H+A Entertainment, 1997
Mortalus is a mixed bag of genres with an excellent plot enough to elevate it to some good position. Game play is more puzzle-solving then overcoming combat sequences, which may be skipped by simply hitting a key on your keyboard. The game starts with a voice-over introduction by the squire of Sir John, which is no other, but you, and a slideshow of the abandoned Citadel of the Brotherhood. The hero tells us how he loses Sir John and meets Brother Peter, a novice in the Dark Brotherhood, who gives him the Book of Dark Knowledge and a curse known as Curse of the Black Hand. The quest starts and your main objectives are to find the Chalice, unravel the secrets of Mortalus, save the world from being dominated by the Servants of the Hand and finally, achieve mortality.
Graphics in Mortalus are similar to Myst kind of games with 360-degree panned view that the players control by keeping the left mouse button pressed while they view left or right. The screen changes to a still image once you leave the mouse button. There are plenty of full-motion video cut-scenes with real actors acting the roles. While the hard-to-solve puzzles are logical and good in quality the combats are even harder and completely keyboard dependent. Sound and music is bit creepy at times and gets annoying but there are no controls to get rid of it so the Windows volume control is the only way to decrease the volume. As for the recommendations, I will only recommend this game if you love puzzle-solving adventure games or if you have nothing else left to play but Mortalus.
