Operation Stealth


Title		Operation Stealth (Second Review)
Game Type       Adventure
Company         Delphine
Players         1
Compatibillity  A500, A1200 (needs kickstart 1.3 emulator)
Submission      Emanuele Rodolà

Review
Following the success of Future Wars, Delphine Software increased its
efforts in the adventure genre by further tuning the Cinematique system
for better playability.

In Operation Stealth, you play the part of a CIA secret agent sent
abroad with the difficult task of recovering a Stealth bomber, stolen by
some South American republic with the intention of conquering the world
(they want to use the stealth to nuke the main capitals of the world
without being detected). The game begins with your alter-ego John Glames
arriving at the airport of Santa Paragua. At first glance, the game
looks like a classic style adventure, in fact you can examine, take, use
objects, you can speak to people and you can also "operate" things (for
example, to open a trashcan you should "operate" it). Soon you are
presented with a somewhat clumsy interface: the left mouse button makes
John walk, but the path-finding schemes require precise pointing or John
will get stuck against walls and poles. The right mouse button brings up
a little window from where you can choose what to do (through the
aforementioned actions) and you can also consult your inventory. Now for
the difficult part: if you want, for example, to operate something in
the scene, just left-click the verb "operate"; if you want to operate
something in your inventory, such as your briefcase, right-click on the
verb and there you go. Even more difficult, if you want to use something
in your inventory with something else in your inventory, you should
first right-click for the actions-window to pop up, then left-click on
"use", which brings up the inventory window, then right-click on the
first item, another inventory window pops up, and finally left-click on
the second item. Phew.

On the visual side of things, the characters are neat and the scenery
looks detailed and colourful. Sound effects are sparse but splendid, the
music is nice (by Jean Baudlot of Ocean's Beach Volley fame) and the
story starts up well with bits of humour here and there. No doubt the
first impression of the game is more than positive and very promising
for an instant classic.

However, problems start to emerge unexpectedly. After the first hour or
so of puzzles, Operation Stealth becomes an "arcade adventure" with a
fair amount of elements of both game styles. What's bad is that most of
the arcade parts are so frustrating that you don't feel rewarded when
you finally manage to surmount them, no raptures of joy whatsoever.
there is only the fervent hope that you won't ever have to pass through
them again. And that's where things go wrong: there'll be more and more.
You have no less than nine mazes to go through, chased by thugs and
rats, and then there'll be plenty of (very) rapid point-and-clicking
requirements throughout the game, all of this till the very end. A
not-so-responsive interface adds tantrums to the frustration. What's
left are the beloved puzzles; as stated earlier, the game starts well
with them, good logic, no problems, take this and use it with that, then
go there and talk with her about something. Everyone's happy before the
first "Game Over", then you re-load a previously saved game, re-try and
pass the troublesome part, and happily proceed with the game till you're
stuck because you didn't do something hours and scenes ago (and you
didn't even suspect it was necessary).

It is clear that in such a situation, the game requires a large amount
of trial-and-error and a huge savegames list. It's true that you can
save your game position at any point, but even so, it is very
frustrating to go very far in the game only to discover that you're
stuck because you did not take a particular object almost at the
beginning. After realizing this, the more you go on, the more your fear
(together with the likelihood) of getting stuck grows, and a walkthrough
is very helpful so that you can check if everything is going well. I
thought that an adventure like Darkseed was frustrating, yet I still
restarted the game over and over to beat it and send the aliens home. And
I loved it. Little I knew about true frustration then! Also, the story
itself starts just fine but does not develop very well: characters are
presented suddenly, their motivations together with their
inter-relationships are not very clear and events happen abruptly.

If you're curious about Operation Stealth, I suggest you play it only if
you want to experience one of the three classics made by Delphine with
the Cinematique system, and want a real challenge for your nerves. Play
it through as far as you can, and don't feel stupid if you don't know
what to do next, just stop, grab a walkthrough, and check whether you
have started down some path of no return. Keep in mind though, that even
with the solution, the arcade parts might require all of your patience
and willpower.




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