235: Archipelagos

Number 235
(4.6 points)
Archipelagos
1991: 55

The Amiga Power lists certainly included a wide variety of genres, and this may be described as a puzzle game, as far as it can be categorised at all.

Regardless of whatever the plot of this game may be, the premise is quite simple: you are on a tiny island, and must break all the large rocks and then touch a tall obelisk, while avoiding ground that is being infected by poisonous trees. There isn't much more to it than that, but with thousands of procedurally-generated levels to play through (plus some handmade ones), it's strangely absorbing. The game uses a basic 3D perspective, and you can select floor tiles to either travel to or 'heal' (after being contaminated).

A word of warning for anyone trying a cracked disk version such as the one suggested below. Every fifth archipelago in the first hundred is bitmapped - that is, the game designers made it specifically, rather than it being procedurally generated. The problem here is that none of the cracked versions have it as the original game does: the fifth level in the one I've suggested just has a few specks of land and thus drops you in the sea, while another has been redesigned with the hacking group's name. So, unless you don't mind skipping each fifth level, you'd be better off playing either the SPS version (using the copy protection on page 28 of Amiga Format issue 24) or the WHDLoad version (which removes said copy protection). Oh, and the game's pretty good, so you should try it.

Recommended TOSEC disk(s):
Archipelagos (1989)(Logotron)[cr Band][t +3 Band]
Archipelagos (1989)(Logotron)[cr Threat]