ST Format


The Adventures Of Robin Hood

Author: Andy Nuttall
Publisher: Kixx XL
Machine: Atari ST

 
Published in ST Format #53

The Adventures Of Robin Hood

Rest assured, during the course of this review you're not going to have to read any puns about Weetabix or Kevin Costner. Oh no. The next 300-or-so words are going to be prime, tip-top, intelligent words chosen to describe the good Robin and his pals going about their business in Sherwood Forest.

Robin's game world is displayed in isometric 3D, which scrolls around a la Powermonger and Populous - and because the land's mostly lush and green, it could be easily mistaken for either of those two games. It's not as good as either.

You're got given any instructions at the start of the game, which is good in a sense because you're really dropped in at the deep end. There are enough clues spread throughout to keep you going, but most of the time you're left to your own devices. If you want to shoot people with arrows you can; if you want to talk to or side with baddies, you can do that too (this seems more like a Bullfrog game all the time).

The Adventures of Robin Hood

Your main task is to be a hero. The people of Nottingham regularly ask you for help in getting rid of raiders, or robbing the rich and giving to the... yes, you know the type of thing. If you bum around doing nothing, they won't kill you or anything - they just shun you, and shout things like "fine hero that Robin Hood turned out to be," to each other. This ought to be enough to get you going, and then all of a a sudden they love you again...

Verdict

So the game content isn't bad, the graphics are OK, and the layout is good, even; but the scoreline at the bottom of this page reads 58%. Strange, eh? No, because the game controls and speed are the problems. Moving Robin around is a chore, using arrow keys because the preferred method of pointing-and-clicking on a spot just doesn't work. The scrolling's pretty quick but the characters move horribly slowly, and after a while you just won't want to bother. Tracking characters down and talking to them is difficult, because they mostly don't want to stop - incredibly frustrating.

It is a grower, though - if you can stick it for the first hour, you'll be there for quite a few more.

Highs

  1. Lots to do, places to go, people to see.
  2. Great still graphics in-between seasons.

Lows

  1. Real world system is just too slow.
  2. Weetabix, Weetabix, Weetabix.

Andy Nuttall

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