Nightlong: Union City Conspiracy

The only notable adventures recently have been Blade Runner and The Secret of Monkey Island 3. Unfortunately, Nightlong does nothing to change the situation.

The extremely forgettable plot revolves around a future where governments have been replaced by huge corporations that dominate the political scene. Think of it as a sort of Syndicate storyline, except without all the violence. You play one Joshua Reev, a fashionably weird cyberpunk. A paltry eight lines of the manual tell us he is an ex-soldier who owes a great debt to a Hugh Martens, the Governor of Union City. With this lack of information in hand, you're dumped on the roof of an apartment block and expected to find out why some mysterious terrorist group is trying to kill Martens.

Gameplay consists of wandering around Union City trying to sort out the mystery. The trouble is that the story is so generic and unexciting that you'll often find yourself almost falling asleep after a few minutes' play. This situation certainly isn't helped by the dire music, which consists of a series of six piano chords being repeated until you are forced to turn down the volume. The puzzles are also far too easy to accomplish -i finished all three CDs in less than seven hours of staid play.

If you're looking for a graphic adventure to play at the moment, then you'll have to wait a bit longer for something more exciting to happen. Otherwise it's back to trying to find yet another alternative ending for Blade Runner.