(it was nominated for some other awards, but I forgot to vote for myself)

The whos, the whats, the wheres, the whens, the hows and the whys.

WHO is Odysseus Kent?

Odysseus Kent is a mystery; a drifter, a nobody, a blot on the population charter. He makes a living as a freelance treasure hunter. Physically, he is around 19 with absolutely no skin pigment and jet black, uncombed hair. For some reason he dresses like someone from the Regency period.

WHAT is this game about?

Odysseus has arrived in a small village community in search of a bonanza called the Lost Treasure of Randolph McBoing. He has tracked the burial site down to a plot in the local churchyard, but the parish priest won't let him dig there. As luck would have it, the man due to be buried there is on his last legs. Unfortunately he has vowed never to die until his last wishes are fulfilled. He's been tucked up in bed for ten weeks now; the old guy means business. Your task is to help him shuffle off this mortal coil and, consequently, gain access to the burial site.

The game is written in the Adventure Game Studio engine, which can be downloaded from its official website.

WHERE can I download Odysseus Kent from?

Well, since you asked so nicely, from right here of course!

I find that the Windows version of AGS games tend to not work on my system, so I've uploaded both Windows and DOS versions of The Trials of Odysseus Kent to this very website for people with the same problem.

Click here to download Odysseus Kent for Windows (770 kb)

Click here to download Odysseus Kent for DOS (932 kb)

Mirrors by RealityBlights: Windows and DOS

WHEN will the game be finished?

Weren't you paying attention? It IS finished.

The reason why I didn't tell anyone that I was making it was because (a) I didn't want to pressure myself or keep anyone interested waiting for it, and (b) I really wasn't sure I was going to release it, or even finish it at all. I guess, since you're reading this, I did.

WHY did you even write this game when you made a big thing of retiring from adventure game design?

Ah, I was hoping you wouldn't ask that.

The release of Odysseus Kent does not mean I have come out of retirement and will be knocking games off regularly again. This was a one-off. Many moons ago I officially said I was packing it in, and I meant it. After the Rob Blanc series and the Arthur Yahtzee series I had written tons of games, and I was sick of it. Sick of always having an unfinished project hanging over my head while people were waiting for it. Sick of the pressure.

However.

Recently I played through Monkey Island again, and became nostalgic. This always happens to me. After playing through Thief 2 I wanted to make Thief levels. After reading Internet humour sites I wanted to make my own. And after playing Monkey Island, I wanted to write one more adventure game. Not just any game, though. This game would be an exercise. I would cut as few corners as possible with this game; rather than have a message box saying 'he gives you a key and leaves the room', for example, I would animate the person giving you a key and leaving the room. The objective, for me, was to write a game like Monkey Island. Not, I hasten to add, a game ripping off MI, but a game that played like MI, with a similar sense of humour and stuff. While of course I could never do anything even the remotest bit as good as MI, I do think - if I may say so myself - that this is one of the best games I've ever done.

Will I make any more Odysseus Kent games? The official answer is 'no'. But maybe one day, after playing through Monkey Island for the umpteenth time, that feeling of nostalgia will return and who knows what will happen. Don't get your hopes up, though.

HOW do I do this / get past that / find the other?

Please don't badger me for hints for this game. The first few times this happened with Rob Blanc it was flattering to know people were playing it, but it got exasperating fast. I've uploaded a walkthrough, which you can find right here.

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