By Kurt Kalata
It's a bit of a weird situation - since its inception, the Simon games have been quite popular in its homeland of Great Britain, as well as the rest of Europe, but they never remotely caught on in North America. It's not that the humor doesn't translate - people all over still appreciate classics Monty Python and Fawlty Tower, or more recent series like The Office and Garth Marenghi's Darkplace. It's probably just a result of them not finding proper distribution, because any fan of British humour will find a lot to like in the Simon series.
It all began with Simon and Mike Woodroffe in the early 80s, owners of a computer shop in Birmingham. Although they initially worked on porting Scott Adams' adventures to British micros, they eventually formed HorrorSoft and created a few games based on the horror hostess Elvira. After tiring of working on horror themed games, their name was changed to AdventureSoft, where they tried to obtain the license of Discworld, a series of comedic fantasy novels by Terry Pratchett. They weren't able to, so they created their own fantasy universe in a similar style, and thus was born Simon the Sorcerer. (Another developer a few years down the line was able to secure the Discworld license for their own series of games, which actually turned out pretty well, although Simon is distinct enough to stand apart from its obvious inspiration.)
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer - PC / Amiga (1993)
European Cover
American Cover
Simon the Sorcerer
On the surface, Simon the Sorcerer also shares more than a few similarities to Monkey Island, which the Woodroffe acknowledge as an obvious inspiration. The menu bar is almost exactly the same, with a few verbs added in like "Wear" and "Consume". Unfortunately it lacks the right-click context sensitive actions of Lucasarts games, but it can highlight all of the hotspots on the screen, an extremely useful feature that also carried forward to most of the future games. If the interface design weren't a tip off, the quest starts off in much the same way - a young kid sets off on a simple quest through a fantasy environment, filled with bizarre and quirky characters. Even right at the beginning of the game, you can walk into a bar, talk with some folks, and accomplish a few tasks to become a wizard.
Beyond that, though, the tone is actually quite a bit different, and that largely lies with the main character. In the first two Monkey Island games, Guybrush is a bit naive, maybe a bit of a trouble maker, and occasionally a bit sarcastic. By comparison, Simon is much, much snarkier. He doesn't really want to be a wizard, and he certainly doesn't want to save to kingdom, he just wants to get on with the whole spiel and find his way home. Nearly every character can be greeted with an insult and continue the rest of the conversation down much the same road. It might seem initially that Simon comes off a bit snotty, but to be fair, most of the other characters in the world are, in their own way, stupid and annoying too, so they pretty much deserve any verbal beatdowns they have coming to them. It's a very distinct characterization of British humour, and while it can be off-putting to some, it does give the game a fairly unique voice, even if initial appearances might prove otherwise. There's also quite a bit of fourth wall breakage, not only with Simon turning to the screen and commenting, but with very explicit mentions about being in an adventure game.
Even though most of the characters you meet fall between "slightly odd" and "downright weird", there's some level of charm to most of them. Many parody well known fantasy or fairy tale characters, so there's usually something familiar but still a bit off about them. Near the beginning of the game Simon will come across what appears to be a talking tree stump, but is actually the home of a colony of woodworms, a species with a helium-pitched squeak and fine taste in mahogany. Another fisherman bears a suspicious resemble to Gollum from The Lords of the Rings, but is in fact just a "Tolkien" fan wearing an elaborate costume. At the end of the game, you need to outwit a pair of evil looking demons named Gerard and Max who aren't so much nefarious as just plain lazy (and also unhappy with their current employer.) And then there's the Swampling, a sad pathetic green Muppet-like creature, with a lovingly overbearing demeanor who claims Simon as his bestest friend from the minute he walks in the door, and insists of feeding his horrible, horrible swamp stew. No matter how many times you ditch his stew and run out the door when he's not looking, he's still just as happy to see you every time you revisit. Since the plot itself is so thin, all of these characters really make up the core of the experience, and many of the more likable ones have become recurring characters in later installments.
