Delaware St. John: The Seacliff Tragedy
Preview
Poor Del is having trouble sleeping again.
by Marcus Mulkins
previewed on PC
A Hero Is Only As Good As His Support Team
In the games, Del uses a marvelous device called a VIC: Voice Imagery Communicator. For the benefit of newcomers to the series, the game comes with a very informative Tutorial that does an excellent job of showing the player how to get the most out of the device. With the VIC, Del can take special pictures and make recordings that can be instantly transmitted back to his main researcher, Kelly Bradford, who then processes those things with her lab equipment and finds evidence of any paranormal presence. [Down, boys. She is not the sexy scientist type, meant to get the males in the audience drooling. More like Velma from "Scooby Doo".] In the first two volumes she was just a sassy, know-it-all voice that would banter with Del on occasion ("You?re actually enjoying the fact that I?m being chased by a hellhound right now, aren?t you?"), and if need be give him hints on how to solve the current puzzle. In Volume Three Kelly sneaks along to the park so she can experience life in the field. The researcher back at the office handing out hints is Simon. (Not nearly as good with the banter; no sexual tension there, I guess.)
The game itself is really, really simple to play. The interface consists of a scrollable four-box inventory at the bottom left, and the VIC controls in the bottom right. On-screen, you see what Del (or Kelly, when she?s the current investigator) sees right in front of him (her). Movement is (possibly) straight ahead, turn left, turn right, or turn around, all accomplished with a click of the mouse. This may involve a certain amount of pixelhunting from time to time as you try to find that sweet spot where the mouse cursor switches from an arrow to a green arrow (movement), grab icon, or examine eyeball. You?ll encounter a lot of closed doors which will in turn provide the puzzles wherein Del plays hide-and-go-seek trying to find the keys or items that will permit him to continue along the correct path. Don?t worry about becoming irretrievably lost: you can?t proceed in the story unless you have successfully done everything and found everything that needs to be done or found. Occasionally this will require you to switch to Kelly in order to permit her to bring her unique skill set into play.
As for what the game looks like, think Myst, with its screen after screen of setpiece settings where you push the mouse cursor around until you find spots where the cursor morphs into something other than a pointer. Except that the vast majority of the screens are of locations illuminated by a flashlight with half-dead batteries.
Also similar to the first two volumes, the game comes with two stories: Story 1: Everyone Loves A Clown and Story 2: The Protector. The format seems to be that first story introduces you to the superficial situation, while the second story digs deeper to find the real story. In other terms, in story one you mess with the paranormal henchmen but in story two you battle the evil mastermind. In Seacliff Tragedy the henchmen are soul sucking Shadow People (who aren?t "people" at all, but rather a variety of demons), while the mastermind is... Well, let?s not say, just in case you decide to play the game. Wouldn?t want to totally ruin the surprise. If you want clues, ask Simon.
