Dragonsphere

The Good
Simple yet has great hand-drawn graphics. Good background music, while it's been out only at the begining of 1994. You don't get bored with this game. It's not too hard and not easy at all.

The Bad
What didn't I like? Umm, nothing? When I started playing it seriously I didn't stop before I managed to finish it. The ending was a bit disappointing but still, You can't expect a real outro for no CD games, could you?

The Bottom Line
If you liked the basic idea behind King's Quest series this one is kind of better since it makes a whole new world and doesn't use the Greek mythology and other things as in King's Quest.

The Good
Its a medieval fantasy point-and-click adventure. I like the genre and I liked this. I especially liked the butterfly king on the toadstool (see screen shots). The story itself is good, and takes an unexpected and interesting turn half-way through, when you turn out to be something other than you think you are.

The Bad
It's a bit murky - both graphics and sound. In one way this adds atmosphere, but on another it suggests that the developers were short of cash. It has the feel of an older game, as if it was a long time in development. For example, although released on CD, the music has the plinky-plonky quality of older games that fit on a couple of floppies, and the voice acting is pretty poor, to the point I had to switch it off.

The Bottom Line
Not the best introduction to the genre - but worth playing all the same.

The Good
I remember bits of the game from my youth, when my brother played it (I was 4 at the time, I think)...

I loved the graphic style, and when you bear in mind that this IS a 1994 game... it's brilliant. A bit kitsch, reminding me of Monkey Island 2.

Storyline? Great. Don't want to spoil it for anyone.

The Bad
Puzzles got a bit anally retentive at times, with the One Correct Way to do things. But it was worth playing with a walkthrough ready at hand just to continue.

My only major qualm in the game is the gambling sequence, when the character involved repeats the same line over and over again... It's a flawed "puzzle" concept itself, with the protagonist gambling for nothing and the other giving things of great value away as if there were several million in the world.

I found the fetch-take-fetch-take "puzzles" a little annoying. But the more experienced adventure gamer will be better at going through backgrounds to find that little item that you missed.

The Bottom Line
What's interesting is that despite being given a sword at the beginning, contrarily to many games of this sort, it is only ever used three times, and only once is it actually used correctly. :D

But the bottom line? Despite my apparent lack of description in favour of it, it's definitely not a game to be missed. I finished it in well under 12 hours, but still a fun way to pass the time.

And now it's free. Do you need further convincing?