The Wonder Years 06.05.08: Week 58 - The Immortal

Posted by Owain J. Brimfield on 06.05.2008

It's nothing to do with Highlander, unfortunately.

Welcome to the column where all gamers of a certain age come to wallow in 16-bit nostalgia. I'm your host, Owain J. Brimfield, and I'll be discussing some of the hidden gems and instant classics of gaming's golden era. Some of these games may crop up in downloadable form at some point, some may be consigned to the annals of history. Either way, they're worth tracking down if you missed them first time round, or replaying if you were lucky enough to catch them. Let's take a trip to:

THE IMMORTAL

(EA, Genesis, 1990)

Perhaps never before has a console game been so misleadingly named. For one thing, there's absolutely no resemblance to Highlander at all - no Ramirez, no Kurgan, and no trace of Chris Lambert's ridiculous accent. Well, maybe that's all for the best. The real grievance, though, is that despite the game being named after a person who is incapable of dying or being killed, The Immortal features a protagonist who dies a lot and gets killed even more frequently. Okay, maybe "a lot" is understating it - you will die a shitload of times while playing this game. It's a simple fact, which wouldn't be quite so egregious if the title hadn't led you to believe you'd be playing as some sort of unkillable superman-type figure. Still, there's no trace of apology from EA, and the game is certainly not for the faint-hearted, representing the kind of old-school challenge rarely presented in the modern gaming climate. Probably on a par with Ghosts n' Goblins, I'd say, so if you've ever played that you'll know the caliber of challenge that awaits you here.

Developed by Will Harvey, the madman/genius whose crazed intellect spawned classic puzzler Marble Madness (whose frequently frustrating gameplay stylings share a bond of kinship with The Immortal), the game is at first glance an archetypal isometric dungeon explore-a-thon. Taking control of a rather generic-looking old wizard, the quest set out before you is to locate your teacher Mordamir, who is being held captive at the heart of an underground labyrinth along with some kind of dragon. It's up to you to succeed where Dunric, a previous pupil of Mordamir's, has failed and bring the old fella back out to safety. Well, that's the flimsy initial setup anyway, and although there are one or two (not entirely unexpected) plot twists along the way, it's really all just an excuse to launch you on a journey through a spectacularly hazard-filled dungeon, the design of which would make the Marquis de Sade weep crimson tears of bloody joy.

As far as the actual dungeon exploration antics go, the gameplay in The Immortal is actually relatively standard fare, but with the environmental hazards ramped up to the absolute limit. While some fantasy games might include a level in which you have to negotiate a route riding on a flying carpet, this game has no time for such an elementary task, and accordingly introduces flamethrowers that shoot randomly both out of the walls on either side, and from the ground below you. Oh, and there's also a giant underground worm that'll pop up occasionally to devour you if you dally for too long in a particular area. Oh, and the magic carpet can only fly for a limited period of time, so you have to do the whole section at a rapid pace. And that's barely even halfway through the game. By the time you have to lure a giant beasty named the Norlac into a whirlpool using only a raft and your quick reactions, you might be wishing you'd opted for a quick blast on Mario Paint instead. Although the battles with foes, which cut away to an almost-Pokemon style one-on-one screen, aren't quite as difficult, they'll still afford you a fair number of lives lost. Thankfully, the death animations are about as gruesome as they come, and using your magic staff to make a goblin's head explode clean off its shoulders never gets old. It's fair to say, though, that the phrase "learning curve" probably never entered Harvey's vocabulary.

Despite the conventional fantasy trappings, there are some moments of pleasing ingenuity in The Immortal, from the "worm sensor" which has you scanning the floor of a particular large room in the fashion of a metal detector, trying desperately to avoid a step that'll lead you to a painful annelid-flavored death scene, or the use of a vial of alcohol, which is intended to dissolve certain substances but can also be imbibed, causing your wizard to stumble about in a drunken stupor. Despite the horrendous difficulty level (although I haven't played the game in many years, I'm pretty sure I never actually completed it), too, you rarely find yourself experiencing the bad kind of frustration that often kicks in with games of this type. Technically speaking, there's not a whole lot to write home about - the visuals utilize a palette as obsessed with gray/brown combinations as you might expect, although the gory death scenes are impressively detailed and slickly animated, and the soundtrack is simply "there".

The game has become somewhat lost to the mists of time, with no resurrection seemingly cared for or planned and the cartridge itself selling only occasionally, although admittedly with some surprisingly cheap prices from what I've seen. It's a game that's unashamedly and uncompromisingly "of its time", flavored by Ultima and Dungeons & Dragons, and would probably be completely out of place in 2008. While it's necessary, I suppose, that games such of this do go the way of the dodo, in another way it's a shame that there's a generation or two of gamers who'll never have had a taste of such a challenging, and ever-so-slightly nerdy, title as The Immortal. For those of you who remember the days when this sort of gaming was prevalent you might get a kick out of this title - relentless and unforgiving, much like an S&M mistress, the game sets out to pummel you into enjoying it, and somehow succeeds.

The Immortal trivia

• The game was originally developed for the Apple II, which explains its distinctly non-console feel and ambience.
  
• Some versions of the game feature a rather odd cameo appearance from the programmers themselves, who will trade a cup of coffee for a stink bomb. Peculiar.
  
• The original release came with a coupon for the official hint book, 'Codex of the Serpent', which contains a rather smartly-written account of the hero's journey through the game.
  

The Videosphere

Let's take a look at this week's video highlight of The Immortal in action. Here's a video of the game's opening level in action - check out the exploding head action on the goblin enemy...




Reactions and interactions

A bit of controversy after last week's look at Mortal Kombat II, which prompted a record number of comments calling out some errors I made. Ooops! Briefly:

- Goro wasn't in the video, that was Kintaro. My bad.
- Jax didn't have metal arms until the sequel. My bad.
- Reptile was selectable from the start, it was just Smoke and Noob Saibot who were hidden. My bad.
- There were, actually, only four humans playable - Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Johnny Cage, Jax. NOT my bad.
- MK 1 did, actually, have a points system (cheers to Rod Oracheski for confirming) - NOT my bad.

Elsewhere, Toddo criticised the Street Fighter series for not having the same level of overarching storyline that the Mortal Kombat series provided. It's a fair point, although the story has rarely concerned me when it comes to beat 'em ups.

And to smithy84 - I actually wrote about Eternal Champions way back in October last year - you can check it out here.


General indulgences

Every week in this section I'll endeavor to provide you, the faithful readers, with a fascinating insight into the various forms of entertainment currently dominating my spare time.

This week, I have been mostly enjoying:

Championship Manager 99/00 - yes, I have in fact been playing this solidly, and have gotten through two seasons since mentioning it last week. I won the Premier Division both times, but the Champions League trophy still eludes me thanks to bloody Barcelona.

American Dad! volume three - I haven't been keeping track of whether the US and UK iterations of the show follow the same season patterns or whether they deviate wildly as with Family Guy, but regardless, it's a damn funny show that does seem to be improving.

Allegiance by Firewind, which is a pretty stereotypical power metal album but has the advantage of being the first metal album I own whose composers hail from Greece. I'll probably have to get some Theodore Ziras stuff soon so it doesn't feel lonely on the shelves.

and congratulations to my friend AJ who has just had a shiny new baby boy. I'm sure I'll end up babysitting at some point. Babies like heavy metal, right?


And finally…

Thanks for reading folks; as always, reader feedback and suggestions are welcome. Next week in "The Wonder Years" - for those about to rock (and race), we salute you. Until then - keep it real, keep it retro.