Legacy - Final Rating

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

German Ad, "The Nightmare Has Begun", as opposed to the American ad, Home is where the heart stops...why did no one buy this again?

At the beginning of this game, back in the comments, because Voltgloss did the introduction, I said this was the best of a certain selection of horror games featured in one issue of Game Informer. Now, I don't remember precisely what those games were, but the ones I do remember are D, Sweet Home*, Alone in the Dark, Phantasmagoria*, Blood, and Splatterhouse. Of those, I haven't played D and the ones with an asterisk for five minutes. All of those games are better than Legacy - Realm of Terror. I'm going to go out on a limb and say when I do finish those two games, I'm going to find them better. Now I could be wrong, it feels like I've been playing this since the day I was born and now my opinion has sharply declined.

Another German ad. That tagline is also trash, so I didn't bother with the rest

But at the end of it, I see a good game buried here. Behind the pre-rendered walls and the feeling that I'm going to break this game somehow, I can see a situation that would have made this game genuinely amazing. You know, an adventure portion that's fun, and not just incredibly obvious puzzles peppered with timing puzzles and bizarre red herrings. There's a whole bunch of conflicting design choices like that. They don't really work together. The RPG elements drag down the adventure elements, because you get hurt clicking on items you don't know are bad to click on. Don't really know why clicking on toilets is a bad thing, but a random worm that just pops out really makes me enjoy figuring out what I did wrong. Then there's the obvious Poe connection, but really, it feels like a really bad adaptation of a third-rate Lovecraftian writer. Someone like Clark Ashton Smith or August Derleth, or at least, my experience with them.

Legacy - Won!

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

It won't be long now before Alberoth is defeated, but first I have a few loose ends. Throughout most of the game two unreachable rooms have confounded me. Well, I'm not supposed to be able to enter them, but I shall phase through the walls of reality to see what lies in them. Don't try to imitate what I do, this is something for masters of reality like myself. The walls into nothingness are very subtle and hard to spot.

Why bother fixing things in here when nobody's coming in?

The room on the 1st basement, the one that throws noise on the screen, tells me there's a scream and teleports me away...has nothing. It is a bit sloppy though, but nothing too terribly interesting.

It's Marcel Marceau's autobiography!

That wasn't surprising, but what was going to be interesting to me was the other room, on the 2nd basement. This one had a book in it. Given that no one would ever see it without hacking, surely the developers would throw in some kind of joke? Maybe hurl vile insults at me for my vile acts against the walls of reality? The answer is rather boring, the book's there, but it has nothing in it. You can't read it. Seems lazy, rather fitting.

Another sight no one has seen

Now, since I was phasing through the walls of reality anyway, I thought I'd see what happened if I phased into a wall or beyond the playing field. I already accidentally crashed the game with my item trick, but I was looking forward to what chaos I would cause here. The answer is more interesting than it sounds. See, because I'm phasing into a place no one should be, it's clear that they didn't prerender any specific graphics for this area, or any area. This is interesting, because it means they didn't just render the parts they needed, they just rendered each "block" of the map in a bunch of different ways depending on where it is in relation to the player and other blocks. I'd do more of this, because this is fun, but I have an elder god to kill first.

Legacy - Definition of Insanity (Request for Assistance)

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

When I began writing what was going to be the original entry, it was not a hopeful one. It would have ended with a request for assistance...a different request for assistance. Something changed between then and now. Because I'm looking to wrap things up, I was looking up old reviews for this game, you know, to provide contrasting opinions with my own. This all went smoothly, until I read the Polish magazine Top Secret's review. It had the answer right in my face, a map. What was in that map? I'll tell you in a moment. To tell you how much of a roadblock this tiny bit was, almost as soon as I had reached that area, I had realized what almost every single item I had did. And then another, entirely different roadblock happened.

The observatory

We start on the 3rd floor, where I had put the Hand of Glory and the Horned Skull on their pedestals. I leave the Horned Skull, but take the Hand; The Horned Skull does nothing useful. It does stop you from using magic, which is nice. It's a long trip, I have to go down to the second basement for the Astrolabe, then back up to the temple. Here, after putting a few points into Key of the Shadow Lord, I open the door to the observatory. Firstly, putting points into Key is very useful for two reasons, one, it is literally impossible to open this door without it, and two, I'm going to need it for the rest of what I'm going to do.

