Forbidden Forest

The Good
First off, this is without a doubt one of the best games ever released for the c64.

The first thing I think about, when remembering my childhood days playing this game, is the excellent music. It sets the mood perfectly, and is good throughout the game.

The gameplay may seem simple at first, fire your bow against the spiders, and if they come too close, or from the wrong angle, run away. But as you progress, you have to change tactics to survive. Each new stage has a new type of enemy, which requires a different strategy to defeat. You'll have to kill giant toads, and a fire-breathing cobra, among others.

This is not an easy game, but by no means impossible. With some training, I'm sure anyone can complete it.

The game has great graphics for its time. What's perhaps most impressive is the day/night-cycle. It looks really convincing, when the day slowly turns into night during the course of the game.

The Bad
If I have to come up with something I don't like about this game, it has to be that all the stages look the same. But that's not entirely true, because the day/night-cycle makes the game change appearance over time.

Honestly, I can't come up with any valid complaints against this masterpiece.

The Bottom Line
When this was released in 1983, it was groundbreaking. The concept may seem simple; it's a side-scroller, and you play as a guy with a bow, struggling to survive in a forest infested with various creepy monsters.

It's how this is executed that really makes this game the gem it is. You can aim your bow in any direction across the screen, which is important, as enemies can approach from any angle. You have to aim up to kill the toads for example, because they fall down from the top of the screen, trying to land on you.

Some of the death-scenes are really funny, and more often than not, very gory.

I recommend this game to any c64 enthusiast. It's a fantastic game for its time.

The Good
This game has incredible atmosphere, haunting music, and amazing sound effects, especially for a system with such limitations.

You play the part of a man armed with a bow and lots of arrows in an endless forest of horrible monsters. Each stage is a different enemy to face, starting with giant spiders (if they grab you they cocoon you and spill your blood all over the forest) and including dragons, a huge snake, and an army of skeletons. Giant toads, which don't sound scary, actually leap at you from the horizon and flatten you if you don't get out of the way, giving you panic-inducing seconds to fire a killing shot before getting out of the way of the huge corpse.

All throughout the game, the sky slowly changes from day to night. The background becomes more alien and mysterious and your eyes play tricks on you.

Finally, the last stage makes the transition to a time of night so dark that you actually can't see the single enemy that slowly gets closer and closer. The only way to catch a glimpse is to wander around and catch sight of his silhouette against the leaves in the background, or wait for lightning to strike and light up the forest, which gives you brief glimpses of the horrific creature to show you that indeed he's gotten much closer than last time you saw him.

Not to mention that for a commodore game, the sound of thunder is very jarring and unsettling. A very challenging and scary game.

The Bad
I only have two major complaints.

1. The only real difference in difficulty levels is the number of enemies you must defeat in each stage to pass on. This doesn't really add to the challenge so much as make you take longer to play. Killing 16 giant spiders rather than 4 isn't really any more difficult, just a lot less fun.

2. Some of the shots you have to make require a ridiculous amount of precision. The ghost that commands the skeleton army is very hard to hit in the right spot, though that's forgivable since it stays still and the whole challenge is lining up the perfect shot while you have to deal with the skeletons that continually pop out at you. However, the dragons are much more unforgiving. You need to be pixel perfect with your shots while they fly very fast at you and a missed shot means instant death. Somehow a shot in the head doesn't count unless you hit it in the exact spot the author wanted you to hit. I think this is totally unfair and frustrating.
   
   The Bottom Line
   These days, the graphics and sound quality would probably be a turn off to most people, but I have to say that despite this, it creates a very eerie atmosphere and intense gameplay that's highly entertaining.

The Good
Forbidden Forest is one of the earliest examples of survival horror games on any eight-bit micro. The game wasn’t going to be released at all until a small software company called Cosmi stepped in. You see, the company Paul Norman was working for decided to shut up shop while he was in the middle of creating the game. While Cosmi was acquiring some of their furniture, they were impressed by his work and hired him on the spot so that he could finish the game on their watch.

As his first game, Norman put a lot of effort into this. From the get-go, the first thing you see is the forest, and it actually looks like a real forest. There are trees with different colored leaves, a few dead ones in the distance, lakes, and some burnt-out buildings. You control an archer who is placed smack bang in the middle of the forest. As soon as you go left or right, creatures of the night come out of their shells and try to attack you. You have giant spiders, killer bees, toads, dragons, phantoms, skeletons, and snakes. All of these creatures have their own attack pattern, with the most common way being to jump on your head and make you lose blood. I always love the victory dance that you perform when you complete a level. Once you have dealt with every creature, you’ll then face the Demogorgon, who only reveals himself when lightning strikes. You only have a limited amount of time to kill him.

There are four difficulty settings, and you select one of these before the game starts. How many of the same creature you face and the number of arrows in your quiver depends on the setting you have chosen. On the “Innocent” setting, completing the game is peanuts. If you managed to get through all seven levels of the game, great. Then perhaps you'll like to try out the other settings, where things will get much tougher.

