I'm sure you're well aware of the board game known as Atmosfear in regions such as Europe,
or Nightmare in North America & it's birth place of Australia.
After all, we already had a Nightmare at the time, and it was goood.
Upon release in 1991, it was a huge novelty, because we got to not only play a creepy board
game, but interact with the wonderful Gatekeeper through the medium of VHS.
Of course, being VHS meant that the Gatekeeper's taunts and demands were the same on every
play through, with the only difference being who's turn it was at the time or the luck
of the dice roll.
So with multimedia on the rise, and the home computer capable of... oooooh... wonderful
things, ramming the board game into the CD-ROM format seemed a superlative suggestion.
Not only could you all pack around a Windows PC and join in the fun, but the Gatekeepers
quips could be mixed up, no longer bound by the linear fashion of video tape.
And so it was that Atmosfear: The Third Dimension would appear for Windows based PCs in 1995,
the same year that Atmosfear's lineage of board game sequels was revitalised by the
release of "The Harbingers"; a game with six interchangeable "Provinces", fitting together
to form a hexagon of the "other side" with Wenanty Nosul making a welcome return as The
Gatekeeper.
It's actually this format that Atmosfear:; The Third Dimension is based around.
So let's begin with the box.
Developed by A Couple 'A Cowboys Pty Limited - the company behind the original board games
- and published by EMG Publishing, we have the familiar Gatekeeper's eyes to lure us
into this multimedia delight.
We're told of Eye-popping 3D SVGA graphics, multiple drop dead dazzling environments and
non stop monitor-melting replayability.
Each game experience is diabolically different.
Yeah, they've tried to cram some appropriate adjectives in there, but it's not really working
chaps.
The back greets us with a WARNING: The Host of This Game is Not User Friendly!
Although I've always found him incredibly amicable.
There's a blurb caught between pictures of each Harbinger of doom.
Inside is a double CD-ROM.
One containing the game, and the other an audio CD you're supposed to play on a standard
CD player to add atmosphere.
It's also the backing music to this very video.
Obviously you can't use your computer's CD drive whilst playing as that's tied up streaming
data.
This makes it feel like one of those old ZX Spectrum titles where the music was provided
on a separate tape... mainly so you didn't have to hear the Spectrum beeper ruin those
sweet, sweet arcade tunes.
Each Harbinger has a card, with a map, and key of errr... keys... and of course, there's
a diabolically illustrated manual... diabolically good, of course.
We obviously need a suitable PC to run this, but the specifications are reasonably undemanding.
A simple 486DX/33Mhz, with 4MB of RAM, 256 colour 640x480 graphics and Windows 3.1 or
higher should do the trick.
So after a brief installation, here's out the game plays out for a single player game.
After setting the game time in minutes and the maximum time for each move in seconds,
you then need to pick a box to receive a character.
Then you pick your greatest fear and you're thrust into your randomly chosen character's
province.
Your job then is to find a key, move onto the next province, find another key and so
on.
If you choose to start with an easy difficulty level, you get no opponents and you also have
all the keys already.
In this case, you simply have to wander into the centre of the board to face a fear.
If the fear is the one you picked, you lose, if it isn't you win.
I mean, that's pretty much it.
Of course, if you choose a harder difficulty, then you have to collect the other keys from
the other provinces, and occasionally have a scuffle with an AI opponent along the way.
You can't see any the moves of these players, which is a little boring, but they can challenge
you to a duel at any time.
Here it pays to have collected Power Points (which you can do by landing on certain spaces),
because the more you have, the more potent your attack bar is.
If you've got 50 power points then a full attack on your bar will take out a full attack
on a player with 25 Power Points.
You lose the points you attack with, so measurement and strategy is required here.
Then you can go back to collecting keys, and getting the hell outta here.
But of course, this is a game which is far more fun played with friends, even if you
do have to huddle around a desk and share the mouse.
Thankfully Octav1us Kitten - of the superb Youtube channel Octav1us Kitten - dropped
by for a game, and we had a... how can I put this?
A NIGHTMARE of a time.
Even with more players, it's no way as good as the board game.
To start with, the game says it needs at least a double speed CD-ROM...I'm using a 24X speed
one here, but even so, the loading is pretty slow.
The game utilises pre-rendered FMV sequences to simulate game play, and each part is streamed
from the CD.
Sometimes turning around is painfully slow, or sometimes you just can't turn around, depending
on possibly where you're standing.
You remember we specified a timer for your turn at the start of the game.
Yeah, apparently that doesn't matter anymore.
You can take as long as you want... it won't be the next players turn until you whack that
space bar.
Kinda making that selection just a little bit redundant.
All in all, it makes for a somewhat frustrating and boring experience.
The only thing good out of this is the Gatekeeper himself, but I can see how even he could become
grating after a few games.
I won't burden you with our full playthrough, but if you're absolutely convinced you'd like
to see it, then head over to my Extra channel for 15 minutes of pure unrelenting horror.
Anyway, thanks for watching.
Have a great evening.
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