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I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream (1995) (VG)

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11 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
Dark, creepy, and great for fans of Harlan Ellison, 22 September 2002

Author: Alicia Belliveau (morgaine@belliveau.net) from Nova Scotia, Canada

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream is based off one of Harlan Ellison's short stories of the same name. A supercomputer gains the power of conscious thought, and kills everyone on the Earth except for 5 humans, which he takes down to the middle of the Earth. Your goal is to jump through the hoops that AM lays out for you and retain your humanity at the same time. A typical point and click game here. use commands such as Walk, Ask, Get, Use, Swallow on objects in your inventory or on the screen. The system is very intuitive, so you won't spend hours struggling on what to do with an object. The only reason this category didn't get a 10, is because there are several times you have to find an object that may only take up a few pixels on the screen, leading to some annoying hunting with your mouse. When you have to talk with people, you get several conversation choice, most of which will affect the plot. Say the wrong thing, and you might fail your task. You also can't just kill people to get your way, as in games nowadays. You have a spiritual barometer that measures how human you are. Treat a person with kindness and it'll go up, and your character will become happier and more-self confident. Do something against their moral beliefs and they'll go into panic attacks and possibly die. Ah, now this is where IHNM really shines. You get to play as each of the 5 humans AM has brought down with him. You must make it through a scenario for each character. You'll have to confront your past mistakes and your one character flaw that caused it. Locales will range from Egyptian electronic pyramids to Nazi Germany to a honky-tonk road side cafe. As you make it through scenarios you'll encounter forgotten machines that let you in on AM's past. And there are plot-twists galore, especially in the final scenario. The best thing about this game in my opinion. The music is ranges from creepy and bonechilling, to sorrowful and depressing. It all fits together with the story. You'll find tunes stuck in your head up to days afterwards. And the voice-acting. Harlan Ellison himself voices AM, the computer God. From the moment you hear him expound on his hate for the humans, you couldn't imagine anyone but him in this role. He speaks with passion and exuberance, making just sitting back and listening a joy. And the rest of the characters are done wonderfully too. With the exception of the child actor, none of these voices will make you cringe in embarrassment or turn down the volume. This game is a definite must-have for fans of the adventure genre, Harlan Ellison, or horror fans.

1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Good plot, tedious game, 28 March 2005
Author: paul51 from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I'm not extremely knowledgeable about Harlan Ellison, just about all I've seen or read about him is a scathing TV Guide article he wrote about his ill-fated run in with the Star Trek crew concerning the episode he penned (and was heavily edited) and spotting some editorial feature he did on...Sci Fi channel, I think. While the guy is brilliant (and I think he'd be the first one to tell you that) I'm not sure I'm a big fan.

The world he creates in the game and the short story it's based on are excellent. His characters seem awfully Steven King-ish (or maybe Stephen King's usual characters are awfully Harlan Ellison-ish). That is, they're the protagonists but there's a lot about them that is unsavory or at the very least makes people not want to entirely identify with them. The characters in the game are at least somewhat less...estranging...than they are in the short story.

The game itself has the potential to end much more happily than the short story, though like a lot of quest games, it's so tedious getting through that about 4 hours into it you're probably doing a web search for a walk-through.

As far as the acting goes, Harlan Ellison does a great job reading for the role of AM. When I say reading, I mean just that. He sounds like your favorite librarian reading a story to you and adding life to the characters, only in this case his reading is limited to just the one part. It's not bad, it's just not what you'd call acting. That may be the intent. After all, the guy is a writer, not an actor. Considering the other voice actors do their parts in much the same manner---95% of the speaking is what you'd call "inner monologue"---that may be why they sound more like they're reading than acting.

Anyway, good game for its type. Unfortunately this game, like many others, is an example of why quest games have died: no real re-playability.

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