ABDUCTION

World leaders gathered together to discuss ways in which to prevent Earth from being destroyed by the effects of heavy pollution. An organisation was formed [EGB-5] which launched a Research and Development station into space. The complex was equipped with the best technology and personnel available: it's purpose to research into methods of restoring Earth to a more stable state.

The complex hides a sinister secret in that EGB-5 has struck up a deal with aliens: the aliens provide their advanced knowledge and in return EGB-5 help them obtain samples from Earth: plants, animals, humans; covering up for them when necessary.

The deal was an amicable one until EGB-5 discovered the aliens had a secret project: the construction of a cyborg which will be cloned, sent to Earth and used to wipe out the current occupants enabling the aliens to settle there. EGB-5 agree the alien base must be destroyed but face a problem in that they don't know how to access it. They decide the only solution is to set up a suitable person as an abductee in the hope that when they discover what is going on they will do something about it. They choose Travis Connor: Head of Research and Development at Sin-Tech, Earth.

~ from the back of the box

With the Amiga 500 Mini still on the minds of many retro gamers, it's hard for someone outside of Europe to understand the true scope of the micro-computer's massive back catalogue. Throughout its many iterations, the brand lasted just over a decade and in that time thousands of games, applications and programs were produced. With a good number being exclusive to the system, it's easy to see how games without the marketing spend to grace the cover of Amiga Format could be lost in the shuffle. If you delve deep, you can find some true gems and the point-and-click sci-fi adventure Abduction is one of them.

Developed by Psyche, a tiny English development team based in the countryside of Cumbria, Abduction is a low budget affair to be sure, but they still manage to pack a lot of atmosphere on the three floppy disks it came on. Not much is known about them outside of the information found in the on-disk text manual. A man named Paul Nordovics handled the programming, having previously worked on some Public Domain applications including a quiz creator named Q-Whiz! which came bundled with Psyche's only other actual game (as far as I can tell); a sci-fi quiz game named Above Top Secret. The other members of the team seemed to be a little more prolific. Graphic artist Martin Jones had a hand in the visuals of many football games, including earlier entires in the Kick Off and Player Manager series, while musician and sound designer Mike Richmond has recently returned to scoring brand new Amiga games with Black Dawn Rebirth and Shadows of Sergoth from just a couple of years ago.

Developed for the Amiga 1200 and released in 1998, long after that model had ceased production, Abduction was still an ambitious title for such a small team. It was developed using an in-house adventure creation tool that was way behind the times in terms of mechanics and visuals, but they managed to get a palpable sense of atmosphere in their dark sci-fi story.

You will find the game's credits as randomly positioned items throughout the adventure.
Click on them to get a little info on those who made the game.

You play as Fox Mulder look-a-like Connor who wakes up on an alien space ship. He's been abducted but his wiles (and your walkthrough) are enough for him to escape his prison cell and explore the vessel. It isn't long before he uncovers a nefarious plot that could lead to the destruction of our very planet so, along with some alien defectors and human scientists, he takes action save our Earth. Through inventory puzzles, naturally.

Visually, it looks a little confusing in screenshots. It takes on a top-down perspective in a similar way to DreamWeb except here they look more like circuit boards than floor plans. In action, with character movement flickering lights and minor animations, it's far more understandable. The exposed wires and pipes add to the otherworldly feel even before you get to the science labs, cloning facilities or cryogenic chambers.

The puzzle design is all inventory based, with most being well signposted enough to make for an easy play through. Clues are hinted at in the item descriptions or text conversations which are very well written for the most part. Dialogue and written information are short enough to not lose the reader, yet still meet all the story and game requirements. Even more impressive is that it doesn't once feel like an info dump. Everything is written with enough thought to the character and plot that you want to read everything that comes up just to see where it goes. It does falter dramatically in the final moments, perhaps due to budget and time constraints, but that jarring end is a minor hiccup in an otherwise engrossing journey.

Click on the eye on the top right of the screen (left)
to access all the interactable items from a grid (right).

Using their own adventure game engine, Psyche implemented a few robust yet unintuitive quirks to the gameplay. Inventory management is a little weird to any other contemporary adventure. For starters, Connor will not walk to just any random point on the screen, but only towards interactable hotspots. While fairly well animated for what it is, his walking speed is stuck on ultra-slow. Thankfully, a right-click will warp him to his destination immediately which is a welcome addition, even if it does seem like an easy fix.

You can hold 10 items at any one time, so if you are full you'll have to drop or store them to carry more. Anywhere where Connor comes to a halt at an interactable hotspot like a door, coffee cup or terminal, a single item can be dropped. In the early moments, I began using the tried and true kleptomaniac approach by picking up everything quickly filling up all of my carrying space. Not only did this mean I had to find enough spots to drop items, but the number of hotspots had been reduced because I had already removed them by picking them up. Later on, you can stash items in a storage locker or the coat of a dead technician, but by then I was clued up to my item management needs.

Manipulating items and the game world as a whole is all done in the inventory screen. Click on any hotspot (or just click on the icon that will appear when you move the cursor on the top right of the screen) and it will take you there. A list of familiar verbs are visible on the top right, with a graphical representation of your inventory, what you're looking and a description of it at taking up the rest of the screen. Any verb you can do will have its button highlighted and from here it's a matter of creating your desired sentence within this space. Want to use a key card on a door lock? First go to the inventory screen by clicking on the lock in the game world. Then, highlight the key card in your inventory before selecting "Use", then click on the image of the door lock to continue. You will then get a nice animation of Connor using that key card, though this is unfortunately the only cinematic shot you'll see in the game.

Using items is a little unintuitive, but still somewhat logical. When looking at an environmental object,
select the inventory item and select "Use" before clicking on the smaller image to complete the action.

It is the overhead game world and the item screen that you'll be seeing the most, though there are others. I briefly mentioned the inventory icon that appears in the top right, but beneath that is a disk icon where you can save, load and quit as well as an eyeball. This will take you to a grid displaying every hotspot in your current location. It seems like a fix for frustrated pixel hunters, but it is a worthwhile addition particularly later on in the game. The cluttered visuals do make it hard to see what's what some of the time, and with some items being only a few pixels in size it becomes a godsend. It does have the unfortunate consequence of making Abduction an easier and shorter play through than it might otherwise have been.

There are many design choices I can criticise in a game like Abduction, but not one of them managed to sully my overall thoughts. The passion of the development team is all here to see in spades. Even when it was decided to remove the musical score to the game, with all audio being foreboding ambience and whirring machinery, they still included them on the disk with a nice note from Paul praising Mike's hard work. Go into Abduction knowing it's an ultra-low budget interactive take on The X-Files and you'll find it to be one of the Amiga's most obscure hidden gems. Recommended.
 

To download the game, follow the link below. This custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses FS-UAE to emulate the Amiga on modern version. Text Manual included. Read the ChamberNotes.txt for more detailed information. Tested on Windows 10.

File Size: 27.8 Mb.  Install Size: 60.6 Mb.  Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

Download


Abduction is © Psyche
Review, Cover Design and Installer created by me

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