The HALLS OF THE THINGS...

The 'Halls of the Things' (or HOTT) is one of those games which looks naff, sounds pathetic and is almost impossible to play - particularly if you are only endowed with one head, two arms and ten fingers. And there is the magic! You see, these obstacles can be overcome if you INCREASE the normal number of appendages. Then, the game becomes one of the most enjoyable things you can do with a quantity of silicon, some rubber, metal and electricity. OK, so maybe not (you poor twisted person, you).

All you do is get two of your (very) good friends, and assign some of the functions to each of you. Then, perform finger origami in order to all get round the keyboard and off you go! For example, one of us would steer, pick things up and fire lighting bolts, one would fire arrows and open doors, and the other would throw fireballs, use the sword and restore health. The result was not dissimilar to the three headed monster in Monty Python's 'Holy Grail'. Frenzied shouts of "Sword him! sword 'im!" mixed with "Run away!!" and "Open the door NOW, F**kwit!" ensued as we crowded around the Sinclair Hand-warmer, our fingers in painful looking positions as we strove to control the character.

Trying to remember which button opens doors near the start of a level....

An added element is that the speccy keyboard would only allow a couple of key presses at a time, and most of the weapons (except the arrows) only work on the direction you are facing, so if the person steering decided to run away from a room full of monsters just as the fireball gunner fancied his chances with a volley whilst the other person tried to open a door, tragedy was the normal outcome. Heated arguments over the participants parentage could ensue as the usual result was the hero performing a little shaky looking dance as the poor speccy tried to cope with all the input. This was real multiplayer!

Sword Him!! (sword you..)

The sword (see above) was just a line that wobbled up and down, pivoting around the bit closest to the hero, and looked more than a tad obscene.... much to our general amusement. Another plus point, as far as we were concerned. If I have whetted your appetite, or maybe re-kindled old memories, use the link below to get Halls. The file is in Snapshot (.sna) format.

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  Page last updated August 08, 1999.

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