![]() ![]() ![]() The Golden Gate Bridge has nothing on this craftsmanship! Just be aware that just about everything in the Colossal Cave wants to kill you. There are quite a few other surprises along the way, but I don’t want to spoil the fun. Naturally, there’s a troll guarding a bridge (because of course there is), which you’ll have to figure out how to get past. There’s a pirate captain who will rob you blind, which results in you having to track down his private den to steal back your stash. That’s just in the earliest parts of Colossal Cave, too.Įventually, you’ll encounter even more outlandish and dangerous characters. Then you’ll encounter obstacles that gradually increase in difficulty, such as catching a shy bird, figuring out how to get across a massive chasm, avoiding a bunch of dwarfs who will throw sharp tools at you, or how to get the treasures that a hungry snake is guarding. No problem, that’s what our trusty lantern is for. The first task is making sure you have enough light for your excursion. Things get far more difficult once you’re actually inside the cave. The wellhouse is where you’ll safely stow all the treasures you find, as well as where you’ll be reincarnated if you perish. Although, that’s by far the easiest part of the whole journey. From there, you’ll have to do some exploring to even find the entrance to the cave. ![]() Inside are several items that you can choose to take, or leave behind for later, but it’s up to you to figure out which items are important and when you’ll need them. Instead, you’re greeted with the sight of a small, brick wellhouse. There’s very little hand-holding in Colossal Cave, to the point that you don’t even start in the titular cave in the beginning. Different tools for different adventures. Or in this case, some keys and a lantern. Much like with the original The Legend of Zelda, all you really need is a sword and an urge to go forth and explore. But you know what? There’s a beauty in its simplicity. That’s all you have to go on before you’re off on your adventure. You play as an unnamed, silent protagonist, who is only told through a screen of text at the start that you are to try to navigate through the depths of the colossal caves and obtain the treasures within. There’s very little in terms of a plot in Colossal Cave, as was typical for games in that era. Still, the cast’s likability keeps us on board, watching the sometimes baffling behavior onscreen just like those on the streets of Seoul, who gape up at a monster in horror but can’t make themselves flee to the suburbs.Fans of the original will recognize this immediately. Few viewers will enjoy seeing Sudeikis set his own bar on fire, for instance, and only slightly more of them will believe it. Though he’s clearly more interested in his human characters than the mayhem in South Korea, Vigalondo’s screenplay only sketches them out, making it hard for Hathaway and Sudeikis to justify some of their dumber and more outrageous behavior. But suspension of disbelief is already a must in a film which claims the residents of Seoul would just stick around at home despite nightly visitations from monsters who threaten to crush them. Instead, Vigalondo develops some darker human-scale themes, revealing Oscar’s nasty, jealous side and hinting at the forgotten trauma that set all this in motion.ĭon’t get your hopes up: This monster’s origin makes less sense than a third-rate superhero’s, and the idea that nobody involved remembers the events is a huge head-scratcher. Charming and funny, that film explored its premise’s comic possibilities more successfully than this one, which is amused to watch a drunk klutz play Godzilla but doesn’t follow through on either the physical or thematic possibilities of the conceit. In his Extraterrestrial, which played TIFF in 2011, Vigalondo staged a massive alien visitation of Earth only to focus on the handful of human lives it disrupted. ![]()
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