The Collection Chamber: WEEN: THE PROPHECY

YOU HAVE ONLY 3 DAYS...

Can you unravel the mysteries of this master-level adventure game before the Revuss of Time runs out and it's too late?

The Kingdom of the Blue Rocks is in peril. The Great Eclipse will come in three days and the evil wizard Kraal has plans to take over. The prophecy proclaims that Ween can save the kingdom if he can find the missing pieces to put back the Revuss of Time.

The Prophecy pulls you into a magical, sometimes frightening, adventure where you'll encounter extremely challenging puzzles, fast-paced threats to your life, and a cast of creatures, friends, and fearsome foes.

Smooth, fluid animation, digitized actors, astounding fantasy backgrounds, and full-motion video make this the most visually stunning adventure available!

~ from the back of the box

Parisian games developer Coktel Vision has made some absolute classics, namely the Gobliiins series and the Dadaist fever dream that is Woodruff and the Schnibble of Azimuth. Most of their well-known titles were published by Sierra On-Line after being acquired in 1992 which, coincidentally, was the year that one of their best games saw store shelves. That game, a sort-of sequel to their forgotten 1989 release Legend of Djel, is Ween: The Prophecy. Or, just The Prophecy for some territories.

It's high-fantasy at the highest order that bears more than a few hallmarks of Scandinavian folklore. You are the grandson of the Royal Wizard of the Kingdom of Blue Rock. The land is under threat as an evil sorcerer named Kraal has stolen the magical hourglass known as the Revuss and kidnapped the princess with the aim of forcing her into marriage, Bowser style. But there is a prophecy; "On the day of the Great Eclipse, three grains of sand will be placed in the REVUSS by the valiant hearted... and Kraal's doom will thus be sealed". I guess you are that valiant hearted one.

Blow your flute to call upon Urm the ever-hungry vampire bat (left).
Feed him food and he'll help you out, but can be a bit chaotic about it (right).

You're not alone in your quest. Your grandfather's faithful friend Petroy, a tamed vampire bat name Urm, and Uki and Ormi, the dancing gnomes who will not just carry your items, but entertain you with the occasional jig. Each of them brings along an interesting game mechanic that will help you solve puzzles. Petroy can be called upon for help whenever magic is involved. He's also a dab hand at translating old texts. Once you've fashioned a flute, you can call upon the ever-hungry Urm who has a myriad of abilities depending on what you feed him. His favourite food is strawberries, and when consumed he will poop out solid gold guano, not that you get to keep much of it. Feed him other fruits and he will assist with his random magic powers or simply fetch items from afar. Uki and Ormi are just clumsy and useless, their tiny frames pre-occupied with boasting about being twins and yelping out their names than any actual assistance.

There is one other mechanic that provides the crux of most puzzles; the copper ball. Petroy will gift it to you from the very beginning, but when touched by specific jewellery, it will morph into a cauldron, an pipe or a sword. Respectively locate the ring, tiara and necklace. It can get a bit fiddly turning to back and forth between forms, but each mode provides some great puzzle design. The cauldron, for example, can be used to carry liquids, mix a variety of potions or brew some camomile tea. The hollowed pipe can divert water or crush breakable objects while the sword can lever heavy items or cut down foliage.

Use a ring, tiara or necklace on the magical copper ball to change its properties (left).
Right click to access your inventory. Drag the item to the top of the screen to use it with another item (right).

Like the Gobliiins games, some of the puzzles can be more than a little random. While melting fat to make lubricating oil for a rusty lever is logical enough, pouring venom on a crystal somehow turns it into a snake. Replace the venom with pollen and it'll morph into a flower. Both of these have multiple purposes as mixing them together in the cauldron will give you a potion that makes plants grow. Find elixirs or truffle mushrooms as additional ingredients and you can brew all kinds of spells. Luciferys can be used on rubies to ignite them, Vitalys will bring stone statues to life while Change can morph silver objects into something random. Like snakes. It's usually always snakes.

The arbitrary and random nature of it all is how the game maintains its difficulty, though in all honesty once you get the logic of the copper ball and the potions, it gets easier. I did find myself resorting to the tried-and-true use-everything-on-everything approach which isn't exactly the most engaging of strategies. It is possible I missed clues, but the stubborn player in me refused to entertain the in-game hint system. I'm not talking about Petroy whose knowledge and expertise is actually required for puzzle solving. I'm talking about the Jokers. You have three available to you for a given playthrough and they don't hold out on the answers. These are not cryptic clues or obtuse hints, but an actual rundown on what you should do. Sometimes pages worth. On top of this there's Sierra's heavily advertised premium helpline which thankfully no longer exists. Those expensive call centres were there solely to milk money from kids. Like play-to-win micro-transactions.

A fight with a dragon. Use the magic scrolls to shapeshift, but know that the dragon can do the same (left).

Call upon Petroy to assist you with magical lore and lost language translations (right).

The definite way to play is via the DOS original. The VGA graphics are detailed, colourful and engrossing. It also has some cutscenes or real actors in the most uncanny makeup you'll ever see. Uki and Ormi's latex-covered faces are nightmare fuel. These scenes aren't exactly full-motion-video. That technology didn't exist yet, but still frames scanned in and animated like sprites. They give the game a great sense of personality and whimsical charm so it's disappointing to learn that the Amiga and Atari ST ports have replaced them with poorly re-drawn static images. The colours for both of these versions have been drastically reduced with whole cutscenes removed presumably to save floppy disk space; both systems could easily handle what the PC put out. What they do have going for them is the sound. The Amiga's lack of a PC speaker means that a loud beep won't jolt you out of immersion whenever you send an item to your inventory. And while the music only plays in the intro, it is a lot better than what we heard on DOS. The Atari ST even pips the Amiga to top spot in the music department. I left that credit screen playing quite a while I was enjoying it so much.

That being said, a good sound card doesn't make for a good gameplay experience, and the lack of additional scenes and animations make both ports obsolete in my view. When the superior PC version is also available, why try anything else? And try it you must. Ween: The Prophecy is a great adventure game that has slipped under the radar for many gamers. An unmissable nutty adventure for adventure-game nuts.

To download the game, follow the link below. This custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses ScummVM to allow the PC DOS, Amiga and Atari ST games to run on modern PCs. Manuals, Hint Book and Code Book included. Read the ChamberNotes.txt for more detailed information. Tested on Windows 10.

File Size: 128 Mb. Install Size: 200 Mb. Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

Download

PC-DOS

AMIGA

ATARI ST