[h1]A bundle of fun beyond the flaws[/h1]
[b]Get past the graphics and Ron Perlman phoning it in, this is a solid piece of point and click history that still holds up to this day[/b]
Chronomaster was a surreal point-and-click sci-fi adventure game released back in 1995. The majority of the story was written by the late, great science fiction author Roger Zelazny before he died and subsequently finished by his widow, Jane Lindskold.
It's set in the future where the development of pocket universes is not just possible, but quite common among wealthy elites. These pocket universes are tailored to the owners' desires and can even have their own sets of physical laws. You play as Rene Korda, one of the most renowned universe designers which makes him sort of a fancy landscape gardener for rich ♥♥♥♥♥. He's been tempted out of retirement by the Terran command who want him to figure out who is breaking into a series of pocket universes and shutting them down. This will require Rene to visit each world with his supply of bottled time and trusty multitool to find the world key and reactivate the flow of time and identify the saboteur.
It's typical detective point and click fare here, you have a command bar at the top of the screen with all the icons arranged in no particular order and you can't re-arrange them. There are also no keyboard shortcuts because people in the future don't use keyboards anymore. This is a result of Dreamforge going for a combination of the LucasArts style verb salad interface and the more graphical Sierra style. But it's managed to incorporate the worst of both with none of the strengths. You will get used to it after a while but it's never intuitive and it'll always be a source of some frustration and mistakes. You can also forgo the command bar and just cycle through the commands with the right mouse button but, dear christ, that gets tedious quickly.
The main aim of the world is to find the world key to restart the flow of time. You do this by finding the magnetic north pole of the world and setting up a scanner on it, this will then direct you straight to the key. You can move in these frozen universes through the use of bottled time which you can see as a kind of bubble around Korda. Bottled time can also be used on objects or other people in the universes and things will even just spontaneously start up again as soon as Korda gets close. This mechanic is wonderfully done with some of the puzzles requiring you to allow a certain event to proceed before you can capitalise on the outcome. It can also lead to some frequent deaths as dangerous scenes now suddenly kick back into gear the instant you stray too close.
Chronomaster boasts not only stellar writing chops but a solid voice cast too. Korda is voiced by none other than Ron Pearlman, Milo is voiced by Brent Spiner and the Ship AI Jester is voiced by Lolita Davidovich. And they even do a decent job of it too! Pearlman at times sounds like he'd rather be anywhere but is decent for the most part. The sound design is quite good too, nicely setting each scene but it does tend to lapse out and leave the whole thing feeling quite silent. The cutscenes fall down because the characters are quite ♥♥♥♥ plastic dolls who communicate solely by waving their arms.
You visit several pocket universes, and as mentioned, each can and often do have its own variation on physics. The themes of the planets are all completely different and the fact that these are artificial worlds justifies all sorts of random characters and constructed problems. Not to mention that the frozen-time element is the best excuse ever for having the world revolve around the player character. For the most part, the game provides lots of solid adventuring along the lines of talking to other characters and helping them so that they will help you. There are many interesting and varied locations to explore -- including the second worst maze in gaming history -- and lots of items to find and use. Sometimes too many, as often there is more than one way to overcome a particular problem so your inventory ends up with half a dozen items at the end of every mission, leaving you thinking you've missed loads.
The variation in the writing and level designs poses another difficulty as the game seems aimed at a science fiction audience with its space travel and technology yet much of the adventuring takes place on fantasy worlds incorporating everything from talking plants, magic spells, flying talking carpets and so on. I quite enjoyed how it tried to run both trails through the game but I know many other players are firmly in one camp or the other. On balance, I suppose it is the sci-fi enthusiast who may be the most disappointed though those who prefer more fantasy-based adventures may well be put off from trying Chronomaster in the first place by its initial science-fiction feel. In any event, this is an adventure game through and through and the designers have, correctly, resisted putting in combat or arcade sequences.
In conclusion, despite my criticisms, I found a lot to like in Chronomaster. The story is entertaining and each of the pocket universes you visit provides an interesting variety of puzzles and obstacles to overcome. . Though Rene Korda himself is dull the game has some humour, some good puzzles and, at times, gently parodies similar scenarios in other popular adventure games. If you're a point-and-click fan and you're looking for a bit of history that's somewhat off the beaten path, then Chronomaster has time for you..