The observatory is...well it sees the stars. There's also a summoning ring that if you left click on damages you. Very nice, but whatever. With the Astrolabe, you can see the stars have aligned in a way that Alberoth is gone.

 The crystal flute, how many times it's damaged my hearing

Behind the other door I thought was impossible to unlock, there's a mummy, a set of batteries, and most importantly, a crystal flute. The flute plays a very annoying sound. Which is very nice when you're desperately running around trying to solve anything at all that might help you win. I have used that many, many times. At this point, I tried to use the Ghettoblaster, in my hand, playing to avoid taking damage from the mummy. Didn't work, but I got the flute anyway.

Legacy - God in an Alcove

Written by Morpheus Kitami

Well, I'm glad I got the help I needed...well...help, anyway. Apparently I missed something in what I called the dismembered zombie room. Its also a teleport room. A dismembered zombie teleport room. There's a sentence in the English language.

There's a lot of opening doors in the log.

This beam is reachable now. Forgive me for not thinking that, when pressing forward multiple times did nothing but hurt me. You have to wait until the chains go out of the way. It teleports me...somewhere...to another room exactly the same down to the location of the severed zombie. Really? You have very few chances to impress me game, and you keep disappointing.

The only reason I haven't had to shoot a girl coming out of a TV set is that its 1992

Egyptian-themed...well, we've gone into horror kitchen sink, haven't we? Demons, evil gods, zombies, evil sorcerers, ghosts, serial killers and now mummies. Jesus, at least Elvira was slightly tongue-in-cheek about things...I'm getting off track. Hey, its Carl again...for some reason...

Oh, no, how horrible

This time Carl isn't interested in talking, no, he's just interested in fighting. Against someone with body armor and a M-16. Its a long and tough battle, in which he takes around half a magazine from me and stabs me once. It takes 24 hours, but the end was glorious. He doesn't drop anything, but he is guarding another kind of robe for some reason. I feel cheated.

Horned skull...sure did a good job there boys

Legacy - Going Insane (Request for Assistance)

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

However screwed it may look like I am, I have options. I have some points, I can put them into dimensional rift and disappear. Maybe Alberoth's afraid of his own reflection. Maybe I can put a squid on my head and pretend to be a cultist of Melchior.

Plot went wrong...cultists suspect everything

I can't do a dimensional rift because I didn't bring the rune stone with me...because I was planning on finding the other person on the Ethereal Realm...and Alberoth is not afraid of his own reflection. I don't know why I'd think that. That must be for the beam of light in the 1st basement. I just have The Last Man on Earth (1964) on the brain, and that trick worked there. Look, that's related to the gothic horror films I assume this game takes inspiration from.

Free fire zone with my M-16

So I'm screwing around, and briefly considering putting in a request for assistance. Because there's no obvious way to advance. The tentacle wizards are invulnerable, Alberoth is invulnerable, and I'm very vulnerable. I'm bobbing around on the gong in the third basement, because I'm dead certain there's another one. The gong summons enemies, but I was hoping it opened a door. It did, but not the actual doors, a secret door. See, what I didn't notice last time was that two wizards appeared when the gong was rung. I see one and think, I'm getting out of here. This is only a good idea because I have no other choice. Its tricky running around here, because there's three more wizards, and its a tad inconvenient to grab the notes I'm seeing.

But then, like the heavens opening up, the M-16, on the ground, next to a mag. Even if for a brief moment, I could consider my problems over. If I can keep cool, and don't run out of ammo, and actually hit them, then just like in Dawn of the Dead (1978), I've got free reign in the candy store.

Legacy - This Will Never End

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

You know, for an adventure game, I don't feel like I'm actually playing an adventure game. I feel like I've mentioned that before, but its not really something I'm going back and checking. That's probably why this feels so long to me at this point. At this point I'm still technically at the stage where another reviewer's debut game is longer, Reiko and Timequest. But checking places where people say how long it took them to beat, I'm seeing 35 hours. To give an idea of what that means, ho ho ho.

