Dark Sky over Paradise_ A
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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By the middle of the 21st century the Earth's population has increased to such a level that the planet can no longer support it. Rivalry between nations is buried for the greater good and a plan for survival is devised by the world's most prominent scientists and thinkers. The colonisation of Mars becomes a top priority and factories across the globe are required to turn over a percentage of their products towards the achievement of this goal. However, this soon brings about an economic recession which threatens to destroy the plan and plunge the Earth into deeper despair.

Much of the work is being done on the Moon where minerals are mined to produce a new form of propellant and men strive to perfect a Shuttle capable of making the journey to Mars. But MoonBase is now in crisis, rocked by bombings and intrigue. It is at this point that you, a mere Citizen, are summoned to the Moon without any instructions, just a TeleGram allocating you a LivingSpace Unit and ordering you to report to a particular ClericalOffice the next day.....

A Dark Sky Over Paradise loads to the display of a Shuttle taking off from Earth, followed by a picture of it coming down to land at MoonBase. When the adventure starts you are standing on the PlastiPavement in the ClericalDome, but you first cast your mind back to your arrival and the Shuttle Hostess' request to complete the necessary VidForm. This appears as a window in the centre of the screen in which you can type details about yourself. This personalisation of the adventure works well as, on numerous occasions, you will be addressed by name.

With only a few minutes before curfew there is little opportunity for any immediate exploration - and the SecurityTroops are ruthless - so you head for your accommodation. On entering you are greeted by a parrot which talks to you while you're there, coming up with some interesting phrases and insults - just take off your UtilitySuit in front of it! There's a greeting on the VidScreen with instructions about a meeting the next day, then it's time to get your head down for a few hours.

Asleep, you find yourself in the first section of a three part dream sequence, leading a band of fugitives in their attempt to escape militiamen in hot pursuit. Successful completion of the dream is not necessary for progress in the main story but it provides a nice contrast from your waking activities. The author, Martyn Westwood, has obviously been influenced by Level 9's Worm in Paradise and this is further evidenced by the existence of VidMasks to wear in VidRooms on MoonBase and, especially, the parrot's "Wake the behemoth! Buy the dagget, and get the inflatable Kim!". It looks like he's an Infocom fan too - just take a look at the statues in the Park when you go there for your meeting the next day.

Between work and sleep there's plenty of time to explore too, although your security clearance isn't high enough for access to every location. You cannot fail to notice, though, that everyone is into religion in a big way and people quote extensively from the bible. In some instances quotations appear in pop-up windows in the centre of the screen too.

Working your way through the adventure is fairly straightforward if you turn up for your meetings on time and get information from various characters. The required input is sometimes very specific but, if you get stuck, there's a very comprehensive hint program to help you out of your difficulty. This loads from within the main adventure - and returns you to it so there's no need to save your position beforehand - and is structured to provide step-by-step hints before revealing the solution.

A Dark Sky Over Paradise has been written with the STAC utility and features most of the commands one would expect to be available including GET/DROP ALL, RAMSAVE/LOAD and OOPS. You can abbreviate WAIT to Z and this is particularly useful as you may find it necessary to wait around for a few turns. When you're not working or sleeping, time advances by one minute per move and is shown on the status bar at the top of the screen. Text appears in 80 column mode and is white on a black background with pop-up windows appearing in inverse. There are only three different pictures, all digitised ones of a space shuttle.

The documentation accompanying the adventure is impressive, consisting of a professionally printed 10 page instruction manual, a card welcoming you to the MoonBase and a loading and general gameplay reference card. You also get a photocopied map showing the basic outline of the MoonBase's Clerical and Industrial Domes.

There are some minor spelling mistakes in A Dark Sky Over Paradise and apostrophes appear in numerous places where a simple plural of a noun is all that's required. I came across a few bugs in my review copy but these were soon sorted out by the author. That's one thing you can be pretty sure of with the smaller software producers and independent authors - a quick response to any query.


http://www.syntax2000.co.uk/issues/06/darksky.rev.txt