Forbidden Forest was one of the first games to feature a day/night cycle. As you progress through the game, you see the moon pass through the sky, and what a sad face it has, too! When it reaches the right side, stars will appear and they twinkle every five seconds. The moon makes it move even when the creatures are killing you and during your dance. When it reaches night, things stay the same but everything is viewed from a different perspective. I love how the phantoms stand out against the blue sky. Forbidden Forest is one of the first games to feature parallax scrolling, where the two backgrounds move independently from each other. I love how most of the creatures appear from the rear background and make their way toward the screen.

There is a hint of realism to the game, in that you actually see your archer reload his quiver, which he has on his back. Shooting an arrow at one of the creatures isn’t just a matter of aiming your arrow in three directions (north, west, east) and pressing the fire button. When you move the joystick left or right, you also see him turn and aim an arrow in any diagonal direction. His walking animations are smooth, as well.

Sound-wise, the normal background music is memorable, and apart from the spiders each of the creatures have their own musical cues. There is also a cue for your death. Out of the sound effects, the most disturbing is the wailing sound that the phantom makes as it disintegrates into thin air.

The Bad
Both the death animations and victory dance take too long. There is no proper ending, and if you want to try the game at another difficulty setting, you are forced to reload the game.

The Bottom Line
Forbidden Forest is the first game by Paul Norman, and he put a lot of effort into it. You negotiate a forest, killing every creature that comes out to attack you, then face the Demogorgon himself. The victory dance that occurs between levels is fun to watch, but it just takes too long. Alongside Moon Patrol, the game was one of the first to introduce parallax scrolling, and to feature animated blood. The graphics are excellent, and the sound is quite scary in some places. This game was also ported to the Atari 8-bit, but the Commodore 64 version is superior.

The Good
It's nighttime. The family den is dark save for the glow of the monitor. The rest of the family is in the living room watching television, but not me. No, I have sworn to rid this forest of evil and that's just what I'm going to do. I steady myself as I hear a noise in the brush. A giant spider is rushing towards me. One well placed shot to its thorax puts it down quickly. Piece of cake... until more start swarming through the undergrowth.
I barely have time to catch my breath before a loud buzzing sound splits the air. A massive bee swoops down between the branches, stinger at the ready. I dodge and fire an arrow causing the bee to explode in a surprising light show. A few more buzz around and, like their hive-mate, meet and explosive end.
The aerial assault isn't over however. The sky grows darker and suddenly massive mutant frogs are raining down upon me. I dodge between their slimy bodies and fire wildly, hitting some as they cascade through the tree canopy.
The sky is now a dark grey and I can see a large dark shadow moving against the clouds. There is a flash of light that I briefly mistake for lightning. I should be so lucky. It is, in fact, fire being belched forth from a massive red dragon. I fire a succession of arrows, all of which bounce harmlessly off the dragon's tough scales. It chases me through the woods, setting the trees ablaze as it continues its fiery assault on me. At last a lucky shot directly to its mouth causes the giant beast to erupt in flames and fall to the forest floor, smoldering.
The clouds have cleared and the moon is up, framed by a sky full of sparkling stars. The air is still. Everything feels wrong. A sudden rustle of leaves is the only warning of attack from a human skeleton wielding a spear charging at me. An arrow puts it down. Then another... and another... and another. They just keep coming. I feel as though I'm being watched. A horrible phantasmagorical phantom materializes hovering above the forest floor. I somehow understand that he is controlling the skeletons and the only way to make them stop is to destroy it. I aim at the black void where the hooded figure's face should be. My arrow vanishes into the blackness as the phantom screams in agony, its robes disintegrating as it howls. The skeletons stop their assault.
All is silent.
That is until a 50 foot snake rises up in front of me, spitting acidic venom towards me. I jump to the side and quickly fire an arrow between its eyes. It falls dead at my feet. Enough is enough. It's time to end this evil once and for all.
The night is full dark. Despite the moon and stars shining bright without a cloud in the sky, flashes of lightning fill the air.
In each flash, I see something massive in the sky.
My God... it's The Demogorgon!
With every flash of lightning I can track his movements and begin to anticipate where he will be at the next flash. A single arrow is all I need to end this nightmare. I pray to the Creator and let my arrow fly true. It pierces the chest of the Demogorgon and it explodes in a shower of light, freeing the forest from it's demonic curse.

The Bad
Really, my only complaint is the length of the archer's victory dance between each wave of enemies. It definitely could have been much shorter!
The dragon is probably the most difficult creature to defeat thanks to the small hit box around its mouth and the fact that it's constantly spitting fireballs at you, so you've gotta be pixel perfect with your aim while running for your life.

The Bottom Line
This game absolutely drips with atmosphere. It is as if each pixel is made of dread.
If you are a retro horror gamer, you cannot afford to miss this game.

And I'll tell you what... I will never forget the first time I defeated The Phantom and it let out that horrid electronic scream. I could still hear it as I lay in bed that night. It really freaked me out!
Of course I was like 6....