Shogun

Dave Arneson

WARNING! This article contains spoilers. Avert your eyes!

Dave Arneson is the co-designer of Dungeons & Dragons" and founder of Adventure Games, a board game company. He is currently involved in an RPG campaign based on 16th Century Japan.

It Was a Dark and Stormy Night . . .

A great storm batters your ship. After months at sea and a heroic crossing of two oceans, it looks like everything will soon be ending.

As Infocom's Shogun opens, you find your player character standing at the ship's wheel in the midst of the storm. Talk about starting right in the middle of things!

In Shogun, the player adopts the persona of the English Sea Pilot, John Blackthorne. The game begins on board the Dutch Privateer, Erasmus, during the most intense portion of the aforementioned storm. On board with you is a deathly ill Captain, half-dead mate, and an almost totally debilitated crew.

Dave collaborated directly with James Clavell, author of the novel, in designing the game. It should come as no surprise, therefore, to realize that Shogun requires the player to act and think like Blackthorne would have.

Puzzle solving is non-existent. In the first sequence, the player is presented with a situation that a real ship's captain would have to solve. This is good! The bad part is that you have almost no idea what to do! This is not good. Here, success is determined by how well you, as Blackthorne, thinks and acts, as compared to Clavell's novel.

Therefore, the first job is to get your ship safely into a small harbor. The ship may still be "wrecked," but you do not necessarily die! Once ashore, the intrepid Englishmen must make his way in a mysterious, war-torn land towards his goal.

Is It "Shogun"?

Nope! It's close, but no cigar! I've read the novel, waded through the mini-series, and even read the biography of Will Adams, the "real" pilot that Clavell based his novel on. In fact, reading the novel will certainly provide the player with some valuable tips on what he/she should do. The game, however, differs considerably from the novel.

Literary license aside, however, there is another question which should be asked. Is Shogun, the game, true to 16th Century Medieval Japan? Ah, well, "would-be Anjin-Sans" (Honorable Needle Watchers), it does not taste like Sushi to my humble palate.

Perhaps, an altogether more relevant question would be, "Is Shogun, the game, exciting?" Well, yes and no! Hark, Hatamoto! Is that a waffling noise I hear? There are some exciting situations, but rather than the stimulation of thinking one's way through to a logical solution, one is continually forced to play . . .

Guess The Parser!

Failure to make the proper decision (note the singular!) means that death follows soon after. A wrong guess? DEATH! Deviate from the path? DEATH! Take too long to come up with the right verb? Death!

Ah, Anjin-San, you may have noticed a subtle pattern emerging. Ah! You are wise in the ways of "The one true way" type of game. Thankfully, there are . . .

Hints!

When is a hint not a hint? When it doesn't help! One hint, two hints, four hints, six hints! If you haven't gotten it by the end of the list, the last hint should tell you exactly what to do. If you can't figure it out by then, you can't figure it out!

To me, a hint is supposed to be a little shove in the right direction. Additional hints for a situation should add to your knowledge. In Zork Zero, the hints built on each other to the point of telling you exactly what to do. Well, at least most of the time. This brought about a low frustration level because players could get quickly back into the game. In Shogun, there were way too many occasions when the last hint was no clearer than the first one was. This brought about a very high frustration level.

Artistic Backdrop

The graphics in Shogun are quite intricate, stunning, and beautiful. The pictures are used as borders around the text, providing a very nice touch, and as part of the story line itself. Some pictures show the rewards received for successfully handling situations.

Well, the pictures are certainly nice to look at and they do show what is happening, but they also carry almost no intrinsic information about what is happening. They are simply there to break up the text. They simply provide a backdrop and enhancement to the information conveyed in the text.

Now, if the designer really wants to make optimal use of these illustrations, they need to convey some additional information beyond what is covered in the text. They should, in a phrase, provide clues and hints! In Shogun, unfortunately, they simply provide a nice atmosphere.

Honorable Mentions

Fortunately, there are some very nice facets about Shogun. First, there is a lot to the game. Players will not win the game without putting in several weeks of game play. There are plenty of items to locate, but the good news is that you do not have to find every item in order to win.

Second, it is easy to save the game as you go. It is also, of course, a very good idea to do so. The nice fact about Shogun is that the game is presented like "Chapters" in a book. Therefore, there are enough logical stopping points that players will rarely need to stop "in the middle of things." There is also no problem about putting the game on your hard disk for easy saves and access.

Wisdom for Anjin-San (General Hints)

Once you get the drift of which verbs the parser is looking for, write them down. It will save trying to recall them and similar situations will tend to use the same command sequence throughout the game. Once you have figured out a "Chapter" (situation), it is time to save (immediately). This will save considerable grief.

When a situation is described, pay close attention to it. Those seemingly meaningless details are important. For example (specific information follows), as the game opens, you are HUNGRY and NEED rest. So, you better get something to eat and manage to get some rest. Of course, there is also a raging storm about. Therefore, the ship's crew will have to man their stations before you go below. If no one is running the boat while you go below to snooze, the next sound you hear could be waves beating against the rocks ... ROCKS!! Not so obvious is getting something to eat. It is also not obvious that you cannot come back at a later time to eat the apple. The same is true of getting sleep and saving the pilot's log.

Now, I have no trouble with a mistake in the middle of a storm resulting in a rapid demise. It is, after all, a crisis situation. However, my character is supposed to be an experienced pilot on a ship that he actually knows. Why don't I know anything, then? Not to mention the possibility of collapsing from lack of food and sleep, why don't I know how close my character is to "the edge?"

This lack of knowledge is invariably fatal. It also means doing the same scene several times before solving it correctly. Further repetition is often required in order for players to acquire all the items in a scene which can score points.

Which Way to the Emperor?

Making your own inquiries is difficult, time consuming, and, many times, profitless. Assuming that everyone who plays the game has read the book seems a bit much to ask. Of course, having seen the mini-series helps, but reading the book is one's best bet with regard to finding a great deal of information. Players should keep a copy handy, along with a paper and pencil.

Frankly, Shogun loses a lot of excitement from the book. There is no wandering off the beaten path to explore the land. Shogun is very linear. There is only "one true way" to success. Ah, yes! Once you succeed as Anjin-San, you can go back and get all those points you missed the first time. In the end, however, your path is still the same. Your major choices are unchanged.

As text games go, however, Shogun is only mildly interesting. Nevertheless, messing around in 16th Century Japan should be "more than interesting!" This game could have been exceptional. Instead, it is merely ordinary. Fans of text games will probably like Shogun simply for the fact that it is a far different setting from the run of the mill fantasy or detective genre they are used to seeing.

For those readers who are still unsure about the entire genre of text games, pass on Shogun. In this reviewer's opinion, Zork Zero offers a much more satisfying experience.

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