1/24/2024 0 Comments The incredible machine 3 solutionsTIM spawned no end of sequels and I can see why. Puzzle games like this seem to have a timelessness that isn’t matched in other genres. Other than those points, this is holding up really well for such an old game. It does at least tell me the last code used when I exit to DOS. I could seriously live without having to store and type these in to pick up my progress again next time I play the game. Another annoyance is that the game doles out text codes every time I complete a level. It’s crying out for a scroll bar with mouse wheel support. If a puzzle requires more than 5 components you have to flick through each group of 5 on the right of the screen using the arrow buttons. The interface could use a little refinement. The 16 colours doesn’t allow for detailed graphics but the cartoony 2D look suits TIM well enough. This was a good call as the game simply wouldn’t have worked at 320×200. The graphics in the game are in a hi-res (for 1993) 16 color VGA mode. The sound is minimal but adequate with some effects for firing a gun/cannon and the like. It reminds me of the fantastic Willy Beamish soundtrack which isn’t entirely surprising as the same composer worked on both games. The music is upbeat and quirky and sounds equally at home on General MIDI or MT-32. There is the notion of scoring points for being quick but I doubt many players pay too much attention to the score. The machine can be reset any number of times, tweaked slightly and started again. Despite this there is no one solution here as the balls starting bouncing against each other and it’s just a case of trial and error. The moment the machine is started all the balls start to drop and gun placement has to be precise so that the bullet hits the right ball and pushes it over to the container. in one puzzle, I had to use 3 guns to shoot 3 baseballs into a container. The puzzles can be quite fiddly requiring very precise placement but I quite like this aspect of it.Į.g. The notion of having to move a cat around the screen by enticing it with goldfish or mice is amusing (if not all that realistic) and not my usual idea of a machine. I do like how untechnical some of these are. The game offers a huge number of machine parts which are gradually introduced before things get too complex. In this case the basketball falls on the mice, which starts them running and they power the conveyors under the bowling balls moving them into the baskets. Nothing moves until the machine is started at which point gravity will affect any unsupported objects kicking things into life. The one on the left is preassembled and I just have to mirror it on the right. In reality, it’s a puzzle game where you have to place some of the 45 or so components available on screen in such a way as to make something or other happen when the machine is started.įor example here is one of the earliest levels where the two bowling balls have to be moved into the containers nearby. The manual portrays the game as a genius simulator where us mere mortals can get the experience of being a maverick scientist. Sierra put out AGI games that used more disk space than this. More unusual for one of their games is that it only contains the one disk and the game doesn’t even fill that one disk up. The box is the usual Sierra fare from this period full of adverts for the likes of the Sierra Network. It was still largely the effort of one coder being developed on a shoestring budget. I prefer to read up on it after I’ve played it but I do know it was originally going to be a C64 game many years earlier but got held back for other projects. All that effort has left me too knackered to explore the delights of Lancashire quite yet so other than the odd Xmas excursion I’m going to do as little as possible this week and play an old game or two.įirst up is The Incredible Machine published by Sierra/Dynamix in 1993. After nearly 2 months of doing little but pack and unpack, I’m moved at last and actually have spare time on my hands.
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