Allow me to take you on a journey again to 1994. As I’ve talked about earlier than, it was the yr my mother and father lastly relented (after a complete lot of nagging about how vitally vital Microsoft Encarta would undoubtedly be to my future profession prospects) and the benevolent PC gods squatted upon our family to delivery a 486 DX2/66 into the world. However after all it was by no means about Encarta. Inside days, I might developed an insatiable starvation for PC gaming mags, poring backwards and forwards by way of more and more dog-eared pages as a hitherto unimagined world of digital marvel offered itself. LucasArts’ Sam & Max: Hit the Street was my inaugural buy, slowly ballooning to incorporate the likes of Theme Park, The seventh Visitor, and Myst. However one recreation I by no means fairly obtained round to taking part in was Simon the Sorcerer.
Simon the Sorcerer Origins
Which is a little bit of a shock given how vividly it exists in my thoughts. I can simply recall the journal adverts and the duvet disc demos; I bear in mind coveting its sturdy, purple-edged field whereas prowling the aisles of GAME, misplaced within the promise of some thigh-slapping fantasy highjinks distilled into that picture of Simon and his spellbook, surrounded by unlikely buddies and foes. What whimsical marvels lie inside?, I contemplated, earlier than relunctantly putting the field again on its shelf, by no means to revisit Simon once more. And a few 30 years later, I nonetheless have not happy my teenage curiosity, regardless of it being available by way of the likes of GOG as of late.
All of which is to say the newly launched Simon the Sorcerer: Origins – an extravagantly produced prequel to the cult-classic 1993 recreation – is my very first time with the sequence. And if I am sincere, I am not solely certain find out how to really feel about all of it. The unique Simon the Sorcerer instructed the story of a snarky 12-year-old boy sucked by way of a portal right into a fantasy world of wise-cracking characters whereas in search of his canine. And so started a quest to defeat the evil sorcerer Sordid and discover a manner house, all unfolding in traditional point-and-click journey fashion – suppose Monkey Island meets Discworld (which might get its personal well-received journey recreation a number of years later) and also you’re sort of heading in the right direction.
Simon the Sorcerer: Origins, in the meantime, posits that Simon (who we see shifting into his acquainted household house at first, after being expelled from college) really had one other journey to the identical universe previous to the occasions of the primary recreation – which makes so little sense primarily based on my scant information of the unique’s set-up, I may be lacking one thing solely. And so what we have now here’s a recreation of realizing winks (‘Have not we already met?’ Simon nudge-nudgingly asks the wizard Calypso early on after assembly him for what would technically be the primary time) that basically solely serves to faintly bewilder the sequence newcomers developer Smallthing Studios was presumably hoping to draw by making it a prequel within the first place.
Simon the Sorcerer: Origins, I ought to say, is beautiful so far as presentation goes. Its whimsical hand-painted backgrounds and well-animated characters look nice; it is obtained some pleasantly becoming music (though Rick Astley’s Collectively Perpetually over the title sequence was a little bit of a shock), and it is solidly voiced too. That mentioned, the faintly Disney-fied presentation is so awkwardly at odds with the snarky, irreverent tone, it takes a number of getting used to. And listening to the now 65-year-old Chris Barrie’s voice come out of a protagonist who really seems 12 this time, simply would not work for me in any respect – though sequence followers may disagree.
The place I am actually struggling most proper now, although, is the script. By way of story beats (Simon’s obtained himself wrapped up in some sort of prophecy, in case you had been questioning) it is completely positive. However its awkward gags and clumsy popular culture references are so laboured (“Reward the solar!” reads the title of 1 guide, “Does my bum look large on this?” 12-year-old Simon asks after donning his wizard robes for the primary time) they rapidly bypass ‘endearingly naff’ into ‘intensely obnoxious’ territory. And Origins is so decided to remind you you are taking part in a online game – whether or not it is a character immediately referencing the tutorial you are at present embroiled in, or Simon referring to a passerby as an NPC – it is a exhausting world to simply get pleasure from.
For sure, I and my interior teenager are confused. Was Simon the Sorcerer, which loved some respectable acclaim again within the day, all the time like this? Is Origins an genuine illustration of the Simon the Sorcerer expertise I might have had within the 90s, if solely I might opened that field? I genuinely do not know, and so it is solely attainable Origins is good at what it is making an attempt to do, and precisely the sort of factor followers have been hoping for all this time. Or perhaps 30 years later with a unique workforce on the helm, Origins simply misses the mark.
I realise this all sounds fairly destructive, however there’s nonetheless quite a bit I genuinely like. Fairly apart from Origins’ pretty presentation, the early puzzle chains I’ve performed – all within the traditional ‘discover this to mix with this to make use of on this to do that’ vein – appear fairly respectable, sitting at kind of the proper intersection between the sensibly intuitive and deliberately obscure. And I am nearly beginning to get used to its jarring tonal mishmash, even chuckling at a number of of its much less obnoxious gags amid its nice puzzle rhythms. However then I take a look at a headstone within the churchyard and get a slipshod Bloodborne reference, and I need to smash it by way of a wall once more.
So so far as introductions go, Simon the Sorcerer: Origins is a bizarre one. No matter image I might painted in my head all these years in the past, this does not fairly sq. up. It is obtained some very good bits and a few decidedly irksome bits, however whether or not it really works as a part of the sequence’ legacy, I genuinely do not know. Maybe I must go and play the unique Simon the Sorcerer in any case!