I don't understand the need to specify when it's in the house...

Legacy - Beast from the East (Coast)

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

I realize things are getting a bit long in the tooth, but I'm feeling confident. The end is in sight. There can't be much left to do. Its a matter of picking a few locks on the 3rd, a mausoleum, and the second basement. Might be a 4th, some set of caves, but we're in the home stretch. Now, off-screen I've been moving around some stuff around, mostly health items, but the important thing is I can solve all the problems I've had on this floor.

You can see how I might think that would work

First, the mysterious door that won't let me in. I have brought down from the asylum Ellen's straitjacket and...yeah, no, that doesn't work. I'm not going to get into this room am I? Eh, if I am, there's going to be a note about it somewhere.

She can get around old nosey, can she?

Repairing the fusebox down here does nothing for me...technically. I've already seen everything this area has to offer, no hidden items or anything. But as I'm checking each room again, and re-reading a note from Ellen, saying how she got past Alberoth. Next to a pit. Know what I'm thinking, right idea, wrong floor. MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! But first, I should make sure the path is completely clear of ghouls.

Legacy - Dismal Clouds

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

Before I continue, I thought I'd take the opportunity to talk about the house and the family tree of Winthrop. I decided to check the manual for once. Its funny, because I usually do that and this is one game I've never read the manual on before. There's a point sort of in favor that this game plays so well without a manual. Funnily, it basically confirms that my playing style, because whenever combat comes up, running is suggested, only "if the odds are on my side" should I fight. On the other hand, it also says that I should extensively check everything, implying that some items are hidden. We'll see if that happens for once, because I've had to find more hidden objects in shooters. Also, its Agatta's Iron Fist, not Agatha. I'm assuming that was misspelled on the spellbook otherwise I have much worse reading comprehension than I thought.

The mansion, supposedly

There are two problems with this map. First, and you probably already figured this out, is that every floor is roughly a square. It might not be a perfect square, but the entire possible map space is used. This map could not actually depict the house as it is unless I've been exclusively moving through the bit rebuilt after the fire. Its not vertical either, the stuff at the bottom is the front of the house. Some of the images included in the manual show that, and that there are six floors. Two of them are just the tips of towers though. Second, in-game documents describe north as the top portion of the map, I'm not just using that conventionally. North in the picture...is right. I realize that time passes between the writing of a manual and the finalization of a game, but that much, really?

Legacy: Doors & Demons

Written by Morpheus Kitami

It's been a little while since I last opened up Legacy, let's see what's...

Yep, this is a comic from an alternate universe, I believe issue #19 of Superman's Pal, Jane Olson

All right, this is going to get sadder and sadder until at the last minute, where I miraculously manage to win. Still sounds like a Superman comic. I take a sad stroll to the places I've already been, curious as to how I'm going to accomplish that without a hex editor or Cheat Engine. As I walk, I discover that quite a few places with a monster inside have nothing inside of them. Except the places where the eldritch squirrels are guarding the doors on, those I'm not touching.

I have no reason to show you this, I just think this is funny in-hand

As I walk past a familiar dropping of items, including the M10, ha, like I'm touching that again, I notice once again the straitjacket. I haven't used that before now. Could it deal with the "no firearms" sign? Whatever, it'll solve something, I'll be bewildered, we'll move on.

Legacy - Are We in Hell?

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

I'm not going to even bother mentioning the fire beasts as long as I have a functioning fire extinguisher. I quickly find a note. Its from Ellen. Remember Ellen, my distant cousin by marriage whom I brutally killed in self-defense with several dozen bullets and stabs?  Eh, its okay, I'm Superman's friend, I'll get out of jail just fine. It mentions that Elias is in his temple, two floors up, the 5th or 6th floor, as I've forgotten how this game is functioning. Also quotes "though the gate behind his face", "Robert said the gates can take you anywhere.", "...death and madness..." To sum up, Ellen probably shouldn't have imagined my face as a tree and I have probably already reached the temple. Remember way back when I found the weird chain room with the dismembered zombie? I don't know where the hell that led me. Its just as valid as any other explanation. There hasn't exactly been anything approaching the extreme south-west of the mansion. The very edge of the map. That'd be incredibly boring if its right.

