Are you a fan of the good
old Lucasarts and Sierra adventures? Do you feel lost and hopeless
now that Lucasarts has flown to a galaxy far, far away and Sierra
is giving the porn industry a run for its money? Well, fear no more,
for here comes the army of the independent developers!

Other
Worlds is a 2D point-and-click adventure in the old
Lucasarts style (Maniac Mansion, Zak
McKracken), using a similar user interface to Sierra’s
SCI1 (King’s Quest V, Space
Quest IV). Believe it or not, Other Worlds has been
in development for about 7 years (!) and actually was intended to
be an Amiga text adventure. Here’s what developer, Alkis Polyrakis,
has to say about his game’s history:

“After witnessing
the decline of traditional 2D point & click adventure games, I
decided that instead of complaining I should do something about it.
This project started as a text adventure for the Amiga in 1997; I
was using the fantastic ADMS engine at the time. However, I abandoned
it after a few months because I realized it wasn’t going to be played
by enough people to justify the hard work I was putting into it.

A
few years later, I learned about the Adventure Game Studio engine
by Chris Jones. I decided to try it and I was very pleased to find
out that it was by far the best engine ever created for the purpose.
That was in 2001. The initial engine was pure DOS-based and progress
was slow at first, but as soon as the windows version was released
it was a lot more user-friendly. Three years later, after countless
hours of editing, drawing, scripting, surfing, testing, correcting
and compiling, the product is almost ready.”

The strength of Other
Worlds lies in its storyline: on an ordinary day, Natalia
– our heroine – returns home to find her boyfriend Alkis gone and
the only clue is a cryptic message. So she sets off to find him, but
her quest will not be that simple as she will have to visit numerous
“other” worlds, interact with common and not-so-common
people and overcome a multitude of obstacles. .

Although
the focus on the unfolding storyline will keep your interest peaked,
it also features beautiful background graphics with nicely designed,
early Lucasarts-style characters. After having played the beta version
– which comprised about 3/4 of the game – I feel safe in proclaiming
that Other Worlds will remind you of the
“old-school” days and have you glued to your seat from
start to finish. I am eagerly anticipating its release this Christmas
and predict it will could be a game that will transcend it’s
independent developer roots and gain some mainstream acceptance.