The Speris Legacy

Amiga 1200, The Speris Legacy (1996) game

Immediately I was impressed by the graphics, they reminded me of the 2D Zelda games, which is the reason I picked this up (from a pile of games in the loft that I'd never played before) over any others. It was soon patently clear that this was no Zelda, even if it was almost a direct clone, visually almost identical to the SNES version. It emphasises the brilliance of Nintendo's works by its levels of sheer frustration and illogic. That isn't to say I didn't enjoy playing it, for the visuals were bright and crisp enough to inspire excitement whenever I got to explore a new village.

The game begins with a forgettable story, and this sums up much of the narrative side of the game: you're expected to remember every piece of information you're given without hearing it again. This was so annoying that I sometimes found myself quitting to my last save point to revisit the conversations and hopefully uncover the hint I was looking for. The characters don't even show their names again after they've first told you, which can be especially confusing if you need to seek out a particular person. Okay, so there aren't dozens of characters in each area and you do get the hang of who's where after a while, but it highlights the lack of thought that went into the game.

The Zelda games had a kind of freedom to them that was true right down to being able to chop up grass willy-nilly, but this is absent from 'Speris' - you're only allowed to chop specific items, even specific flowers, and to do this you have to stand in the right spot rather than having collision detection from a distance. This all adds up to a less than cohesive experience, and one which the player wasn't expecting: they went out of their way to make it Zelda-like, but comparisons don't leave 'Speris' looking too healthy. The key is I did persevere to the end, even getting stuck for a while a couple of times, which shows the game was intuitive enough to be enjoyable despite its over-arching flaws. I particularly enjoyed the Cow Tree Island level which is a bright, colourful relief after being stuck in Gilliard's Rhine and the Outlaws Caves for several days (I didn't realise I needed the pass to the Information Building to progress, and running into someone isn't in any way obvious as a solution!), the music melodic and much superior to the grating and loud tone of Gilliard's.

There were some elements in the game that made me wonder if I was missing something as they didn't appear to have any function - the pink gem Phillis sells for one, and the anti-toxin from the block of ice, which I didn't realise was necessary in the Sandoon Hideout desert area as I got through without using it. Then there's the statues in Gilliard's Rhine, one of which has the circular blocks nearby that can be blown up with bombs, but doing so achieves nothing. Not to mention the fenced off area nearby that has two of these blocks which you can't get to. Add to that a hint in the manual that 'the adept player can use bombs to more deadly effect' and I was wondering if it was possible to make them more powerful or even throw them, though nothing I ever did made a difference.

Still, I'm fairly proud I only had to look at the (excellent, life-saving) walkthrough by Stuart Kyzer Caie and Murray Kendrick at one point (getting the Information Building pass). I must admit I did scout another person's saved game file who'd progressed further for clues when I was stuck in Makiah, but it only took the hint that the Invisibility Cloak was missing for me to realise it was a magical thing, and that Monkian was into magical things. As is usually the case, it's the journey that's important rather than the destination, but I couldn't help but feel the ending was rather abrupt and the two 'bosses' in the game (the Mud thing and the flying nasty in league with Gallus at the end) were very easy to dispatch. I sensed the puzzles were sometimes illogical because it was too difficult for the scripters to come up with ways of getting you to a point without forcing you down some contrived and confusing route, and the game was even artificially lengthened when you have to go back and forth between characters with little reward.

With all the problems I've mentioned you'd think this was a dismal experience to take part in, but in fact in the three weeks it took me to complete it, I did rather enjoy the overall experience, as close to playing Zelda on an Amiga as you can get I expect. The ending, with Gallus kidnapped, presumably by the nasty creature you kill at the end, set it up for a sequel though I doubt if one was ever made. I played it on an Amiga 1200 the way it was designed to be played (with a CD32 joypad which made control a lot easier than the alternatives), and though it could be put on a hard drive it was too technical to bother, and the disk accessing wasn't frequent enough to be annoying. I would recommend this to anyone that wants to have a go on an old-fashioned 2D adventure, just don't think about Zelda.

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