Prism Leisure Corporation, 1998
Mission Sunlight is an excellent educational adventure game for the kids age 8 to 13, but parents and adult members of the family may also play and equally enjoy this masterpiece. The game is set inside the three-dimensionally created postimpressionistic paintings of famous Dutch painter, Vincent van Gogh, who was noted for his artistic use of colors. Vincent van Gogh died in 1890, a few years before the French painters started picturing appearances by stokes of paints to give an impression of reflected light, but Vincent's paintings, which actually revolt against impressionism become extremely famous in later years.
As the game starts, the intro gives you an impression of a futuristic science-fiction story, but in the next moment you find yourself inside an art gallery facing it's front desk. A funny looking floating druid welcomes you at the front desk and tells you that the sunlight has been disappeared from all the painting in the gallery, which is sub-divided into three halls. The druid gives you an empty flower vase and asks you to restore the sunlight by travelling inside every painting to explore, collect items and place them where they belong. The solving of each painting's puzzles and quizzes will earn you a personal visit of Vincent van Gogh, who will then explain you the historical background of the painting and also award you with a sunflower to add in your flower vase, which the druid gave you earlier. The game will finished once you earned all the sunflowers from Vincent van Gogh by crossing all the obstacles and fixing all the problems in all his paintings.
Visually, the game looks like a reminiscent of "Monet and the Mystery of Orangerie Museum" with excellent graphics that offer the player a colorful real-time 3D world of Van Gogh's wonderful paintings. Puzzles are mostly like finding and collecting misplaced items and placing them back in their right place. There are few other quizzes and puzzles including some jigsaw puzzles in the game and Van Gogh, being your sidekick, guides and furnishes you with hints and clues for these puzzles. The Game control interface is mouse and keyboard hybrid that provides smooth and easy movement in the game. All in all, this is a wonderful adventure game for all the family members and I highly recommend it.
