On Deck Interactive, 2000
The Ward is an excellent Science-Fiction adventure that, to some extent, will make you believe that this could be the possible future of our space technology. The game takes you in the spacesuit of astronaut David Walker, a member of the Apollo XIX crew. The intro shows that you are doing research on the moon surface away from your crew members when a strange alien spaceship appears and blasts off your friends. Soon after, a huge lightning sphere, which rises from the moon's horizon surrounds you and renders you unconscious. When you awake you find yourself alone in an alien medical ward. In fact the plot of the game involves two different alien races, one who is after the destruction of the universe and one who is trying to save the universe with the help of humans, or one human to be precise, as foretold by their prophecy, and you're it! You have three quests in this game, the first quests is to explore and safely escape the alien's moon based building complex, the second quest is to free all the humans imprisoned on Mars and the final quest involves saving the universe from destruction.
The Ward is a true adventure game keeping all the standards of the genre, which includes a point-and-click interface, huge inventory, mild-action and multiple dialogue option. The game is choke full of puzzles that vary from easy to very hard including some kind of board games and sliding tiles. Some puzzles are timed and need quick action to accomplish. Graphics as well as animated sequences are well done, which are spiced up with good quality sound and music. If you like science-fiction adventures and you can excuse some very hard puzzles and irritating long walks between two locations then the Ward is really your kind of game.
