24 February 2015 Memory Cache: Little Big Adventure 2: Twinsen's Odyssey
GOOSE
Some of my greatest gaming discoveries were thanks to the once revered but now redundant demo disc found attached to video game magazines. And one of my all time favourites discoveries was 'Little Big Adventure 2: Twinsen's Odyssey.'
This was a 3D adventure game for the PC from French developers Adeline Software and the follow up to the original Little Big Adventure, also known as Relentless. In it you played as Twinsen, hero of the planet Twinsun (already a little confusing) - which has been invaded by some suspicious aliens that are kidnapping the planet's children and wizards. Along with uncovering this dastardly plot you must also heal your injured pet Dragon, train as a wizard yourself, speak with some of the local Rabbit, Elephant and Mosquito people,visit an off world casino, and defeat enemies with your magical ball... yeah, it was a bit weird.
But I think that's what drew me to it in the first place, there was a liberating amount of wackiness to LBA2 that I feel is missing in many of today's games. Almost like no idea was off limits; each location, character and storyline abounded with surreal storybook like qualities and strange art design that could have only come from a French developer.
One of the weirdest elements however was an obtuse control system that involved selecting from four distinctive behaviour types. Normal, Sporty, Aggressive and Discreet. And while it was great to have such a variety of movement and actions at your disposal, having to constantly swap between modes, often mid action, felt absurdly clunky and unnecessary even 18 years ago! The camera also required constant resetting which made platforming sections particularly frustrating due to strange perspectives and awkward angles.
Luckily the rest of game was just so darn charming that these issues were easily forgiven, characters had detailed animations that played out as if they had lives beyond your involvement, side quests and mini games rivalled the Zelda series for creativeness and fun, and the story was just so bizarrely dreamlike that it mesmerized me like no game I'd played before.
In fact I probably racked up more hours in the demo of this game than in the full version, and this was because the demo allowed you to fully explore the main island while randomly transporting you to future sections of the game via regular doorways. Which gave younger me the idea that if I explored thoroughly enough I could actually find the entire game within the demo somewhere!... what an idiot.
So you can then imagine my wonderment and delight when I finally saved up enough to buy the full version of the game, which included full CD quality voice acting, a way off the island AND doors that actually connected to their corresponding structures. Amazing.
