And while there's some good gameplay to be found in
Stupid Invaders, it gets bogged down in stupid technical issues and the return of something I thought we had seen the end of in adventure games -- stupid deaths. This alone almost made me throw the discs out the window, and the mazes (ye gods, what were the developers thinking?) near the end brought me that much closer, but there are a few gems here if you dig hard enough.
In Stupid Invaders, you control a motley crew of five aliens on a quest to get off of Earth and back home. Of course, a certain evil character has it out for you, and from the get-go you're presented with challenges that will bewilder and amuse. There's not much plot in Stupid Invaders, but what's there is quite amusing.
You control each character separately, jumping between the characters as the game sees fit. The basic game consists of the same adventure fare that we've been doing for ages -- click on the environment, and your guy moves there. Click to examine something, or pick it up, or whatever. Combine items, use them on things, and get further in the game.
Unfortunately, Stupid Invaders brings back a convention or two that I thought we had lost in the great Adventure Game Upgrade that was brought about by Lucasarts. First of all, you will die in Stupid Invaders, and die a lot. Things that don't make any sense will kill you, and send you back to the title screen. Saving often is key. While many of the deaths are quite amusing, it doesn't excuse them. There's nothing more frustrating than having to creep-and-save in an adventure game.
And the great pixel-hunt is back with a vengeance. Search for tiny hot-spots to turn on switches, or try to find the one place where the camera shifts angle so you can see what you have to do next. This sort of thing is really unforgivable in this day and age -- it was annoying in Maniac Mansion, and it's still annoying now.
Stupid Invaders limits your inventory, which is a good thing -- you never have to worry about having a gajillion junk things cluttering up your, er, whatever aliens store their stuff in. And the humour in Stupid Invaders, while base, elicited a chuckle or two from me as I played the game. But it's a little too short for my tastes, and the inclusion of a maze is another Thing That Should Not Be Done.
