Mystery Science Theater 3000 Presents: Aceland
The second (as far as I know) ZZT MiSTing released takes us back to the Joel Robinson era of the show, a good move in my opinion. Anyway, on to the Amazing Collasal Episode Guide format...
The Game: Prakash's "Aceland" is a fairly mediocre attempt at a ZZT game. It has a very basic "save the kingdom from the evil tyrant" plot, strung together with many boards suffering from "i-gotta-fill-in-the-board" syndrome. Basically , you must collect 5 keys, (note: actually objects, not really keys) four white and a yellow, to get to the tower of the evil mugerlock. The game actually holds together rather well, until the point in the game where your character gets the microwave weapon, essentially allowing you to kill every NPC in the game with only a touch or two. A gem generator in the bank makes money/health essentially unlimited, even if getting to it is supposed to be a secret. Also, the original version had a bug that prevented you from finishing the game, fixed for the purposes of this misting. And further still, the game has an annoying habit of holding your hand at times, removing almost all difficulty. Overall, Aceland is a dull, unoriginal ZZT game that the author must of thought was terribly witty. Unfortunately, it's mearly terrible.
Segment One: Joel & the 'bots discuss ZZT, and possibly making their own game. Crow suggests one set on the Satellite Of Love, and Joel tells him it's been done.
Invention Exchange: Joel - Device for clearing a room full of monsters Mads - Device which turns classic literature into bad ZZT games
Dr. F decides to try his invention on Shakespeare's Macbeth, and tells Joel it should be ready by the time the experiment is over.
Segement Two & Three: none
Segment Four: Joel does the classic "tell me one good thing about Aceland, and i'll give you a RAM chip" bit. Dr. F sends Joel the Macbeth game, and Joel deletes Tom's knowledge of Shakespeare for the time being. You then get to play through a rather silly dark board where you must murder the king. TV's Frank then recites a little from "A Midsummer Night's Dream", which the 'bots gleefully riff.
Stinger: howa bouta soma ammonitino
Although the second ZZT MiSTing leaves out Joel & the 'bots in the corner of the screen like in "Godzilla", it is still my second favorite in the series. John W. Wells is our writer this time around, and he captures the characters prefectly. The riffers poke fun at the game's poor level design, ridiculous economic system (what with the infinte gems in the bank) and all points in between. The addition of the MST3K theme song overlayed on Aceland's original title screen is very nice. Very, very funny. allthough "Despair" is still the better MiSTing if you ask me, it's only by a small margin. I'd give this game 4.75 stars if i could, but since a can't, i'll round it up to a 5 :)