 True terror is subtle in this game

I find a staircase near the note. I think to myself, hey, why not, after all, I might find some sweet loot there. The ensuing ten seconds are perhaps the most terrifying I have experienced in the game. I'm not joking. After the customary waiting period, I am greeted by two slimes. I stop for a moment. Oh, no, I think to myself in more vulgar terms. I press S, to go back down the stairs. "You fail to dodge past your attacker". Who is that? I quickly turn around. Its another slime. I back away from the door. He walks away, I slap W twice, and breathe a sigh of relief. Unfortunately, I don't think that's going to be the last we'll see of these slimes. Probably because its early on that floor yet.

Legacy - The Heart Collector

Written by Morpheus Kitami

You know, its been a while since something killed me and I never did find out what was in the second basement.

I didn't anticipate the deadliest enemy being a slug with too many eyes

The answer. Sheer terror. I'm so afraid. This thing's guarding the way past the staircase. He doesn't seem to take any damage and he does dish it out. Who is this, Agatha? Wait a minute...This is Alberoth. Old Nosey. Even the game acknowledges that this guy looks like a joke. Is the final boss going to look like a brown, lumpy sausage then? I can't get past him, I think this is a puzzle. Remember those? After all, this is supposed to be an adventure game I'm playing. Rock salt? Eh, I hope not. Flamethrower? Hmm...this could be interesting, but chances are the answer is incredibly boring.

Judging by the standards set by Alberoth, he should have the consistency of a pancake

Reloading from back upstairs, I reenter the asylum. Ah...I really don't want to wander around this place. I wonder if Mr. Teeth-thing will let me through. Unlike a bland looking Outer God, this guy lets me go. Ah, sweet freedom. Eh, knowing my luck, I come back, nearly dead and he rips my face off.

Legacy - Way-oh Way-oh

Written by Morpheus Kitami

Despite my relative success on this new floor I feel as though unfinished business on the 1st floor is a bad thing to have. The only question is, where is that damn painting? As I walk back to the stairs, I notice that the mouth-thing I assumed was an elderitch squirrel is actually guarding the stairs up. Hopefully something will be able to blanket kill all these things.

Feeling old yet? All the people on this tape are dead now

So I desperately comb over the parts of the 1st floor I haven't already checked. At this point I'm just savescumming. Forcing a door hurts me. I've got an axe, apparently that doesn't work. Who knew that the leading cause of death among firefighters is killing themselves breaking open a door. One thing good does come of this, as I trap a daemon inside an empty room. A locked empty room. I hurt myself on that door for nothing. This means...dun dun dun...I can see the VHS tape. Except there's still another daemon there, but by the time I notice him I'm already inside...again. Also the tentacle float is angry at me, but its too late to savescum again.

So, finally seeing this tape reveals that Ellen killed the rest of her family. Robert is also surprisingly calm and collected for someone who's killed a TON of people. But there's more to this than that. Think about this for a second, Ellen stopped recording the tape, took the tape out, put it in a safe on the ground floor, locked said safe, put the key on the other side of the floor. Further, Ellen has been inside this mansion for months, a year, and nobody noticed. These furniture movers never noticed her, which makes my jokes about the quality of their services even more poignant.

You know, I keep mocking the estate agent and the furniture movers, but apparently I misread that, the PC is supposed to have suggested auctioning off furniture. I'm clearly as smart as the PC.

Legacy - Is That You, Ellen?

Written by Morpheus Kitami

By now it was clear that wherever the painting was, looking in the south was now completely impossible. At least for my current abilities. That left most of north, and a bit of east. So, I go down one of the big hallways I haven't gone down yet.

Now this is what I call a media room

The hallways surrounded one room, drawing attention to it. Inside, a room worth pre-rendering, because this one actually is full of interesting furniture. Screw your shafts of light, give me a room that has stuff I can screw around with a little. I immediately know what to do with this room. I just have to go downstairs and grab that VHS...