A lot of the personality is sold through the voice acting, which is shockingly good for a CD-ROM game from the early 90s. Chris Barrie (mostly known as the hologram humanoid Rimmer from the comedy sci-fi show Red Dwarf) supplies the voice of Simon, and although some of his readings sound a bit off, he still perfectly encapsulates the prankish and slightly bastardish nature of the character. The rest of the characters are pulled off pretty well too, even if some of the voice modulation makes them occasionally hard to understand. The only real downer is that there's no way to enable subtitles in the CD-ROM version. If you want text, you'll need to stick with the disk version, which naturally doesn't contain any voice acting at all.
Your actual goals are somewhat vague, and there's very little direction throughout.
The game world is also quite large, with much of it contained within a forest in the middle of the map. The beginning of the game is quite tedious, as you slog around, checking through different routes and discovering new areas, but you do have a magic map that lets you warp to major areas. It doesn't allow you quick access to every screen, though, which still means you'll need to do a bit of walking regardless. And Simon doesn't walk so much as slog. Thankfully, if you're using SCUMMVM, you can turn on the "fast" mode option to greatly speed things up, even though it screws up the timing of a few non-interactive events.
Due to the non-linear nature of the world, it can often be confusing to figure out your next goal, much less how to solve it. Sometimes they'll make a bit of sense - at one point, you need to knock over a tree to get across a canyon. Simon can't do it himself, but as luck has it, there's a sleeping giant nearby. He's snoozing too soundly for Simon to wake him up on his own, but if you've been exploring, you probably came across the massively incompetent bard causing a cacophonous ruckus with a sousaphone. (The sound effects for this are simultaneously aggravating and hilarious.) Naturally, you need to figure out some way to steal it, causing the giant to momentarily snap and knock over the tree.
Others are far, far more nebulous. In the next screen, you come across a series of climbing pins, except one is missing. The game never tells you this, but it's located in the house of a woodkeeper, which you access by giving him an axe, which is made an non-copyright infringing mineral called milrith, which can only be found by tricking an archaeologist into digging in a specific spot, which can only be found if you have the metal detector, which you get by...you get the point. As a result, you end up aimlessly running around, running fetch quests and solving puzzles for the various inhabitants until you stumble across the proper items to let you proceed. It's pretty messy.
Still, even if there's way too much lumbering around, at least there's some completely gorgeous scenery. Unlike many other 256-color adventure games of the era, which relied on painted and scanned backgrounds. Simon the Sorcerer is pure 100% pixel artwork goodness, with lush green forests and mountainous terrain, each filled with animated niceties like scurrying woodland animals. The music is also fairly good, although there's only a few songs which quickly grow repetitive.
All and all it's a nice bit of a classic, and definitely worthwhile material for classic gaming fans. The only true bummer is the somewhat rushed and unsatisfying ending. It was released in North America via Activision's Infocom label (the actual text adventure company had long been gutted) but failed to gain much of any traction, sadly enough. But this one, along with most of its sequels, are constantly being sold both in budget packs in retail (at least in Europe), and worldwide as digital downloads on sites like Good Old Games. It's also compatible with SCUMMVM for easy play.
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer
Simon the Sorcerer II: The Lion, The Wizard and the Wardrobe - PC / Amiga (1995)
European Cover
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
The first half of the game takes place in a rather large city. For those sick of all of the forest wandering in the first game, nearly all navigation is done through a map screen, alleviating on the bigger headaches of the original. The interface is a bit different, dropping a few verbs and implementing an icon-based command system, although it's a bit hard to understand at first. (The magnet grabbing the nail is "pick up", the hammer hitting the nail is "use" - they make sense but it's not as immediate as it should be.) The structure is much the same, as you wander around town searching for various items, and eventually stumbling upon puzzles where they're required. The formerly all fantasy/medieval game world now has a number of anachronistic elements, most notably the fast food chain MucSwamplings, as well as some smaller details here and there. Eventually Simon gets kidnapped by pirates and ends up on a (not quite) deserted island, before taking off for Sordid's fortress,
Simon is a bit older in this installment, having grown a ponytail and wearing a somewhat less purple wizard's robe, which becomes his primary outfit for the rest of the series. His voice is now provided by Brian Bowles (Chris Barrie had become a bit too popular in the meantime and his asking price was too high), and while some fans aren't too happy with his delivery, it still keeps the spirit of the character. Barrie's voice is fairly similar to his predecessor's, just a bit deeper. Simon's snottier elements of his personality are played up a bit more, so those that found him abrasive in the first game will find his sarcasm even more unlikable here.
