Amiga CD32

Dark Seed

Despite its original atmosphere, Darkseed follows a typical adventure game style. You have to examine the environment, acquire objects and find clues to the whole puzzle. One of the problems with Darkseed is that some of the clues only appear in parts of the house at certain times.

It's ground breaking stuff, but that's more to the inclusion of speech than anything else. Still, as Howard Jones said, things can only get better...

There are some nice visuals and the odd horrific bit, but it's all rather unexceptional. Still, those with a feel for wandering-around-looking-for-things adventure games should enjoy Darkseed.

Dark Seed did keep me plugging away for some time because it has an intriguing idea behind it. Unfortunately, while I was persevering the game was moving too slowly and unsatisfyingly to make my progress as enjoyable as it could have been.

It is a bravura attempt at something different, and genuinely unsettling in its depiction of a small town harbouring a Sinister Secret, but the game is deeply unsatisfying. Wait for the promised sequel.