The Immortal

"You WILL die. Badly. Guaranteed."

Ah, there's nothing quite like a good, old-fashioned, dungeon crawling RPG-style game. You know the type. ''You see a treasure chest in front of you.'' ''Cool! I open it!'' ''Oops! It was booby-trapped. You die.'' ''Damn. Where are the Cheetos?!?''

I suspect that's what Will Harvey and Co. had in mind when designing The Immortal, a game where you play a wizard crawling through a dungeon, fighting goblins, trolls, pink pterodactyls, and other nasties in order to find your teacher, Mordamir, and to destroy a pesky, city-destroying dragon. This is a game where, if your character makes one false move, he will die... and badly. Step on a loose piece of tile? You die. Play with the green slime? You die. Climb down a ladder the wrong way? Uh-huh, you die. This game is NOT for the impatient, but those who can get through it will literally jump for joy and crave more when they finally manage to get through a level. It took me the better part of a year to finish this game, as I found myself banging my head against a wall trying to get through some of the trickier levels and had to take very long breaks before starting again.

Graphics (9/10): For Old School Nintendo, the graphics are fantastic. Sure, they're a little dark, but, hey, it's a dungeon, what do you expect? And, remember how I said how you will die BADLY? Part of the fun is watching your character biting the dust for the first time. The amount of detail put into the sandworms that eat you, the slime that strips the flesh from your bones, and the enemies you have to fight are extremely impressive for an 8-bit game. The only reason I didn't give this a 10 is because occasionally you'll come across something in the various dungeon rooms and not really know what it is. A crack in the wall that lets in light kinda looks like some sort of weird white cobweb or some funky glowing melee weapon.

Plot (10/10): As mentioned earlier, you're a wizard trying to find your teacher Mordamir, who was in this dungeon on a quest to destroy an ornery dragon. Sounds simple, doesn't it? It isn't. First of all, you're not the only one who's wandered down here looking for Mordamir. Some dude named Dunric wandered down here and hasn't been seen since. Plus, there's a helpful servant who shows up now and again to give you a hand. Second of all... well, let's just say things aren't quite what they seem, and leave it at that, m'kay? And, guess what? NO FRIGGIN' PRINCESS to rescue... well, maybe one, but, hey, what's an RPG-style game without a damosel in distress, eh?

Music/Sound (10/10): For NES, the music's pretty damn good. You hear a different background theme for every room you enter, and the music is always appropriate for the scene. Creepy scene, creepy music. Fairly benign scene, fairly benign music. You get the drill. As for sound effects, they're pretty good, too, from the synthesizer growls you hear every time you accidentally step too close to a cannon and blow up, to the ''ugh!'' you hear every time you kill an enemy during a fight scene.

Challenge/ Frustration Factor (10/10): There are parts of this game that will have you banging your head against a concrete wall until blood gushes from your scalp. Sometimes, it has more to do with solving a riddle or performing an activity in just the right way at the right time. Sometimes, however, this will have to do with how well you can maneuver, and you can't always maneuver very well. For example, one level requires that you travel via flying carpet. The problem is, the flying carpet will fly across the room and ricochet off a few walls at the most gentle touch of the keypad. This is a problem if the walls are loaded with cannons that will KILL YOU INSTANTANEOUSLY if you get too close. On levels like these, you WILL lose lives and, if you lose three of them, you will have to begin the entire level all over again. Like I said, this game is not for the impatient.

Plus, there's one enormous annoyance that has been known to drive me to throwing my controller across a room several times: bats. These obnoxious bastards will attack you at any time, anywhere, and will drain your lifeforce until you lose one of your precious lives. The only way to fight back is to throw fireballs at them... except it doesn't always work, and there will be scenes where you really don't want to cast a lot of fireballs for fear you might kill something important while trying to kill the bat. Rrrrr...

Overall (8/10): Frustrating game. Hideously frustrating game. However, it's a well-designed game and, more importantly, it's a game that will keep you entertained... at least until your patience runs out, whereupon you may end up breaking the cartridge.

Buy or Rent: Either, but, whatever you do, be sure to get the handbook that goes with it. The handbook comes with ''The Codex of the Serpent,'' Mordamir's notes and hints on how to get through the various levels. I couldn't finish the game without it.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/02/02, Updated 03/02/02