But like the previous game, even if you don't care for the main character, it's the support cast that really makes the game. Right at the start, you meet the Three Bears, who live in constant paranoia of Goldilocks, who is, in fact, a professional thief. One of the prisoners you meet on the pirate ship bears an explicit resemblance to Mr. T. Later on you'll meet the three witches from MacBeth, each of whom is disabled in some manner. All throughout the game you'll find a little hedgehog boy wandering through the scenery, occasionally getting into mischief. His purpose is never even remotely explained - he seems to exist just to be weird. You'll meet a genie with a bad hangover, who, despite attempting to grant your wishes, will accidentally end up teleporting you into some sort of ridiculous situation, including a ride aboard a spacecraft a la The Life of Brian. A handful of characters from the first game make an appearance too, including Gerard and Max, the guard demons (who are also quite displeased with Simon) and the Woodworms. Most amusing is the Swampling, Well, in somehow ended up as the corporate chairman at a restaurant chain called MucSwamplings. The rest of the corporation have revised his swamp stew formula into something vaguely edible but completely removing its homebrew essence, causing the Swampling much consternation. It's such a wacky character arc that it's hard not to be amused by its absurdity.
But perhaps the funniest moments come from the roleplayers. Since they already live in a fantasy world filled with dungeons and dragons, they find their escape in Apartments and Accountants, which emulates the mundane minutiae of British life. There's a remarkable amount of detail put into these guys - you can sit and listen to their ridiculous game for several minutes, and each of the players plays off some kind of nerd cliche, the most amusing one being the techie geek who can't stop talking about computers. At one point you can join in, during which you need to defeat an interior decorator with a pair of loaded dice.
Visually, Simon II is about on par with its predecessor. The backgrounds aren't quite as colorful, but the town - and later, Sordid's fortress - are still well detailed. For some reason, nearly all of the character sprites (outside of Simon) are drawn with large, somewhat deformed heads, which looks more nasty than funny.
For the most part, Simon II fixes nearly every complaint from its predecessor, and makes for a longer and slightly more interesting game. It still ends on yet another cliffhanger, but at least it's more involved than the last game. Many fans seem to prefer the first, mostly because it's a bit less snarky, but this is still an excellent game.
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
Simon the Sorcerer II
The adventure gaming scene has a golden age defined largely by the early-to-mid 90s, with publishers like Sierra and Lucasarts creating some of the best games in the genre. Naturally, there are numerous other worthwhile titles that were passed over or forgotten, coming from all sorts of companies from around the world.
Simon the Sorcerer begins in the house of an average British teenager, whose dog wanders into the attic and disappears into a chest. Just a bit bewildered, Simon follows him, only to end up in a medieval realm called The Magic Kingdom. His quest, detailed by a note left on the table, is to rescue the good wizard Calypso, who has been kidnapped by the bad wizard Sordid. Although he wears a garish purple wizard outfit, complete with a goofy hat, Simon actually isn't very skilled at magic...at least, at first. After wandering around the game world - which includes a small town and a fairly expansive forest - Simon will pick up a bit of skill to give him a fighting chance against the nefarious Sordid.
Simon the Sorcerer II opens up with a young boy named Runt, who wants nothing more than to become an evil magician. During this learning process, he decides to resurrect Sordid, who is still none too pleased with being killed in the last game. Now with a robotic body, Sordid sends a wardrobe back into the real world, with the hope to capture Simon and take his revenge. Things get slightly screwed up when Simon ends up at Calypso's house instead of Sordid's fortress. Mostly unaware of what's going on, Simon begins searching for a can of Mucusade (a play off the Lucozade energy drink, a pun that's lost to non-Brits) to recharge the wardrobe and return home. Much of the game is spent searching for this drink, only to find that Sordid has kidnapped Calypso's daughter. Simon, not exactly thrilled with the prospect of doing any more work than he really has to, sets off to find her anyway.
