Elvira

(Accolade, 1990)

Sure, it's celebrity tie-in was a little gratuitous and over the top, though it was also right on target. I mean, when playing an RPG/horror game like this, in the late 80's/early 90's, who wouldn't want to see a cameo by Cassandra "Elvira" Peterson? When you consider how popular she was at the time (she even had her own tv show, introducing classic horror flicks), you wonder why a game design team hadn't thought of using her, long before this game. While I don't know which of this game's four game designers came up with the celebrity tie-in idea, each of them should be commended, for a game that is also quite fun, as an RPG thriller. Exploration of each maze/map was elaborate, and involved many hours of excessive gameplay; the best feature of a truly great RPG. In addition, Elvira was present, to help concoct a few witch potions; all you needed was to give her the proper ingredients, and the appropriate spell page (the latter was this game's "copy protection," to try and ward off software piracy). While combat was a little clumbsy, the celebrity idea was not; the game even warranted its own sequel in the following year, which was even better than the original!

Rating : Large Crater.

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