Brataccas is a video game released in 1986 for the Amiga

Amiga

The Amiga is a family of personal computers that was sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. The first model was launched in 1985 as a high-end home computer and became popular for its graphical, audio and multi-tasking abilities...

, Atari ST

Atari ST

The Atari ST is a home/personal computer that was released by Atari Corporation in 1985 and commercially available from that summer into the early 1990s. The "ST" officially stands for "Sixteen/Thirty-two", which referred to the Motorola 68000's 16-bit external bus and 32-bit internals...

, and Macintosh, and was the first game published by Psygnosis. It is a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 action-adventure game

Action-adventure game

An action-adventure game is a video game that combines elements of the adventure game genre with various action game elements. It is perhaps the broadest and most diverse genre in gaming, and can include many games which might better be categorized under narrow genres...

, with role-playing game

Role-playing game

A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...

 elements. Brataccas is believed to be the remains of the much hyped vaporware

Vaporware

Vaporware is a term in the computer industry that describes a product, typically computer hardware or software, that is announced to the general public but is never actually released nor officially canceled. Vaporware is also a term sometimes used to describe events that are announced or predicted,...

 project Bandersnatch, which was partially developed by Imagine Software

Imagine Software

Imagine Software was a British video games developer based in Liverpool which existed briefly in the early 1980s, initially producing software for the ZX Spectrum and VIC-20...

.

Story

The player controls Kyne, a genetic engineer who developed technology for creating supermen

Human enhancement

Human enhancement refers to any attempt to temporarily or permanently overcome the current limitations of the human body through natural or artificial means...

. The oppressive government of the day desired this research to create a breed of supersoldier, which Kyne refused to assist. In retaliation, the government frames him, claiming that Kyne was seeking to sell his work to the underworld. At the same time, the government secretly offered a reward to anyone in the underworld who turned Kyne over to them. With both the forces of law and lawlessness aligned against him, Kyne is forced to flee Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

.

During his escape, Kyne learns that evidence needed to clear his name can be found on the distant asteroid

Asteroid

Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...

 of Brataccas. Brataccas, first of the asteroids to be colonized, is a backwater mining colony with a "wild west" feel of lawlessness and corruption. Kyne has to find the evidence in order to win the game, obtaining it from the in-game characters. The manual gave no indication of who held the evidence, suggesting that everyone was equally corrupt and dangerous to talk to.

Gameplay

Brataccas displays the game world as a series of rooms that would appear on-screen as the character moved through the habitat, each one displayed from a side view (a pre-side-scroller). Most movement was horizontal, with automatic elevators to permit access to different floors. Occasionally, labeled doors in the rear wall or teleportation

Teleportation

Teleportation is the fictional or imagined process by which matter is instantaneously transferred from one place to another.Teleportation may also refer to:*Quantum teleportation, a method of transmitting quantum data...

 booths with the appearance of cylindrical shower stalls led the player to different sets of rooms. The term "rooms" is slightly inaccurate, as there were also a small number of outdoor areas displayed using the same system. In order to preserve detail on the character animations, the characters had to be fairly large, making the rooms small in relative terms. They could get quite crowded with even a few characters in them.

The player had a limited amount of interaction with the game world, generally limited to movement, picking up or dropping objects, or talking to non-player characters (NPCs). These NPCs operated under computer control and pursued their own objectives, sometimes even engaging in combat with other NPCs. All the game's characters utilized sword

Sword

A sword is a bladed weapon used primarily for cutting or thrusting. The precise definition of the term varies with the historical epoch or the geographical region under consideration...

s in combat to maintain extended battle in the small rooms, justified in-game as a measure to avoid potential loss of atmosphere to space from stray ranged weapons fire.

Interaction between characters was carried out through dialog bubbles similar to those in comic strips. The player could only respond to other statements, at which point a menu of possible responses appeared. The selections were fairly limited, and the outcomes often seemingly random. Additionally, a number of loudspeakers located in some rooms would announce events like fights breaking out. No attempt was made to "declutter" the balloons, so if more than two characters were talking the screen would often fill with them, rendering most of them unreadable.

The control system was an early example of a gesture-based interface, or as many reviews pointed out, a poor attempt at one. To move, the mouse was moved in the direction the player wanted to walk, or faster if they wanted to run. However, the inaccuracy of the system combined with lag times in the interpretation of the movements often rendered the game almost uncontrollable. One reviewer wrote, "Controlling Kyne reliably ... in a critical situation is nearly impossible."

Interaction with objects was limited to picking them up or dropping them, at which point other characters might interact with them as well. For instance, one could buy information by dropping money, bags of which were scattered around the game world. One annoying gameplay problem was that if Kyne fell from one level to another, he would drop whatever he was holding. If another character was there, they would pick it up.

Critical reception

The game received mixed reviews. Audiences generally liked its sophisticated setting and story and ambitious graphics; on the Amiga and Atari ST, the game ran in 4-color, 640 × 200 resolution, a high resolution mode rarely used for games at the time. On the Atari ST, it was one of the very rare games to support the monochrome 640 × 400 high resolution which required a special monochrome monitor (model SM 124 or SM 144), and it is likely to be the only game ever which allowed to change the type of monitor during gameplay. (Disconnecting the monitor or TV-Set usually resulted in a machine reboot in order to protect the video equipment.)

However, it was criticized for the extremely difficult game controls. Despite this criticism, the game is fondly remembered today by some fans, and enjoys a cult status.

Cover art

The box cover art for Brataccas was made by fantasy artist Roger Dean, who would provide artwork for many Psygnosis titles. It was later used as the album cover for Uriah Heep

Uriah Heep (band)

Uriah Heep are an English rock band formed in London in 1969 and regarded as a seminal classic hard rock act of the 1970s. Uriah Heep's progressive/art rock/heavy metal fusion's distinctive features have always been massive keyboards sound, strong vocal harmonies and David Byron's operatic vocals...

's 2001 album Remasters: The Official Anthology.

External links

• brataccas.com fan site, with full text of original game manual
• youtube short video depicting scenes of the game
• Brataccas.NET another fan site, about technical aspects
• Compute! magazine 1986 review of Brataccas