Starship Titanic

Copyright: KBkids.com 1998

Fans of the popular "Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe" series will be familiar with the name Douglas Adams. Those who are not, need to know that Adams' idea of science fiction is a bit on the quirky side. He is known for his off-the-wall ideas and humor. Diehard fans of Adams have reported that this new software program is a Douglas Adams dream come true. They are eating it up! For the average person who knows nothing of Adams work, this is an extremely hard program, but a lot of fun.

If you or your teens enjoyed playing Myst or Riven, you will like this new program. It is more difficult in the opinion of some testers than either Myst or Riven, so that tells you something of the difficulty level! This is not a program for the weak of heart who want to sit down and plow through a program at light speed. Starship Titanic is a program for those true gamers who will go for days without sleep or food as they doggedly try to solve that one last difficult puzzle. This is for those few who are masochistic enough to want to push their brains to the very limits! Get the picture? It's hard.

You will find yourself in your apartment at the beginning of this game. Shortly thereafter, if you do all the right things, a huge spaceship will crash land in your living room. The crew is made up of a bunch of mental misfit robots who need your help to find out what is wrong with the Starship Titanic, "the ship where nothing can go wrong." Don't expect anything dealing with the movie in any way, shape or form. The title may be smart marketing, but is basically coincidental. One tester reported that the idea for this story line was actually a joke in one of Adam's earlier literary works. The ship is huge, very complex, and not terribly 'user-friendly' in the sense that you are left to flounder (which many gamers love!). You are left very much to your own devices to figure out what to do and how to do it, much like Myst and Riven.

The 3D environment is beautiful, but a little bit difficult to explore. There are better 3D environment renditions on the market, so don't expect state-of-the-art here. The graphics are spectacular though and the ship quickly draws you in, making you feel like you are part of this new world. At the bottom of your screen, you will find all of the tools you need to explore the ship. Like many other problem solving programs, you will carry on conversations with people (robots in this case) that you meet. The characters react and respond to what you type at the bottom of the screen in your "chat-o-mat." The dialogue in Starship Titanic is more flexible, lively and variable than any program of it's kind. The fresh dialogue was a very nice change. You can also pick up and keep items for future use. A separate dialogue box allows you to create special "chevrons," or symbols for each room you have visited. A very odd device called the Suc-U-Buss will help you transport items to and from other places in the ship. The Suc-U-Buss has a very odd personality himself. You can make things happen around the ship remotely by using your "remote thingummy."

There are so many secrets with this program, that it is difficult to tell you in detail what you will be doing without giving away precious clues you must figure out on your own. Things must be done in a certain order at times, and must be done at specified times. The game play is a cross between Myst, Riven, The Last Express and Byzantine: The Betrayal. The humor and game play is extremely quirky and has it's own personality quite different from any of the above mentioned programs, but you will find the basic play similar.

Bottom Line: This one is for the hard core gamer who is not afraid to stretch the gray matter in his head to the limits. If you are a Douglas Adams fan you will love this. If you just like science fiction and have an odd sense of humor, this one will keep you busy for a long time!

Ratings: (based on KBkids.com's 4 star rating system)

Overall: 4

BrainGain: 3 1/2

FunFactor: 4

EasePlease: 3 1/2

See all versions of Starship Titanic at Amazon!

While sometimes hard to find, this product IS still listed by Simon and Schuster.