GENRE
	Adventure
	DEVELOPER
	ICOM Simulations
	PUBLISHER
	Kemco
	NUMBER OF PLAYERS
	1
	WORTH PLAYING TODAY?
	yes
	BUY NOW AT OR

So begins the ICOM Trilogy. What exactly is the ICOM Trilogy, you ask? These three games are a small collection of text/graphic novel adventures that follow the general point and click interface. Basically, these titles belong on an episode of VH1's I Love the 80's. Well, maybe at least Goatboy's "Hey, Remember the 80's" show. This trilogy includes Shadowgate, Déjà vu, and last but not least, Uninvited. Out of all three, I’d have to say that Shadowgate is definitely the most entertaining, but not the best overall. It may not look as good and definitely doesn’t sound as good as Déjà vu (the best in the series), but it can be a load of fun.

The colors in Shadowgate are extremely vivid and shows plenty of detail in every room in the game. Unfortunately, nothing is really animated, other than small, scrolling movements from time to time. The character animations in Uninvited aren’t found in Shadowgate. Thankfully, the visual drawback to the game isn’t harmful to the overall enjoyment of the title. The menus are easily navigated, but once again, scrolling through every single inventory page can be annoying. Thankfully, it really is more of a test of patience than hand-eye coordination.

I’ll skip all of the minor details and go straight to the point: Shadowgate has the worst music in the ICOM trilogy. While it can be uplifting and creepy at the same time, the swirling bleeps and bloops are hardly entertaining and make you want to smash your face in a mirror to stop the pain from entering your brain. That’s beside the point, however, as the music and sound effects can easily be avoided. Simply turn down the volume and pump up some tunes of your own.

This is where Shadowgate and the other ICOM Trilogy titles excel. The play mechanics in games like this are less of a test of reflexes, but rather a test of your cranial intake. In other words, you use your brain rather than your buttons. Some of the puzzles can be tedious and sometimes the answer is staring you right in the face, but the solutions are fun in a smack-yourself-in-the-head kind of way. You basically move from room to room examining, pushing, taking, hitting, and using stuff. There’s really not more to it. You can easily die a lot in this title, more so than the others, but not nearly as gruesome as in Uninvited.

What’s great about Shadowgate is that it’s set in a fantasy period rather than modern. I’m not sure what it is about wielding swords and slings rather than guns or the like, but it’s a lot more suiting for an adventure such as this one. It makes it feel more like a role-playing game. Rather than finding every spell you need ala` Uninvited, the spell system in this title works a lot better. Some spells aren’t even in scrolls, but as signs that you need to read. This makes the game much more about discovery and exploration than any other title in the trilogy.

N/A

Shadowgate is an extremely addictive title. If you’re stuck, you want to just search every nook and cranny until you can enter a new room or gain a new item. It can be frustrating at times, but difficulty is a good trait in an adventure title. Thankfully, it isn’t uber difficult and a veteran player can whiz through it in a matter of hours. The title was so successful, Kemco released a sequel on the Nintendo 64 entitled Shadowgate 64: The Trials of the Four Towers a good 10 years after the initial release and even a redux on the Game Boy Color as Shadowgate Classic.

8.9/10