I head back south (across the disk change boundary) to explore the forest near the mountainside some more. If we try to RIDE LANDSTRIDER, however, they won't let him approach. In this area, west of the Pod People village, Jen finds the Hill of the Landstriders TWO LONG-LEGGED BEASTS ARE GRAZING HERE. (The map layout here presages some of Sierra's King's Quest games, with north-south bands of similar terrain laid out in a rectangular grid.) We can head west along what seems to be the northern edge of the map, through an arid scrub area and a desert bordered by a chasm TOO WIDE FOR A GELFLING TO JUMP ACROSS. This creature does not attack or interfere with Jen's movement northward, where we find another wooded area with a great river visible to the east. We are now in the Village of the Pod People - but not that kind, these are GENTLE PEASANTS WHOSE LIVES ARE DEVOTED MAINLY TO FOOD, LAUGHTER AND SONG (proto-Fraggles, perhaps.) There's a one-location silent forest to the east, and to the west is another forest, where a creature hides behind a rock LOOK CREATURE suggests that it APPEARS TO BE VERY, VERY HUNGRY. Continuing north, I encounter the dreaded disk-change boundary of the pre-hard drive days, moving on to disk 2, side "A" thanks to the game's simple but copious illustrations. Whoops! Well, I'll continue exploring here before I restart, if only for the sake of mapping. North of the starting point, we tumble into a forested wilderness area from which we can't return we find a sling in the woods to the northeast.Īs I pick up the sling, JEN SHUDDERS, and HE SENSES THAT HE IS TOO LATE, AND URSU HAS DIED. To the east is a rocky mountainside, where we can get LOST IN THE MOUNTAINS but safely return the way we came. We're urged to go quickly, but since we don't really know which way to go I'll take time to explore a little. This is the Valley of the Stones, according to the Gelfling Mystics, and we can't tale any action before one approaches to tell Jen that he has been sent for by the dying Ursu, "WISEST OF OUR RACE." If you've seen the film, you know the story already, but as far as the gameplay goes, be warned that there are certain to be.Īs the adventure begins, we see our character, Jen, onscreen, and are informed that JEN IS IN A BEAUTIFUL MOUNTAIN VALLEY. There are no indications of which directions we can move in, so we have to just try things to see how the navigation works, and I was surprised to find out that only INV works to take inventory, I and TAKE INVENTORY do not.Īs always, interested adventurers are encouraged to heal The Dark Crystal firsthand before reading my playthrough notes below - though I will note that the game is not meant to be difficult, but I had to reference a walkthrough several times to get myself unstuck. The circa-1980 Sierra game engine was also showing its age by 1982 - the vector-and-fill illustrations don't capture the characters or world of the film with much fidelity, and dropped objects are often drawn in strange places. In license-based games, especially those based on an existing novel or movie, the plot is often constrained to conform to the existing narrative, and The Dark Crystal runs into some issues in that area. I'm playing the Apple II edition here, using the AppleWin emulator The Dark Crystal was also released for the Atari 400/800 computers. It's also something of a bridge to the King's Quest series that followed, presented in third-person perspective with our hero, Jen the Gelfling, seen onscreen, unlike the first-person perspective of the earlier Sierra adventures. I remember reading magazine articles about it back when the movie was released, and it's been on my to-play list for decades now. Based on the Jim Henson movie, with visual design work by Brian Froud and a cast of sophisticated puppets, Roberta Williams' game was one of Sierra's larger adventures, occupying two double-sided floppy disks. I met the gentleman behind Muppet website last weekend at International Toy Fair, and was reminded of an adventure I've always meant to play - The Dark Crystal, published by Sierra On-Line in 1982 as the sixth and final entry in its Hi-Res Adventure series of illustrated text adventures.
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