Guilty

The Good
The adventures of Jack T. Ladd continue in Guilty, which is the sequel to Innocent Until Caught. Jack goes his merry ways until he gets arrested for hijacking a Jersey cow and placed on board the "Relentless", later to be dropped off at Alkaseltz Prison. Unfortunately for Jack, it turns out that the arresting officer is a female cop called Ysanne Andropath, but Jack goes out of his way to make Ysanne's life a living hell.

At the start of the game, you have to select which character you are going to play as, either Jack or Ysanne. I recommend playing Jack since you have to do things that could upset Ysanne. Depending on the character you choose, the paths will be different. For example, at the start, Jack has to break his way out of his prison cell, while Ysanne has to plot a course for a mining colony as a result of Jack ruining the ship's hyperdrive so the ship is forced to use Impulse Power. However, no matter which character you choose, you will explore at least five planets, including Lixa, Gelt, Broygus, Lowe's Planet, and Haven. And it is these planets that there is a greater variation of gameplay. For instance, you have to beam down on Lowe's Planet to investigate a distress call from some colonists. On the planet, Jack and Ysanne have to enter a cave, where Jack has to collect some eggs and bring them to the colonists for research. Ysanne, meanwhile, has to search for the alien queen who keeps reproducing those eggs, and destroy it. This type of gameplay means that both Jack and Ysanne carry different inventory items to each other, and there is different dialogue between the two. Unfortunately for the both of them, they eventually have to work together to stop the upcoming Alien invasion. Besides Jack and Ysanne, most of your favorite characters from Innocent are also found in Guilty, including Narm, P'PauD'P'Pau (I would like to know how that sounds in the CD-ROM version of the game), and his daughter, Ruthie. (who looks exactly like my friend's girlfriend, who also is called Ruthie. What a coincidence.)

Guilty's interface is the same as Innocent with the map, icons, and inventory window sitting next to each other. One thing I noticed that is different is that you don't have the blinking eye among the icons, which allowed you to magnify objects in the room. Instead, in its place, is just a blank area, reserved for inventory items that you are currently using. This wasn't available in Innocent. Also, the inventory window is revamped with scroll buttons on the right side, which could be useful if you have items that go way beyond the space in the window. To tell you the truth, I haven't worked this one out yet as I'm used to just piling shit on top of other shit, and then dropping shit that I no longer need. Pressing space doesn't bring up the same status screen that we all saw in Innocent, with a picture of Jack or Ysanne in the middle. Instead, it brings up a menu that allows you to save and load games, change game and audio options, view your progress, and quit the game, among other things.

Like Innocent, you can save in many positions as you like. Speaking of saving, all the games you save apply to the character that you picked at the beginning of the game. What I mean is, if you play as Jack and save something in Position #5, you'll find nothing saved in that position if you play as Ysanne. The save games are independent to the characters. Also, you can't die in this game, no matter how stupid or lame-brained you are. You can try to use unusual solutions to get past obstacles and you still won't die. This technique reminds me of the "no death" policy in LucasArt's adventures, such as the Monkey Island series, Day of the Tentacle, and Full Throttle.

Graphics are still in 256-color VGA, not SVGA. However, there is support for more sound cards (contrary to Innocent's choice of Adlib, Roland, or Sound Blaster), including the Tandy PC Speaker, Pro Audio, Microsoft Windows Sound System, and the SB AWE-32. The sound effects are great, which my favorites are the jungle birds, and the trans-dimensional rip near the end of the game. Also, be aware that if you save a game using the speaker, and try to load the same game using a Sound Blaster, it won't work. I tried this, the music just stuffs up.

The Bad
When you speak to numerous characters, you automatically go to the conversation screen like you do in Innocent, where you are presented with a list of questions you can ask. Only this time that the two characters do not appear in ovals, but sitting right there in deep space, looking slightly pixelated. Some of the dialogue appear outside their speech bubbles. I also expected an alternate ending if you play either Jack or Ysanne, and the ending to Innocent is much better than the one Guilty has.

The Bottom Line
In conclusion, with two different characters to choose from, Guilty has a high replay value, but not as high as King's Quest VI or Tex Murphy: The Pandora Directive. So, if you have finished playing the game as one character, you might want to play as the other just for an alternative.

As I said earlier, there is a CD-ROM version of Guilty containing full speech throughout the game. In the setup program, I have the floppy version, and I've found that enabling the "Audio soundtrack" option does nothing. Maybe that option is reserved for the CD version.

Rating: ***