Hocus Pocus

Moby ID: 515
DOS Specs
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Description official description

Hocus Pocus is a young magician apprentice who has two goals in life: to join the Council of Wizards in the land of Lattice, and to marry his sweetheart Popopa. Unfortunately, both objectives cannot be accomplished without embarking on a long and dangerous journey to gather magical crystals on behalf of the wizard chief Terexin. The quest for career and love begins!

Hocus Pocus is an action platform game. Controlling the young magician, players run, jump, and climb through levels populated by various types of monsters. Hocus will encounter many magic potions on his way; some will restore health, others will grant special powers; such as as a super-jump that will allow access new areas, or laser shot which offers a better attack.

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Videos

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Credits (DOS version)

18 People (11 developers, 7 thanks)

Programming
Level Design
Graphics
  • Cygnus Multimedia Productions
Story
Music
Manual Design
Sound System
Cover Art
  • Depew Illustration
Financing & Resources
  • Apogee Software
Special Thanks to

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 69% (based on 6 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.5 out of 5 (based on 44 ratings with 8 reviews)

Another year, another WEAK platformer...

The Good
Not much at all. It's pretty long but at the same time that "length" works against it by making the game feel like it's dragging. If I can think of anything else, I'll get back to you on that.

The Bad
Of course, Apogge had to approve and release yet ANOTHER weak-sauce game. But this one actually has a reason as to why it's so crappy: Moonlite Software, who's (in)famous for the extremely lame Clyde's Adventure and Clyde's Revenge.

The gameplay is simply far too ridiculous. There's enemies here but they do nothing at all to you; they simply just walk around and hurt when you touch them. Gathering the crystals can often be an excuse for suicide, because some of them are stuck in unseen corners and are nigh impossible to find.

The graphics? Well, to be honest, I really didn't think the graphics are anything special at all. They have that typical European-style shading and coloring that attempts to make them look a little rendered but instead just makes everything look too shiny and unnatural. A bit of advice on this part: not EVERYTHING has to look rendered, people!

As for sounds and music, both departments are weak. The music is flat, dull, unmoving, and is hardly what I call "game" music...more like "LAME" music if you ask me. The sounds are also nothing really to shout about; they're too quiet and often times just really stupid sounding.

As for a final mention: this game is just way, way too easy in some places and hair-yanking insane in others.

The Bottom Line
Unbalanced difficulty + uninspired gameplay + crap visuals and sounds = a big old 10 on the "lame-ass game" scale. Ehh, I'm in a good mood today...I'll make that an 8 instead.

DOS · by Satoshi Kunsai (2020) · 2002

It is a spiritual question

The Good
It's not a question of graphics - neither resolution nor bits of color. Yes, my GeForce 4 can make things come alive... on the screen, not for my perception. There're two essential sides of my spiritual ingredient: active and passive. Active stands for eternity and power and passive for... fable and dreaming. That's the case. It's more than enough to say this is a wonderful ASCII tale.

The Bad
If it was 10 times longer, it wouldn't be enough.

The Bottom Line
For anyone it will be the same that he is.

DOS · by Gennady Panfilov (4) · 2003

Basic Mario type platform game.

The Good
Personally I like the music. It's a standard platform game otherwise.

The Bad
The enemies are repetitive. Same moves over and over.

The Bottom Line
Good platform game. Excellent parallax scrolling. Cute character.

DOS · by gametrader (208) · 2000

[ View all 8 player reviews ]

Discussion

Subject By Date
Both related sites links are dead J D (3) Jul 3, 2021

Trivia

References

Right through the game there are references to J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. The Tree-People who attack you in the second level are obviously parodies of the Ents, and the wizard to whom Hocus is an apprentice, Terexin, is a Gandalf spoof.

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Related Sites +

  • Hocus Pocus
    The official homepage - obsolete site, last archived in 2003.
  • Hocus Pocus Web
    Hocus Pocus fansite in Portuguese and English - obsolete site, last archived in 2009

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 515
  • [ Please login / register to view all identifiers ]

Contribute

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by IJan.

Linux, Macintosh, Windows added by Sciere.

Additional contributors: Xantheous, Frenkel, Maw, Patrick Bregger.

Game added December 3, 1999. Last modified January 25, 2024.