The Legacy - A Dangerous Meeting

Written by Morpheus Kitami

After escaping the basement, it was clear that I needed to lighten my travelling load. I need some place to put all these magical artifacts and doodads. Unless this M16 "clip" is a cruel trick, there's probably an M16 lying around, and if I'm lucky, maybe a M60 or M67. Regardless, I needed to drag up some of the items from the basement. Unfortunately, this means going back in the basement. Whether or not I'll need to put it lower down is irrelevant, the ground floor is now effectively safe. Fortunately, I have more options now than I did before. I enter from the south, picking clean anything that looks useful.

"Document wallet", and here I just called them document holders...

Clearing out anything useful, I take my approach through the southeast, the darkened hallway from earlier. A doorway, wedged innocently enough just outside that hallway, contains another gargoyle and another fusebox. I so hope it isn't going to go out. Especially since the doorway isn't that far from where I ended up dragging the other gargoyle, on the eastern VHS-shaped hallway. Now, that note...

The Legacy - One-Way Wonder

Written by Morpheus Kitami

With the mausoleum protected by someone with more shotgun shells than brain cells and the "1st floor" presumably flooded with spirits who likely hate my guts...that leaves the basement. Seeing as my supply of food consists of a vague meal contained inside a tin foil pouch, possibly spoiled, it seems the wise choice.

Pictured: Not the wise choice

Unfortunately, Roberts of Boston failed to drop a letter mentioning these things. They look a bit like gargoyles, so that's what I'll call them for now, never mind that gargoyles are winged fellows. I'll probably need some kind of sledgehammer or explosive device to deal with these things. The poker doesn't do a lot of damage and one J. Olson meets the sweet embrace of death once again. But death is fairly cheap.

The Legacy: Death Awaits

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

I have to wonder what possesses someone to make a horror game, go to all the trouble of building a macabre atmosphere and enemies capable of killing the player quite quickly...then have the death sequence just be the player as a skeleton. No transition, no nothing, the player model is normal one frame and a skeleton the next. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

If I could be bothered to take gifs, I'd show you Mr. Zappa here dancing, instead you'll have to imagine it yourself

Clearing up where I left off, I obtained three more items, a poker, another speedloader of small calibre ammunition and a spell, Agatha's Iron Fist. Which by the description, leads me to think it increases melee damage. The spell was inside a hidden room was very obvious because the map freaking told me. Its too confusing for the zombie to understand, so instead he's shuffling back and forth in front of the secret wall.

The Legacy - Restless Dead

Written by Morpheus Kitami

As you can probably guess, Voltgloss was unable to play this game. The rumors of his grotesque demise at the hands of the undead or outer gods are greatly exaggerated. I'm sure Nyarlathotep gave him a quick smile and sent him on his way. No, he managed to escape the mansion, don't worry about that. In his stead I shall be handling the exorcising of whatever infests this mansion. I have a good deal of experience with spooky mansions, and indeed a little here. So forgive me if the first floor or so is handled stupidly, I don't want to come off like the scrub I am when I remember something.

As you all voted, I shall be picking one J. Olson, a very, very subtle reference on the team's part. If you get it, well, hopefully you'll get some of the jokes I'm going to be making. To recap, she's a journalist, and she plans on uncovering the secrets of the mansion. As an investigative journalist, she's well balanced. I suspect her usual skillset will not be very useful in a haunted mansion. But it seems she's dodged her fair share of bodyguards, so that's a plus.

Game 117: The Legacy: Realm of Terror (1993) – Introduction

By Voltgloss

In 1992, Infogrames released Alone in the Dark, which put the player in the role of an unsuspecting investigator who experiences the horrors of the mansion of an eccentric magnate, after said eccentric magnate committed suicide. The player tries to escape from the mansion, the unspeakable lurking fears that haunt it in the dark and from the raving madness that the secrets of the mansion could deliver. It is exciting, deadly and … why do I suddenly have this overwhelming sense of déjà vu?

All the pictures into the mind/There’s a flashing in my eyes
(Image still from here)