The Ward is a 2000 point and click
adventure video game
An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus on story allows it to draw ...
developed by Fragile Bits. It was first published in
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
under the name Poslanik by LMI, followed by an international release by
On-Deck Interactive in January 2001.
Development and sales
The game uses
3D pre-rendered
Pre-rendering is the process in which video footage is not rendered in real-time by the hardware that is outputting or playing back the video. Instead, the video is a recording of footage that was previously rendered on different equipment (typic ...
character models over a static, often animated backgrounds. The developer released a demo, which could be found on the CD of the computer magazine Hacker. The development took around 2 years without a budget and the game sold in nearly 300,000 units.
Synopsis
The story follows the fictionalized version of events of the
Apollo 19 mission from 1979. Two of the crew member are found dead, with the protagonist, David Walker, finding himself in an
extraterrestrial laboratory. Throughout the story, the protagonist realizes he is meant to be the mythical Ward, in order to resolve the conflict between two alien races; the
Grey
Grey (more common in British English) or gray (more common in American English) is an intermediate color between black and white. It is a neutral or achromatic color, meaning literally that it is "without color", because it can be composed o ...
s and the
Reptillians.
[ He sets out to help humanity from total annihilation, but also aids Greys in their war against their former masters, the reptillians. During the course of the adventure, he uncovers many secrets and histories of the universe.
]
Reception
Croatian website Gamer.hr praised its low system requirements, the story, music and the animations but stated the game was littered with bugs and the movement was badly implemented. It also criticized its ending as rushed, as if it skipped over a certain portion of its story.
The game received mixed reviews upon its international release. Ron Dulin, in his review for GameSpot
''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...
gave it 6.2 out of 10, praising certain points in its story and gameplay, but criticized the lack of voiceovers, the dated graphics and the lackluster progression of its story. IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
gave a similar opinion, stating that, apart from a neat few locales, it falls short of games like ''The Longest Journey
''The Longest Journey'' ( nb, Den Lengste Reisen) is a magical realism, magical realist Adventure game, point-and-click adventure video game developed by Norway, Norwegian studio Funcom for Microsoft Windows and released in 1999.
The game was a ...
'' due to the relatively low production values. It, however, praised its soundtrack and gameplay as entertaining, giving the entire package 6.4 out of 10. PC Zone
''PC Zone'', founded in 1993, was the first magazine dedicated to games for IBM-compatible personal computers to be published in the United Kingdom. Earlier PC magazines such as ''PC Leisure'', ''PC Format'' and ''PC Plus'' had covered games but ...
gave it 5.1 out of 10, mostly criticizing its outdatedness.
The game currently holds a score of 57/100 based on 14 reviews on Metacritic and 60/100 on Gamerankings
GameRankings was a video gaming review aggregator that was founded in 1999 and owned by CBS Interactive. It indexed over 315,000 articles relating to more than 14,500 video games. GameRankings was discontinued in December 2019, with its staff bei ...
based on 19 reviews.
References
External links
Official website
The Ward
on Mobygames
MobyGames is a commercial website that catalogs information on video games and the people and companies behind them via crowdsourcing. This includes nearly 300,000 games for hundreds of platforms. The site is supported by banner ads and a small ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ward, The
2000 video games
Point-and-click adventure games
Video games developed in Croatia
Windows games
Windows-only games
Science fiction video games