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                  "NETHACK v3.4.o" - new version of the hack'n'slay
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system .... all TOS machines with 2MB or more, 16 colours (RGB, VGA), harddisk

style ..... hack'n'slay

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Yooo, it's quite a while ago that I have  played this game  as it appeared first
for the Falcon and I got a copy of it. So I think there was also a review in one
of the  old issues of UCM, maybe  by my old mate  Lot, but I don't remember yet,
since this is the first new version  of that game  that was released  within the
last 9 years and so I thought it would be good to take a look on it, again...

But at first, what is NETHACK? It's quite simple, an overhead  hack'n'slay game.
The original HACK is one  of the oldest role  playing games in gaming history at
all. It exists on many  machines, so also on  the ST/Falcon/TT and  this version
called NETHACK is the first that offers more than just ASCII grafix. Furthermore
you have an intelligent menu and  window system and you  can play the  game with
mouse or alternative only via keyboard (as it was in the classical HACK).

So I wont spent too much words here, but take a closer look onto it.

After  starting the game (it is better to use a high resolution with 16 colours,
and things like Screenblaster or BlowUp will better up the situation a lot more)
you get a welcome screen and you have to type in your name. At next, and this is
new  in  comparison with  the '93 version  of NETHACK, the  game offers  you the
possibility to create a character by your own OR to create a random hero for you
that is  surely the less attractive  one for classical  players but  maybe a new
challenge for hardcore players.

Here some short hint for ST users, as said, the game runs also in ST Low, but be
sure that it doesn't looks good there, since it runs under GEM 3 windows are put
onto the screen... The main  window, showing  the playfield  can be scrolled up/
down  and left/right, but on  the state and info  windows you have work in parts
with very small fonts and I doubt that it is a fine thing under RGB. Furthermore
the menu's are smashed close together and sometimes  the screen looks a bit like
screwed up, so don't take this review too serious for your machines since I have
tested  it on  Falcon/VGA/16*8oo*6oo... not to  forget that you  urgently need a
harddrive and a HD floppy as well, a HD floppy since the packed file is over 1MB
in size and the harddrive since even if you matched it  with exe packers to make
the files matching onto your disk, the loading times will be awfully slow!
Sorry for you all, the only way to pass some of the problems could be to convert
the  grafix files (IMG) to 4 or 2 colours to let it run in higher resolutions on
your ST... or  you have to buy a grafix card (yurk...), as well as a accelerator
(aargh...)... Or, much better, don't try the game at all (sorry...).



In ST Low Res the game looks like this...

Therefore you can chose between 13 different classes, just as the usual knights,
rogues and monks as well  as also  some archeologists, quite crazy. As this game
features  only a "one-man-party" the  game starts right  after you have  defined
your character if it has to be male/female or orc/human/dwarf/elf/gnome, it just
depends on the  hero you select (such  as a caveman can be human/dwarf/gnome/orc
and a barbarian only human or orc).
At this point  another difference to the old  version pops up since you have now
one class more as well as some classes  changed, so the  elf isn't available now
but therefore the monk and the priest.

While chosing  your character you should keep in mind that all of them have some
special skills and  if you like it to run  around as killing machine, you should
take the  ORC since he has the  advantage against  the DWARF that he's resistant
against poison, but therefore he isn't  very clever and  mostly will  find traps
only if he already  stumbled into  one. Every hero  you chose has  furthermore a
special equipment, the TOURIST  uses his photo camera  to flash up  the monsters
while the BARBAR uses rough powers and metal weapons...

NETHACK is in the following fact quite different  to usual role players since it
always creates a new dungeon, many levels deep. You will never play the same one
again and so also rooms, dungeons, traps  and monsters always  differ a lot. But
here lays also a big problem since the quite limited  save option makes very big
problems for players that are willing to save their position, but later for that
more...

A thing that didn't changed from the former version is the grafix side, the game
uses the known little grafix, without much  animations and so on. It looks a bit
dull in high resolutions, but if you would see the  little monsters and items in
original size, you would be happy to see them not :) Btw. some of the grafix are
ripped from  the game "ROGUE" from EPYX  that was released  in the late eighties
for the ST, that is some kind of a grafical predecessor of NETHACK since it uses
also the window environment... but as mentioned above, it suffers under the very
limited grafical abilities of the ST.

But back  to the game  itself... After you have  chosen your  character you will
find yourself back in level one of a dungeon system  with 2o or more levels. You
can just see the things that you could see if you would stay there and while you
are moving around you can explore more and more parts  of the level and your aim
is to find  the way to the next  one and so on, finally to  find some  amulet or
something.

