Labyrinth: The Computer Game

Nintendo console exclusive

Labyrinth: The Computer Game is a 1986 graphic adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games and published by Activision. Based on the fantasy film Labyrinth, it tasks the player with navigating a maze while solving puzzles and evading dangers. The player's goal is to find and defeat the main antagonist, Jareth, within 13 real-time hours. Unlike other adventure games of the period, Labyrinth does not feature a command-line interface. Instead, the player uses two scrolling "word wheel" menus on the screen to construct basic sentences.

Released: 1986
Platforms: Apple II Commodore 64 Commodore C64/128/MAX MSX NES
Genres: Adventure Point-and-click adventure
Developers: Lucasfilm Games
Publishers: —
Modes: Single-player
Perspective: Side view
Themes: Fantasy
Country: United States
Composers: Russell Lieblich

About

Labyrinth: The Computer Game is a graphic adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games and published in 1986 by Activision. Based on the fantasy film Labyrinth, it tasks the player with navigating a maze while solving puzzles and evading dangers. The player's goal is to find and defeat the main antagonist, Jareth, within 13 real-time hours. Unlike other adventure games of the period, Labyrinth does not feature a command-line interface. Instead, the player uses two scrolling "word wheel" menus on the screen to construct basic sentences.

Labyrinth was the first adventure game created by Lucasfilm. The project was led by designer David Fox, who invented its word wheels to avoid the text parsers and syntax guessing typical of text-based adventure games. Early in development, the team collaborated with author Douglas Adams in a week-long series of brainstorming sessions, which inspired much of the final product. Labyrinth received positive reviews and, in the United States, was a bigger commercial success than the film upon which it was based. Its design influenced Lucasfilm's subsequent adventure title, the critically acclaimed Maniac Mansion.

Keywords

graphic adventure
based on - movie

Media

Labyrinth: The Computer Game screenshot 1

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Development

Lucasfilm Games began to design Labyrinth: The Computer Game in 1985. Company head George Lucas had requested a tie-in video game for the movie of the same name, which was under production at Lucasfilm. As was common with Lucasfilm Games projects, Lucas himself provided very little direction to the team. Labyrinth was the first licensed game developed by the company: earlier products, such as Rescue on Fractalus!

and The Eidolon, had been original intellectual properties. According to project leader David Fox, working with a license "frees you up in some ways and restricts you, too". With their adaptation, the team was not pressured to reuse events and characters from the Labyrinth film, but they "felt obligated" to follow the source material. Because they saw the film as an adventure story, they chose to set their adaptation in the adventure game genre.

Reception

Commodore Magazine's Mark Cotone lauded the game's puzzle design, detailed graphics and newcomer-friendly interface. He believed that experienced players would enjoy its depth and challenging puzzles. Keith Campbell of Commodore User praised its animation and dubbed it "a superb game"—which he found unusual, given its status as a tie-in product. Nevertheless, Campbell hesitated to call it an adventure game, and he wrote that the word wheels were "rather tedious" for genre veterans. Roy Wagner of Computer Gaming World summarized Labyrinth as a "very well done [game] with an excellent user interface".

Writing for Computer & Video Games, Matthew Woodley praised the game's variety and interface. While he disliked its long loading times, he believed that they were "a small price to pay for such a brilliant game". However, Labyrinth was criticized by the three reviewers of Zzap!64. Although he praised its visuals, co-reviewer Paul Sumner called the game too slow-paced for an action title and too simplistic for an adventure. Co-reviewer Julian Rignall considered it to be boring and "a real disappointment", given Lucasfilm's strong track record.

Legacy

Labyrinth was the first adventure game produced by Lucasfilm, which became a critically acclaimed and commercially successful developer in the genre. The game's technology and mechanics influenced the company's subsequent title Maniac Mansion, whose "SCUMM" engine was reused in many Lucasfilm adventure games. The word wheels were a predecessor to that game's point-and-click interface. Gary Winnick, an artist for Labyrinth, went on to lead the production of Maniac Mansion with Ron Gilbert.

Fox contributed to Maniac Mansion as well, and he later directed Lucasfilm's Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. A retrospective feature by Australian video game talk show Good Game regarded Labyrinth as a solid first attempt, but as inferior to "the real classics" made afterward by Lucasfilm.