There's a name change here. Adventure #3 was originally called Mission Impossible, but copyright concerns led to a rebranding. Secret Mission was branded as a much harder adventure than the previous two; not something for a newbie. This time round, the player is attempting to stop the detonation of a bomb connected to a nuclear reactor.
1979 appears to have been a busy time for Scott (and Alexis) Adams. By the end of the year, there would be eight games in the Adventure series, one of them written by a fan!
Playthrough
Unlike the previous two titles, I find myself in the thick of things. I can play a tape to receive my briefing, but I'm described an envelope that seems to be missing. This game seems to be more dynamic too; there's someone else here with me moving around. I map out as much of the complex as I can for now and find a series of locked doors that require some sort of authorisation
The other entity wandering around, the saboteur, seems to kill himself after a random length of time and reveals a number of items. Most of them I assume are red herrings. The only other thing I have access to is a chair and strange device, which I quickly blow myself up with. I find myself longing for the verbose descriptions in Zork to help work out what I am looking at.
Once I understand how to take a picture (PRESS RED to activate the camera and then PRESS WHITE to gain a visitors pass), there's only a couple more sticky parts where I struggle to work out the next step. I'm blown up when I correctly guess that I need to break the window but have not brought the (dead) saboteur and his window maintenance pass to safely allow me through it. I also take longer than I would have liked to realise that I need to "KICK" the door to the control room. I appreciated that it was my own mess blocking the door though!
Finally, I mistakenly bring a pail of heavy water into the reactor core, ruining the bucket. It seems like there was a warning not to do this if I'd taken the film to the projector room, but that would have taken no less time than just playing from the beginning again.
Closing Thoughts
While described as a harder game, I didn't think Secret Adventure was that bad. Like Pirate Adventure, I had a single goal to work towards, and I didn't feel like there were any impossible to guess puzzles, apart from possibly realising I needed to break the window.
Is it Worth Playing?
Yes, as a small self-contained puzzle.
👍
Loot for the Hoard:
The Anti-radiation Suit.
My Map:
(Click to view in full size)
No comments:
Post a Comment