While  running  around  and exploring  the rooms and  dungeons it depends on the
character how fast you can  find out more, just you're stumbling into a trap, to
find a hidden door or to  find out that a big stone is blocking your way and you
are moving him. From time to time some monsters are  coming up, some are running
afterwards you and some don't take notice, but you should kill them anyway since
every kill brings experience points :)
A -short- list of monsters that may appear on your way through the dungeons will
follow at the end of this article.

Ofcourse the game features not only deep  dungeons and monsters, nope, also some
shops are around where you can buy and sell different items, there are some kind
of role playing game supermarkets, that dealing with everything  as well as some
specialised  shops for  potions or  weapons. Furthermore  there are  some  magic
fountains or places to pray to some  gods. About the fountains you just can find
out what kind of water they have while drinking something, sometimes you're just
a bit refreshed and sometimes you will get healing.

To pray is another way to gain some  power, if your godess is satisfied with the
things you did, you will maybe get some power back, if not, you will see :)

On the way through the dungeons  you will  stumble over several items like gems,
potions, weapons, armours and several other items. It is  always very usefull to
collect the food laying around since your character needs it to survive the game
too, if  you're going hungry  it's time  to eat, if you  ignore it, or you don't
have food on  the hand, your hero will go weak, loose hitpoints and finally will
die. If you collect eggs, eat  them fast since  they're very  perishable. And if
you need  hardly food, you  can try to  eat the corpse of the latest monster you
killed. Here you will get some bonus if you're an orc since the corpses are most
rotten and you wont suffer too much  then, just getting a bit confused or even a
bit unconcious, other guys that aren't poison resistable could die.

Another problem comes up with other things you will find and so the orc offers a
drawback too since he isn't very clever and can't read  the scrolls he finds and
so it is always  a bit unsave to drink  some potions since  as orc you will have
problems to find out what you're going to drink then...

But not  only the potions  can have negative  effects. So the  armours, weapons,
rings and amulets can have them too... Not every armour will protect you and not
every shoe will help you while running around. The problem is the following, the
most armours and  weapons that  are laying around in the dungeons are worthless,
the best  items you can get for a lot of money at the shops or by killing a good
monster. But here it can be that you will get a cursed weapon or armour and they
will make surely some problems to  you. So some of them are lowering your armour
points, there are rings around  that will make your body change into some animal
or monster within special times always  causing that  you're loosing all weapons
and items, others like floating  shoes will make  it impossible to get back onto
the floor  and so you  can't go downstairs  to the next  level, can't get things
that are laying on the ground and so on. This can be very demotivating since you
mainly only get informed if you're a specialised guy (like magician or so) or if
you are already wearing the cursed items and then you can't remove them anymore.

But LOT gave a hint  in his old review  of NETHACK I wont leave out here. A good
possibility to  find out what  you're wearing and  having in your  pockets is to
leave the game with saving it since so the  computer MUST  give you all the info
about the things you collected.

And as we're speaking about  hints, the save option is the dullest I ever saw in
a role playing game. So you always can only save the  game while leaving it, and
this only once. If you're dying the save game will be deleted automatically!
That sucks a  lot and  the only  way to avoid  this is to copy the savegame into
another folder to get it back if  needed. It isn't a comfortable  procedure, but
it works and saves the motivation to start the game again.

And as we're on the run for hints, here  are a few more. If you're in a shop and
you took something the shop owner offers, you can't leave the shop untill you've
paid the price. If you think now "Hey, I'm  a barbarian, let's  squeeze his head
out..." forget it, you can't kill shop owners, they will kill YOU, everytime!
I never matched it, even as level 1o fighter, to kill any shop owner...

Another thing to  mention, in  later levels  there are  areas where watchmen are
running around. Avoid it to slaughter monsters if they're in sight since they're
hunting you, calling  their colleagues  from the whole level and an escape isn't
easy then. It can also be  that there are some  rooms that are  occupied by some
guys that are calling for the watchmen too, if you're entering their room. So if
you're exploring a  level where you  can see some  watchmen running around, take
care about the things you're doing!

But ehh, I wont give  you too much hints  here since I wont make it too easy for
you to step  deeper into the world  of NETHACK and you should make your very own
experiences, maybe you're  going other  ways, dunno, but this game gives so many
different ways in solving it that hints aren't really universal.

Ok, It seems as I have lost the thread in this review and I think it's better to
cut it off here...

