DIAMOND ICE

Martin Milner takes a look at STOSSER Software's latest game...

'Diamond Ice' (a follow-up to 'Heartland') is a 'platform puzzler' type game which runs in ST low screen resolution. It's available from PD libraries or the STOSSER web site (maintained by Tony Greenwood) and is joystick controlled and hard disk installable. Falcon owners will need Backwards. (See boxout.)

Sound is enhanced when running on an STE or Falcon and more so when run on a machine with more than 1Mb of memory. With the game come instructions on how to install and play it and also a form to provide feedback for the authors. (It is Commentware, see boxout).

Unlike 'Heartland', which was a fast and easy to play platformer, 'Diamond Ice' has objects to find, pick up and use and various characters who can be interacted with. The plot is as follows:-

Sissy and Sassy have just found the 13 hearts cards hidden around 'Heartland', but while they were having that adventure someone sneakily stole the set of diamonds and encased them in a block of 'diamond-ice'. The object of this game then, is to find the cards (quite simple) and then find some way of melting the block of ice and retrieving the cards. (Quite tricky, actually.)

Examples of characters in the game are Eskimos, grumpy or helpful old men, even talking Penguins and Snowmen! The characters are interacted with by pulling back on the joystick while standing next to them and some may give you advice, while others just make sarcastic or cryptic comments.

Mobile phones can be used to display a menu allowing you to see how many ice cubes you've collected, toggle the music on or off (on an STe or Falcon), or you can reset the game. (Equivalent to dying and starting afresh.)

At various places there are bottles of red liquid which you can drink to replenish your health, (you will need to do this if you keep walking over jets of water), and objects such as carrots and candles which you can pick up and use. Overall, there's a lot of things you can do in the game and you will need to experiment quite a bit to make progress.

The joystick control is smooth and responsive as you would expect, the fire button being used to make the character jump. Pulling back on the joystick is also used for picking up or dropping objects and also to move cable cars which can be used to cross certain voids. It can be important to return some of these to their original positions, otherwise you can get stuck and be unable to continue.

After several attempts, I managed to work out how to get onto the second play area of the game and reached some snow covered steps up to a platform with jets of water. Going in one direction allowed me to reach an area with three sets of ladder-like steps side by side where the only way on was up. At the top was a cable car which I couldn't get to move at all and to the right the first of two ascending staircases. 

The first staircase is very long with virtually no platforms between it and the floor a long way below. This means that the slightest misjudgement in jumping from one step to another (and there are a *lot* of steps) causes you to fall all the way down and you have to start over again. This was extremely frustrating, although I did manage it eventually.

When you do finally get to the top (and maybe meet Phil and Grant), the next staircase leads off immediately and although shorter, has steps of different sizes and is even more difficult. Again there are very few platforms to stop any fall and again you have to restart at the bottom. 

On the two occasions I made it all the way to the top I walked straight onto a slope that saw me back at the bottom of all three sets of steps. (Aaargh!) On subsequent attempts I avoided this area and this proved to be much more fruitful.

The more I played, the more I appreciated just how big the play area is. You could spend hours just wandering around looking for the objects you need to complete the game or finding characters to ask for advice. In fact one of the trickiest things is finding your way back to places. (Now where was that helpful Eskimo?)

One thing that is a great help in completing this game is the map viewing feature. This allows you to use the cursor keys to scroll the map around and although you only have a short time period before the map jumps back to where your character is, it is invaluable.

A final feature are rooms which look impossible to get into, but which contain objects that might be needed to complete the game.

Conclusions

With judicious use of the map viewing feature, I did manage to complete the game. I'll probably have another go soon, as it's that sort of game. The graphics and animations are good, as is the dry sense of humour which pervades the game and a lot of thought is needed to solve the various puzzles.

One small gripe, is the fact that on the Falcon you can barely hear the normal sound effects while the music is playing and an option to switch the music off without using a mobile phone would have been nice. That aside, Diamond Ice is highly recommended.

** Boxout **

Falcon compatiblity

One problem became apparent when testing the game on my (TOS 4.02) Falcon. Running the game off hard disk, I found the 'Game Over' screen and the mobile phone 'reset game' option wouldn't work and locked the machine up. The problem was resolved by configuring Backwards to ignore the internal hard drive and running the game off floppy disk.

** Boxout **

Commentware

This means that the software is free, but that the Author's would appreciate feedback on what you thought of the game, to encourage them to continue developing for the Atari in the future.

** Product boxout **
Product name: Diamond Ice
Publisher: STOSSER Software
Contact: Any PD library or the STOSSER web site (http://www.airtime.co.uk/users/stosser/).
RRP: free
Requires: Any Atari with 1Mb or more of memory

Pros: It's free!
      There's lots to do
      Nice graphics and animation
      Game save and load options provided

Cons: Sound effects a bit faint when music playing on the Falcon
      Only 1 background tune. (Jingle Bells!)
      Urm, Can't think of any more, really!

Score: 85%

** Screen shots and captions **

shots\1.pi1      -  This is a talking Penguin and above him a spinning
                    ice cube
shots\2.pi1      -  Up there is a snowman I wanted to talk to. Pity I'm
                    rolling uncontrollably down this slope!
shots\intro.pi1  -  The title screen showing the main character