Eventually, I found the General’s office and a hidden safe containing the documents I have been chasing, but I was nearly captured again and had to chase after the documents on jet skis. Naturally, I succeeded and am delivering them to the US government for analysis. Will they reveal the location of the STEALTH plane? Where will I be going next?

Good thing I dropped that pick-axe. I’d hate for the boat to spring a leak.

Where we left off last week, Julia Manigua and I had just survived being thrown overboard a yacht with rocks strapped to our feet. When we finally broke the surface, there was a boat waiting for us. A rescue? Or another fine mess?

Fortunately for both of us, the boat is a rescue! Our rescuer, a man named Tonia, takes us to a rebel base deep within the jungle and explains the situation. Julia is not the General’s wife, but rather his niece. It also appears as if the General himself is a victim as he is trapped in the palace while Otto pulls the strings. Julia and Tonia are leaders in a resistance movement against Otto and hope to restore democracy.

This is crying out for a caption contest. Any takers?

Rather than just hanging out in the jungle and dying of malaria, my hosts have a plan: we will sneak into the palace and take on Otto. Or maybe they are trying to free General Manigua? Honestly, I do not know what they are doing except that I am going to tag along and use them to get into the palace myself. If Otto has the documents, then that is where I need to be. The President (but really Otto?) will be having a performance at the palace and the three of us will disguise ourselves as performers. That should at least get us by security and through the door-- but what then? I guess we’ll play it by ear.

Purple carpets really say “third world dictator” to me.

I suppose Hamlet was beyond the abilities of our resistance movement, because the performance of choice is a magic act. Yes, Toinio-- I mean “Rudolfo”-- is the magician and Julia and I are the lovely assistants. Well, I am lovely and all, but don’t you think the General would recognize his own niece at the performance? And how convenient is it that Tonio also happens to be a professional magician with props and everything? I suppose that could have been his occupation before he became a guerrilla fighter, but it stretches credulity a bit.

We start the performance and Tonio will be doing a disappearing act. Julia and I are each brought on stage to fantastic applause then each of us goes into a large box and disappears. Finally, Tonio makes the whole box disappear. This allows Julia and I to slip into the palace properly undetected-- except Julia is immediately kidnapped and calls out for me to rescue her. Our cover is blown and now not only do I have documents to find, but also a damsel in distress.

Less fun than it looks.

As soon as Julia is hauled away, I find myself in a maze minigame. Each level consists of a sequence of interconnected hallways patrolled by guards. If a guard catches you, you die. Somewhere on the level is a blinking key-- grab it and a stairway to the next level opens up. Adding to the strategy is that a number of walls may be rotated, giving you a momentary respite or trapping guards in a walled-off location. The game is not that difficult, but there are four screens and each get progressively harder. While the winning strategy on the first two levels seems to be to trap as many guards as possible in small areas off the path to the key, the latter two require a lot more timing and luck as not all guards can be so isolated. In addition, moving some walls also can cause other walls to move elsewhere in the maze, opening up or closing other avenues for the guards. I probably died at least twenty times clearing the four levels, but eventually I make it through.

This is the only “adventure” game room of this entire play segment. Try to make it last.

I emerge from the maze into an empty hallway with a large door. There does not appear to be anything else to do than walk through the door, so I do and emerge into a nicely furnished office overlooking the sea. There is a bookshelf, a large desk, some chairs. I search the room and discover that pulling on the statue’s arm opens up a hidden safe in the pedestal. I have been waiting to use my safe cracker since the bank vault!

1-2-3-4… no, that’s not right.

The safe cracking interface is another example of this game being very easy when you know what to do, but very difficult when you have to puzzle through cryptic error messages and poor interface design. The safe has a four-digit combination with arrow buttons to select the next digit and a round button to confirm it and go to the next one or submit the combination. If you get any digits wrong, the safe explodes and game over. When you place the safecracker on the safe, it flashes a set of LEDs as you change the digits in the combination. The combination seems to change every time you reload, so it is difficult at first to figure out what the LEDs mean. My first inclination was to choose digits that had the most LEDs lit, but since the same LEDs flash regardless of what position of digit you are in, that is not helpful. It was not hard to deduce that the LEDs would show the position of the number-- so if the number “1” had the third and fourth LED light up, then the code would be “??11”-- and that turned out to be correct, but after a few explosions I was convinced that solution was “too easy” and looked for another. In fact, I was correct but my problem was the order that you have to do things: after verifying the combination you have to turn off the safecracker, remove it, and then push the round button again. Remove the cracker without turning it off? Boom. Obvious in retrospect, stupidly difficult in the moment. With that little mystery resolved, the safe opens! The envelope that I have been searching for is there, just waiting to be picked up.

You’re not my real father!

I am starting to think that envelope is cursed: I am surrounded by Spyder agents yet again. The next scripted scene is difficult to follow, but someone else comes into the room (the Russians?) and the envelope goes flying out the window and into someone’s (Otto’s?) waiting hands. If someone can explain what just happened, I would appreciate it! I give chase and we both climb down a rope from the balcony down to the beach where a convenient pair of jet skis await. We both jump on board and resume the chase over the water.

See? I just knew there would be a dock with a motor boat. Well, jet skis in this case.

Chasing the spy is done using yet another minigame. My target is just in front of me and I have to maneuver the jet ski to avoid some obstacles-- not sure if they are sharks or rocks. If I last long enough without damaging the jet ski too much, I catch up to the bad guy and take back the envelope.

Is anyone following the plot at this point? Who is this guy?

Once I get the envelope, the second round starts. This time, rather than trying to catch an enemy agent, I am fleeing from enemy agents on their own jet skis. This segment was much more difficult than the first and I only survived because I found that if you park your jet ski in the lower-left corner, only one of the enemies is able to reach you. I keep taking damage, but fortunately not enough to end the game. After some period of time, the chase ends and I arrive at a giant submarine climbing out of the water. It is the Americans! I turn over the envelope to the CIA for analysis and await my next orders.

Ninjas on jet skis? Turtle power!

This week was far more a collection of action minigames than an “adventure” game. We have now had four arcade sequences in a row with only a single adventure-game room to play in and no inventory-based puzzles. I am also confused over which spies were doing what. The safe was clearly Otto’s and I recovered the documents from him, but was that the Russians interjecting? Tonio’s liberation army? And what happened with Julia? I was expecting to rescue her, but it seems that she will remain a captive of Spyder for now. (Unless I missed something, but with only one room to explore, I doubt it.)

Session time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Total time: 6 hours 30 minutes

Note regarding spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There's a set of rules regarding spoilers and companion assist points. Please read it here before making any comments that could be considered a spoiler in any way. The short of it is that no points will be given for hints or spoilers given in advance of me requiring one. Please... try not to spoil any part of the game for me... unless I really obviously need the help... or I specifically request assistance. In this instance, I've not made any requests for assistance. Thanks!

New Contest - James Bond References & Trivia

As I indicated in my review post, I am not a James Bond expert - but you might be. As I play through the game each week, please post comments with all of the James Bond trivia and references that I am missing for the portion of the game that I have played. At the end of the postings on "Operation Stealth", I will tally up the unique comments and the contributor that finds the most references will receive a "Dr. No" DVD provided by me (or an Amazon gift card equivalent if shipping or region locking is prohibitive.)

Joe Pranevich blogs about random geekiness at Kniggit.net and about religion at Coat of Many Colors.