Final words... Apart from the problems to leave the  game run  on a simple ST it
               is a game  that should  make the  teeth of  hack'n'slay  gamblers
               dripping. Stunning grafix  and sound are  a foreign word here and
               apart from the fact  that there is  no sound at all, very sparse,
               even on ST niveau. But therefore  the game matches  it to attract
               by its nearly endless  play modes, hardcore slayers will find new
               dungeons every time  and hundreds of  monthers to kill, there are
               tons of items to collect and try out and many levels to explore.
               Because of the lack of  grafix the atmosphere  isn't the best and
               far away from 3D  role players, but  in some way  it still is big
               enough to bound you on your machine for hours and days. Biggest
               drawback  apart from  the low  gfx/snd use  is the  horrible save
               option but with our hints above it wont be that hard I hope...


___ratings______________________________________________________________________

visuals .....  2o % - ST low, extremely small sprites, oooould school
audio .......  oo % - errr. nothing?
controls ....  9o % - with mouse or keyboard, window systems
idea ........  4o % - a hack'n'slay
motivation ..  8o % - very deep dungeons to explore, dungeon generator

___overall_____46_%_____________________________________________________________

Sure, not much points here, but we're  writing the year of  2oo2 where you can't
win any flowers pot with such grafix and missing sound...

At last the announced monster list... far from being completed!

At next here  comes a list  of the many, many  monsters I met during my fight as
barbarian as I reached level 9 of the dungeons...

*   - means very easy to kill
**  - means no problem if you're a skilled fighter with, level 5 or higher
*** - don't try this, it even kills very skilled fighters!

Acid Blob          - *   ... Easy to kill, but damages you while dying!
Bat                - *
Blue Jelly         - *** ... Don't attack them, they will freeze you to death!
Bugbear            - **
Cave Spider        - **
Centipede          - *
Coyote             - *
Crocodile          - **
Dingo              - **
Dwarf              - **  ... Mostly peaceful if you don't attack them!
Dwarf Zombie       - **
Elf Zombie         - *** ... Can be killed, but take care!
Fire Ant           - **  ... very dangerous, kills also other monsters!
Floating Eye       - *** ... If you don't attack them, they stay peaceful!
Fog Cloud          - *   ... Not very dangerous, but difficult to destroy!
Fox                - *
Gargoyle           - *** ... Can be killed, but you have to be a good fighter!
Garter Snake       - *   ... Easy to kill, but they often appear in groups!
Gas Spore          - *   ... Easy to destroy, but beware of the gas cloud!
Gecko              - *
Ghoul              - **
Giant Ant          - **
Giant Bat          - **
Giant Beetle       - **
Giant Rat          - **
Gnome              - **  ... they're using distance weapons very often!
Gnome Lord         - **
Gnome Zombie       - *
Gnomish Wizard     - *** ... Curses you, you can kill him, but be careful!
Golden Naga Hatchling - **
Green Mold         - *
Grid Bug           - *
Guardian Naga Hatchling - **
Hobbit             - *   ... Beware if they're going angry! sometimes peaceful
Hobgoblin          - **  ... Using distance weapons very often!
Homunculus         - *** ... You can kill it, but be very careful!
Housecat           - *
Human Zombie       - **
Iguana             - **  ... Sometimes they run away in a longer fight!
Imp                - *** ... This small enemy makes bad jokes while killing you!
Jackal             - *
Jaguar             - *** ... Can be killed, but hard even for level 8/9 fighters
Kitten             - *
Kobold             - *
Kobold Lord        - **
Kobold Mummy       - **
Kobold Shaman      - **  ... Will try to curse you or to burn your brain!
Kobold Zombie      - **
Large Kobold       - **
Leather Golem      - **
Lichen             - *
Manes              - **
Mimic              - *** ... Beware! They kill even level 1o fighters!
Monkey             - *   ... Easy to kill, but they steel your stuff!
Newt               - *
Orc Mummie         - **
Owlbear            - *** ... Takes a hard fight!
Paper Golem        - *
Pony               - **
Quasit             - *** ... Can be killed but take care!
Quivering Blob     - *
Rabid Rat          - **
Raven              - *
Red Mold           - *
Rock Mole          - *** ... Hard to kill, eats stone and metal!
Rock Piercer       - **  ... Not very dangerous but hard to kill!
Rope Golem         - **
Rothe              - **  ... It goes hard if they appear in hordes!
Shrieker           - *
Soldier Ant        - **
Spotted Jelly      - **
Straw Golem        - **
Tengen             - **
Vampire Bat        - **
Violet Fungus      - **
Watchmen           - **  ... better don't attack them...
Watchmen Captain   - *** ... Be aware!
Werejackal         - **
Wererat            - **
White Unicorn      - *** ... Mainly peaceful, make a bow around them!
Wolf               - *** ... You can kill them, but be careful!
Woodland Elf       - **  ... Fights over distance! Double shooting speed!
Yellow Light       - *   ... Easy to kill but let you stay blind for a while!
Yellow Mold        - *

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