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Little Big Adventure (LBA) is a PC game made by Adeline Software International and first released at the end of 1994. It was released in Europe by Electronic Arts and in North America, Asia and Oceania under the name Relentless: Twinsen's Adventure by Activision, with the game selling over 400,000 copies worldwide in the first release.[citation needed] The game was initially released in a CD-ROM version and some time later in a floppy disk version; the CD-ROM version featured full motion video, music and speech whereas the floppy disk version has MIDI music files and still images to replace the videos. The game was later ported to the PlayStation, and released in Europe and Japan. A sequel was released under the name of Little Big Adventure 2 (also known as Twinsen's Odyssey).
Background
The game takes place on Twinsun, a strange planet (not to be confused with Twinsen, the game's protagonist).
The game's introduction sequence:
Twinsun is a relatively new planet on the outskirts of a remote galaxy. Its rotational plane has stabilized between two suns. There is a huge mountain range running along its equator, that divides the planet in half: each hemisphere is warmed by a single sun. The Northern hemisphere, with its orange sky, is warmer than the Southern hemisphere. Except for a polar region, the planet's climate is clement. The formation of life forms on the planet was thus favourable. Four species developed over the course of the centuries: the Spheros, the Rabbibunnies, the Quetches and the Grobos. They all lived in harmony until a tyrant named Dr Funfrock reared his ugly head.
Ever since Funfrock's rise to power, the population has been living under a reign of terror. FunFrock set up a police state where suspicion is omnipresent. He is all powerful and controls the people with an iron fist. He has at his disposal two high-tech weapons that ensure his power: cloning and teleportation. FunFrock can clone any of the species at will, and subsequently recruit these clones into his ranks. He can then deploy these clones instantly through a network of telepods that are dispersed over the entire planet.
A few years ago, under the guise of protecting the population, Dr. FunFrock herded the planet's habitants* into the southern hemisphere. The repression is harsh. Every day brings more and more arrests, and the people slowly begin to lose hope. In an effort to keep their spirits up, the people sometimes evoke an ancient legend along with the name of a goddess, Sendell. The mentioning of the legend or Sendell has since been forbidden by Dr. FunFrock.
Meanwhile, a young quetch named Twinsen has been having strange dreams.
The Game
Little Big Adventure is viewed from a pseudo 3D isometric perspective (the game field is rotated 45 degrees). All characters and vehicles in the game, including some props in the world, are real 3D polygon-based objects, allowing for full rotation and movement abilities. The game field is divided in scenes (a small block of the game that is active). When the player exits a scene the game is saved automatically (PC version only). After completion of certain tasks the player is presented with a full motion video sequence. All text in the game is spoken by the characters in the CD-ROM version of the game. The quality of voice acting is generally regarded as being quite poor. A floppy disk version of the game was released where speech was purely text based. The game world is very large for its time - there are 11 different islands and over 120 scenes that the player can visit. Locations in the game include a desert, a snowy mountain range called "the Hamalayi mountains", a rebel village under attack from missiles, and a construction site.
The game's genre is a real-time adventure. It combines several action game/arcade sequences and some elements from the role-playing game genre. The game's gameplay is partially free-roaming, allowing the player to travel around the islands once they have been "unlocked" by completing certain objectives; there are also many tasks which are optional or non-linear. Certain locations in the game are initially blocked from the player until they progress to a certain stage, such as the islands in the Northern Hemisphere and fortresses on several of the islands in the Southern Hemisphere.
Interactivity with the world is important in Little Big Adventure. Almost all characters can be talked to, and enemies are often performing tasks while the game world is active. The artificial intelligence in the game was particularly groundbreaking at the time, with enemies often running to alarms to alert other guards to the player's location, opposed to games like Doom released in the same timeframe where enemies can only chase and shoot at the player.
The game features an automatic save system. When starting the game the player has to enter a name, this way giving a name to the player's save file/slot. The game gets saved each time a player enters a new area. While there is no manual save feature, the same functionality can be achieved by cleverly copying save files/slots.
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06-28-2009, 02:20 PM
(PC) Little Big Adventure: Twinsen's Adventure (1-CD) (1994)
Linear Mode
