The Death Trap/TDT01.webp)
The Death Trap/TDT02.webp)
The Death Trap/TDT03.webp)
The Death Trap/TDT04.webp)
This time I played The Death Trap, an adventure game more known for who worked on/published it rather than anything in the game itself. Being Square's first game and produced/scenario by Hironobu Sakaguchi (who only worked there part-time at the time), what the game's actually about kind of fallen by the wayside. After playing it, honestly understandable lol
The game takes place during the cold war, where you play as Richard Benson, spy for Country A (pretty much the US), on a mission to save Dr. Gitanes from a guerilla faction in the Eastern African Country B. Its genre has been described as hardboiled spy action, though it really only sells that in its opening moments. Once you arrive in Country B, the plot slows to a trickle as you solve boring puzzles. Even if not executed well, the gameplay has two interesting things about it.
First, The Death Trap is the first parser game to accept both Japanese and English commands, but it has to make some compromises to achieve this. The Japanese commands take typical English Verb-Object rather than the typical Japanese Object-Verb. So "TAKE ROPE" is 「トル ロープ」, which is a little awkward at first. I didn't look at the code, but I'm guessing no matter the language the commands are processed the same, thus its more like one verb and noun bank rather than separate ones for each language.
Second, is that the game has multiple paths, puzzle solutions, and endings. This gives some variety on replays potentially, but what it seemed to result in were mostly indistinct, boring puzzles... So much of the game is going from place to place while surviving the environment, with the occasional sprinkle of story updates, which just had my eyes glazing over most of the game. If you can't be sure the player will see a certain part, it can't actually matter to the overall plot, so it all becomes mush until the final part of the game concludes the narrative.
Ending Spoilers
My ending had Dr. Gitanes killed but the microfilm was secured. Benson gets on a boat, a storm has him escape on a rubber boat, and ends up stranded for 3 days before being rescued. There's another ending I didn't get where Joker, your information guy, turns out to be a spy for Country C. Even by 1984 this twist is getting a little old...
As for how the Eastern African Country B is handled, it's an extremely stereotypical idea of what an African country is like. It's the surface of a cold war narrative, with little if anything to say outside of clichés.
Overall disliked The Death Trap. Really felt like I was pushing myself through it, which is bad when the game is under an hour long. Apparently the sequel in 1985 is more well remembered, hopefully I have a better time with it.