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Genre: Arcade Action/Puzzle
Format: Shareware
Developer: ActionSoft
Publisher: ActionSoft
Minimum Requirements: PowerMac, Mac OS 9.1 (with CarbonLib v1.6) or Mac OS X v10.1.5, 15MB RAM, 640x480 monitor supporting thousands of colors, QuickTime v4.0
Review Computer: 1GHz G4 PowerBook, 512MB RAM, Mac OS X v10.3.8
Network Feature: No
Price: $20.00
ESRB Rating: N/A
Availability: Out Now
Version Reviewed: v1.0
Demo: macgamefiles.com

See, I thought this game was called "Midnight Madness" and was based on the movie of the same name. I was looking forward to controlling Eddie Deezen, Stephen Furst and a young Michael J. Fox as they race across town in a zany, madcap scavenger hunt that's "the most fun you'll ever have...in the dark!"

But no, the game's actually called "Midnight Mansion" and is about a little guy named Jack Malone (who kind of looks like Michael J. Fox, actually) scavenging for treasure in various haunted houses. I guess that's for the best: seeing that Midnight Madness is like Bill Stiteler's favorite movie ever, he'd probably quit Applelinks if I wouldn't have let him review a game based on the movie.

Midnight Mansion is a screen by screen puzzle/adventure of days gone by, kind of like Prince of Persia or Ambrosia Software's Ferazel's Wand, only not as detailed and quite a bit simpler. Each screen presents a puzzle or challenge, usually involving getting from here to there (or that) without getting turned to stone by a floating Medusa head or falling into a pit of lava. Which...

I don't know. I can see how a house might be haunted by floating Medusa heads. Whose isn't? But why are there lava flows through the living rooms of these homes? Are fire places not enough anymore?

Also scattered throughout the house are coins and money bags, which you collect for points to gain extra lives. There are also keys...oh, those many keys...that you'll need to open doors of varying colors. I'm not sure what the key restrictions are—whether there are the exact number of keys for the exact number of doors or if there are extras lying about—but I found it wasn't too difficult to get to all of the places I needed to go. A bit harder to get to all of the places I wanted to go, but I never got the point where I couldn't progress because I'd used up all of my keys.

The eight mansions are all quite large, and there are often multiple ways to get to your destination. You can usually backtrack to explore areas you may have missed, but there are times when entire sections will be closed off if you go the wrong way. To help you figure out where to go, each level has a map lying somewhere that'll show all of the rooms in that level, darkening those you haven't yet explored. The map even shows what keys are available where, which I found quite helpful in planning my route. I will caution all players, though, to avoid sliding down poles until you've done everything you want to do.

And hey, what would a haunted mansion be without secret rooms? Midnight Mansion has plenty, most of which are quite simple to find; when a room comes to its apparent end, just see if you can run or jump through the wall. Sometimes take a leap of faith. At the end of each level, you're told the percentage of secret rooms you found.

Controlling Jack is a simple matter of up, down, left, right. He can jump, of course (you can set up jump left and jump right buttons, but I found it just as easy to quickly tap a direction key just before hitting jump), and he can duck. You'll need to do both quite a bit, obviously, to make your way through the rooms while avoiding the myriad creatures who'd rather you not rid the house of treasure. And quite honestly, I'm on their side. Who are you to just run through abandoned mansions stealing money? I'd certainly hope that while I'm out at a movie or a Barons game, people aren't running through my house stealing quarters or the keys to my luggage or something. Maybe I should look into getting one of those lava flows...

Anyway, the graphics are kind of bland, really. Just there. The animation is fluid and the backgrounds and creatures look okay (on par with the old console games that were Midnight Mansion's inspiration), but certain elements seemed out of place. I'm thinking specifically of Jack and of the artwork that decorates the house, as it seems they were developed for a completely different game; they're too flat against the simulated 3D textures that make up the gaming environment, and therefore just didn't fit in with the general look. Perhaps this is why the heads in some paintings will periodically up and disappear. The sound effects, on the other hand, are as fun as you'd want them to be. Music's good, too, complementing the gameplay quite effectively.

How about the gameplay itself? That depends. It's fun enough if you're into games such as this (which I am), but there's nothing new here. The aforementioned Ferazel's Wand gave the player more to do, and was therefore a bit more fun. Midnight Mansion, by comparison, has taken the simple route. The puzzles are easier, the creatures are meant to be avoided instead of attacked, and Jack has fewer control options. And although there are eight mansions included with the game (you can play seven of them in any order you wish), they do tend to all feel the same. As a result, young gamers will probably be pleased for quite some time, but more experienced players may begin to question the point of it all.

For them, the fun may lie in the level editor included in the game. I didn't dig too deeply into this (like David Banner, game reviewers must keep moving on), but it seemed to be one of the simpler level editors I've seen in a while. I see two reasons for this: 1.) ActionSoft intended from the start for the game to include the level editor, so they always had users in mind when developing the game, and 2.) because the gameplay itself is fairly simple, that makes the ability to build levels fairly simple as well. I don't see that ActionSoft has posted any custom levels yet, but the game has only been available for a few weeks now. Hopefully, some will start appearing soon. It's been my experience that user-built levels usually aren't all that fun, but you can occasionally find a gem that help prolong the life of a game.

I experienced no major problems with Midnight Mansion, just a few minor annoyances. When disconnecting my computer from the internet, the game seemingly forgot that I'd already registered and asked for my number again. After reconnecting, it did it again. Also, Midnight Mansion never remembers where your save game files are. Each time I wanted to load a previous game or save my current one after booting up the first time, I had to navigate to my save game folder. I'd like to see that Midnight Mansion just remember each time. And finally, there was one point where I managed to jump into a wall and get stuck there. I couldn't waste a life to start the screen over, so I had to reboot from a previous saved game, which was a while back. Note that I'm reviewing v1.0, however, and these problems are small enough that they may have been addressed if you're playing anything beyond the initial release.

Ultimately, I enjoyed Midnight Mansion exactly as much as I expected to; no more, no less. It's a fun game, simple as that, and a solid entry as ActionSoft's first. Even Ambrosia started somewhere, right? Even Michael J. Fox. Everybody sing, now, "When Midnight Madness starts to get to you..."