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by Ice Cream Jonsey 06/16/2006, 11:50am PDT |
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(I have a kickstart rom if anyone needs it for WinUAE.)
Brataccas has the worst control scheme I have ever seen. It's exclusively mouse-driven in the Amiga version. You move your guy back and forth by moving the mouse left and right. He moves in a floaty manner which is infuriating. Trying to get him to stop on a dime is very difficult, as you have to anticipate and left-click where you want him to stop.
At first I thought this was due to poor emulation. But Usenet indicates that WinUAE emulates it just fine. It was simply sluggish on the original hardware.
When you start the game you are treated to some of the most incompetent graphics ever displayed for its era. I had a PCjr in the 80s and had to hear about the superior graphics and sound of the ... well, not just of the Amiga, but rather every system that came out at that time. Even the Apple II GS. Well, they ain't shit in Brataccas. It's tough to make out what's going on.
You're trying to clear your name in regards to a crime you did not commit. To do so you will commit much crime. The manual is at www.brataccas.com and it's intentionally unclear. If you want to turn direction you need to hold the right mouse button down and then twirl your guy. If you want to whip out your sword you need to hold, IIRC, both buttons and gesture up. To put it away hold down both buttons and move down. It's unbelievable that they developed the game like this and didn't put keyboard controls in to keep themselves sane.
It appears that everyone in the game attacks you for no reason, if your sword is out (which could be considered a good reason to crappy AI, I suppose). There are robots who hate you and will try to kill you upon site. Conversation has a unique interface -- someone will pose a question to your guy and the possible responses will slideshow in thought bubbles above his head. You then click when the one you want is displayed.
Why are people talking about this game years later? Only thing I can figure is due to the fact that the other characters will start beating the shit out of one another regardless of what you do. It's got a side plot. Advancing in the main quest requires the player to turn it into a bloodbath, which has its merits. There are also a number of items, prizes and evidence that can be picked up -- it doesn't sound great, but I know that getting 100 rings / coins in Mario was a big deal for my generation, so I won't discount it.
Oh, and if you die you immediately restart the game, which I wish more games would implement.
Unfortunately, the horrible controls cause Brataccas to fail on every single level. Not recommended.
ICJ |
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