In this game, you control a historical character, Robert Ripley (1893-1949), a famous traveler and collector of rarities. One day, during a travel in Egypt, Ripley was attacked by mysterious Chinese assassins. The trail leads him and his Chinese girlfriend Mei Chen to the Forbidden City of Beijing. There he becomes involved in a mystery that will take him to exotic locations all around the globe.
The game plays like a traditional puzzle-solving adventure. Ripley will have to talk to various people, searching for information, but the main emphasis of the gameplay is still on puzzles, mainly inventory-based. The game features live actors filmed over pre-rendered backgrounds. Cut scenes are often presented as full-motion movies shown in small screens with close-up on the actors.
Originally, Peter Donnelly was the game's principle designer, and he developed the basic storyline and some of the puzzles. After his research, he became thoroughly sick of Ripley the man, and the result was that the design was taken over by
Lee Sheldon
and François Robillard.
DOSBox Setup (Inferno explains how to use DOSBox to play this game on your Windows system.)
Game Nostalgia (Provides extensive background info for The Riddle of Master Lu, with pictures of the cast and examples of voice-overs, full credits with shots and info about the design team, a demo of the game, specific details about the game, various goodies, all musical themes, shots of every location in the game, saved games, a list of reviews, including a "nostalgic "review and tech specs. )
