''Wonderland'' is an
interactive fiction game developed by
Magnetic Scrolls
Magnetic Scrolls was a British video game developer active between 1984 and 1990. A pioneer of audiovisually elaborate text adventure games, it was one of the two largest and most acclaimed interactive fiction developers of the 1980s.
''Magnet ...
and published in 1990 by
Virgin Games
Virgin Interactive Entertainment (later renamed Avalon Interactive) was the video game publishing division of British conglomerate the Virgin Group. It developed and published games for major platforms and employed developers, including Westwoo ...
.
Plot
''Wonderland'' is based on
Lewis Carroll
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are '' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequ ...
's classic children's book ''
Alice in Wonderland'', with the player taking on the role of
Alice. It does not involve anything from that book's sequel, ''
Through the Looking-Glass
''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' (also known as ''Alice Through the Looking-Glass'' or simply ''Through the Looking-Glass'') is a novel published on 27 December 1871 (though indicated as 1872) by Lewis Carroll and the ...
''.
Gameplay
With this game, Magnetic Scrolls introduced a bespoke
windowing system
In computing, a windowing system (or window system) is software that manages separately different parts of display screens. It is a type of graphical user interface (GUI) which implements the WIMP (windows, icons, menus, pointer) paradigm fo ...
dubbed "Magnetic Windows". The player's inventory, the location's graphic, the map and so on are all in separate windows that can be moved and resized independently.
(A similar system is used in unrelated adventure games like ''
Deja Vu
Deja or Dejah may refer to:
* Deja News, an archive of messages posted to Usenet discussion groups and its successor ''deja.com''
* Andreas Deja (born 1957), German animator
* Dejah Mulipola (born 1998), American softball player
* Dejah Thoris, a ...
''.) The developers stated they believed it would make the game more accessible, giving it a much wider appeal.
Development
Development began in December 1987, when David Bishop pitched the concept to Scrolls' Anita Sinclair. Bishop would become project manager.
Reception
''
Computer Gaming World'' favorably reviewed the game's graphics and interface, describing it as "a satisfying romp through Wonderland ... fun stuff to play".
ACE
An ace is a playing card, die or domino with a single pip. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit symbol (a heart, diamond, spade, or club) located in the middle of the card, sometimes large and decorated, especially in the c ...
gave the IBM PC version a score of 910 out of 1000, praising the puzzles, interface (if used with a mouse) and the graphics, with the lack of sound being a negative point.
Keith Campbell of ''
CU Amiga
''Commodore User'', known to the readers as the abbreviated ''CU'', was one of the oldest British Commodore magazines. With a publishing history spanning over 15 years, it mixed content with technical and video game features. Incorporating ''Vi ...
'' called it "an outstanding game that is a pleasure to play, extremely entertaining, and with widespread appeal to gamesters from nine years of age to ninety."
In ''
Zero
0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. In place-value notation such as the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, 0 also serves as a placeholder numerical digit, which works by multiplying digits to the left of 0 by the radix, usual ...
'', Mike Gerrard wrote that it is "a very open adventure, designed to appeal to people who maybe haven't tried an adventure before. Regular adventures will try it and love it, but newcomers will find it very accessible and easy to play... if not easy to solve." He strongly praised its presentation and ease of use, calling its window interface "wondrous".
Reviewing ''Wonderland'' for ''
Amiga World
''Amiga World'' was a magazine dedicated to the Amiga computer platform. It was a prominent Amiga magazine, particularly in the United States, and was published by Massachusetts-based IDG Publishing from 1985 until April 1995. The first several iss ...
'', Peter Olafson summarized, "Frankly, the game is an almost unalloyed delight." He praised its graphics, music and interface, and found its difficulty level to be fair. Olafson believed that the game was "destined to restore interest in
hesadly vanishing genre" of interactive fiction.
In ''
PC Magazine'', Cristina Córdova wrote that "''Wonderland'' brings the best of text-based and graphics-based games to Alice and her adventures." She praised it for combining the "complexity and detail" of interactive fiction with visuals, and she praised the ease-of-use of its interface.
''
Strategy Plus''s Theo Clark noted that ''Wonderland'' had received significant hype prior to release, and he believed that the game lived up to these expectations. He praised its interface and parser, calling them "very close to ... ideal." While he was let down by the limited music, he found the visuals to be "a feast" and enjoyed the hint system. He concluded, "If the purchasing public has any sense at all the sales should be brisk enough to ensure a rapid start to
sequel"
The magazine's editors later named ''Wonderland'' the best adventure game of 1990, other nominees including ''
The Secret of Monkey Island''. Editor-in-Chief Brian Walker wrote, "Witty, charming, and of course,
ith
The Ith () is a ridge in Germany's Central Uplands which is up to 439 m high. It lies about 40 km southwest of Hanover and, at 22 kilometres, is the longest line of crags in North Germany.
Geography
Location
The Ith is immediatel ...
a wonderful storyline, it proved that the text adventure is not dead after all." He believed that it was "destined to be a classic of its kind."
In 1991, ''
PC Format
''PC Format'' was a computer magazine published in the United Kingdom by Future plc, and licensed to other publishers in countries around the world. In publication between 1991 and 2015, it was part of Future plc's ''Format'' series of magazines ...
'' placed ''Wonderland'' on its list of the 50 best computer games of all time. The editors described it as "a very impressive windowing system that takes you through Wonderland in the company of Alice and cronies."
References
*
External links
*
at th
Magnetic Scrolls Chronicles
{{Alice
1990 video games
1990s interactive fiction
Acorn Archimedes games
Amiga games
Atari ST games
DOS games
Magnetic Scrolls games
Single-player video games
Video games based on Alice in Wonderland
Video games developed in the United Kingdom
Video games featuring female protagonists
Virgin Interactive games