The Space Bar

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Description

Armpit VI is a mining planet rich in ore known as Uptite, which can be refined into the very valuable Upshot. The planet is owned by a corporation named Amalgamated Vacuum, which runs its own Security Force. Alias Node is a member of AVSF, and also the only human on the planet. One night, he and his partner Maksh nearly witness the assassination of a fellow officer during an investigation of a break-in. The trace leads to the local bar, The Thirsty Tentacle. Unfortunately, the killer appears to be a shape-shifter capable of assuming the likeness of any of the multiple aliens in the bar. To make matters even worse, Maksh has been abducted. Alias Node has only a few hours to find the criminal before he escapes on a space shuttle.

The Space Bar is a humorous puzzle-solving adventure game. Navigation is done by moving between pre-rendered backgrounds, which can be viewed from different angles using full camera rotation. Many areas and objects can be zoomed on and interacted with in a fairly detailed fashion via context-sensitive menus. Conversations with the characters contain recurrent commands allowing the player to order them to perform actions, ask about various topics, as well as assume different attitudes. Following the tradition of older text-based adventures, each action advances the game's clock by an equivalent of a minute. Certain events will occur and characters would appear depending on the game's internal time. There is an overall time limit of several in-game hours.

Alias Node possesses a unique ability known as Empathy-Telepathy ("emp-tel"), which allows him to enter the worlds of several alien bar patrons and control them there. Each such segment plays as a self-sufficient adventure game on a smaller scale, with inventory-based, logic, and time-based puzzles. Controllable aliens include a shady character in conflict with the authorities, a teenage tree-like creature "rooted" by her mother, a robot specializing in alien sports, and others. Their gameplay may differ as well - for example, one of the aliens can use his tail for interaction; the insect-like bartender sees the world through his many eyes, etc. Most of the segments also involve unique application of local lore and rules, reading various documents for clues, and so on.

Once an emp-tel segment has been solved, crucial information is obtained, bringing the protagonist closer to the goal of his investigation. It is possible to tackle those sections in any order, but all of them must be eventually completed. In the bar itself, as well as in the alien worlds, the player has access to a map at all times. Alias Node's log contains general information about the aliens and the ongoing investigation and lists collected clues.

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Part of the Following Group

• Theme: Psychic powers / Psionics

User Reviews

Intriguing, imaginative and one of a kind!

Windows

monkeyislandgirl (8610)

Critic Reviews

Coming Soon Magazine	Macintosh	May, 1997	94 out of 100	94
Coming Soon Magazine	Windows	May, 1997	94 out of 100	94
Just Adventure	Windows	Feb 01, 2006	A-	91
Gamezilla	Windows	Nov 01, 2000	88 out of 100	88
GameSpot	Windows	Jul 25, 1997	7.7 out of 10	77
Power Play	Windows	Mar, 1997	77 out of 100	77
GameStar (Germany)	Windows	Sep, 1997	76 out of 100	76
Macworld	Macintosh	Feb, 1999		70
PC Joker	Windows	Aug, 1997	65 out of 100	65
PC Player (Germany)	Windows	Sep, 1997		60

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Trivia

Ron Cobb, the artist who designed the aliens in this game, also designed the aliens who drank at the Mos Eisley cantina in Star Wars.

Related Web Sites

• The Space Bar (official website)
• UHS Hints for The Space Bar (Question and answer hints help you solve the game without spoiling it for you.)