There are two ways I could go about reviewing Istvan Pely’s adventure
game Majestic. I could compare it to the standard of quality for adventure
games. Or I could compare it to another game of his, Zero Critical (originally
Satin Rift).

Oh, heck, I’ll do both.

Majestic is a first-person,
point-and-click adventure. It’s a bit on the old side (in fact, it has to run
in 256 colors); however, most of the movements are fully animated, as opposed
to slide show. There are music and sound effects, but no spoken dialog–just subtitles.
This curious choice is unfortunate (and also seriously hurt Zero Critical).

However,
as he showed in Zero Critical, Pely has a very good sense of story. Sherban
Young has crafted a compelling one here: the Majestic is a luxury cruiser
that has had a terrible mishap, and you have been dispatched to figure out what
the heck went wrong. This is a classic, irresistible setup for and adventure game:
an abandoned space ship to explore!

Pely employs an imaginative device to
facilitate this exploration. Your character never physically boards the ship.
Instead, you use four programmable probes. This is pretty cool because it allows
you to effectively be in several places in the ship at once.

Pely is nothing
if not a talented artist, and the ship is quite attractive and fun to explore.
I was seriously put off by the drab monochrome art in Zero Critical, so
it was quite a relief to move through Pely’s colorful and appealing environments.

Unfortunately,
this time around there’s the puzzle problem again. Some of the puzzles in the
game are fine; they are logical and fun. However, in order to complete the game,
you have to make some leaps of logic that would make Evil Kneivel dizzy.

There
is much higher profile adventure game with a very similar premise–Starship
Titanic. It probably had 100 times the budget of Majestic. However,
despite a few obtuse puzzles, Majestic is a lot more fun to play.

One
word of warning, though. This is one short game. This characteristic doesn’t
bother me, but I know it’s a real source of irritation for many gamers. Majestic
is about five hours long, tops. But it’s a pleasant time.

Final Grade:
C+

If you liked Majestic:
Watch: Hellraiser
Read: Voyager in Night by C.J. Cherryh
Play: Starship
Titanic

System Requirements:

PC:
Microsoft
Windows 3.1 or Windows 95
486 or higher
8 MB RAM
SVG display (640×480,
256-color)
2X CD-ROM drive
Sound card and speakers
Microsoft or compatible
mouse

Macintosh:
68030 or faster
System
7.1 or later
640×480 256 color
CD-ROM drive (double speed)
8 MB RAM (4096
KB free)