Normality (MS-DOS)

Developer:

Gremlin

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Release Date:

1996

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Systems:

DOS

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This week on Super Adventures, I've reached my last proper game post of the year. I mean it's not the last thing I'll be writing for the site, there's another article coming next week, but this is the last time I'll be going through the first hour or so of one game, showing off screenshots along the way. Until next year anyway.

Oh, I'm playing Normality by the way, in case the title stamped up there didn't give it away. The logo jitters around in game and I was tempted to make my image animated to show it off, but then I realised I didn't need another ugly distracting GIF on my front page for weeks. I learned that lesson back when I did that Amiga Fighting Games article.

My GOG orders history page claims that I bought Normality two years ago and I'm sure it's probably right, though what it doesn't know is that I only got the game so that I could write about it here... and then I forgot. Until now! I've only got a vague idea of what the game even is, but the love I've seen it get online put it on my radar and I have a feeling that even if it pisses me off I'm going to get some good screenshots out of it.

The game has a story and puzzles, and if you keep reading you're going to find SPOILERS for the first couple of hours of both. Just so you know.

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The game begins with narration over moody black and white shots of of a dark polluted city, but I can tell just from the voice that the protagonist is going to be the opposite of noir. The jean shorts were another clue. He's called Kent by the way, Kent Knutson.

Kent talks about how how he began to learn the shady history of Neutropolis and got swept up in events, but he's keeping it vague right now to avoid spoiling the entire game. It all started with him whistling an annoying tune while taking a motion captured pre-rendered walk down this exact street.

Suddenly an N Police car drove up out of the smog, sirens blaring, and Kent was arrested. Nice colour banding there by the way.

They locked him up for a week, inflicting elevator music on him in prison in an attempt to 'normalise' him. But while he was there, someone slid a note into his cell under the door.

Brown writing? That's never a good sign. Though it's nice to have some clear instructions.

Step 1: Get a job at 'Plush Rest'.
Step 2: Snoop around.
Step 3: Find the group of like-minded individuals in one of the dumpsters.

Wait, what is he supposed to do with the note afterwards? It doesn't say! It gives away the location of the hidden rebel base so it seems way too dangerous to keep it, but it was probably really awkward to make so maybe they expect him to pass it on to the next prisoner?

Anyway, the next thing that happens is that he's taken home, shoved inside and told that if he doesn't have the TV on 24 hours a day they're coming in afterwards. I've only heard two people speak so far and I can already tell this is going to be a game of many accents.

Okay, I've reached gameplay.

I don't know if you can tell by looking at it, but the game's running on a very Duke Nukem 3D looking software-rendered 3D engine, and I'm free to wander around the room and look at things. I tried clicking on things as well, but it seems that left mouse button is used for turning and walking, so that didn't work out. Plus I'm finding it more comfortable to use the arrow keys to turn and move, seeing as it's not letting me use them for strafing. No side stepping allowed in this dystopian hellhole.

You know what the weirdest part of this is so far? I'm not all that bothered by that spinning bag in the top right. In fact I've stopped noticing it already.

Ah, I have to right click on things to interact with them! Right mouse button brings up this weird voodoo doll, which seems to work like the verb coin in Curse of Monkey Island, letting me pick what I want my cursor to do. I click on the fist to use things, the grabbing claw to pick things up, the door in his chest to open things etc.

Okay, I'm going to use my new-found powers to get this TV on before the Norm outside goes from irate to furious.

That's cool, the game switches to a third person pre-rendered video clip when you use something to show Kent doing the interacting. In this case he decided to interact with the TV using his boot.

Well the TV's on, so that's my first problem solved. Not sure that Teletext is what the Norm outside wants to hear, as it's silent, but screw him.

The note told me to get a job at that 'Plush Rest' place, but I can't find a phone and I can't use the front door, so I'm struggling a bit with that. I'm happy just exploring Kent's tiny flat at the moment though. The graphics are basic enough that I can look around the place without feeling physically sick at how gross it is, which is good seeing as he's got his bathroom connected to his kitchen with no door.

In fact I actually really like the visuals so far; it's it's like I'm visiting somewhere behind those windows in Duke Nukem 3D you're never able to get into. Not as keen on the music, but it's bearable.

Oh damn, now I know why Kent wears those glasses all the time.

I've come across another problem: the TV won't stay on. So now I'm looking for objects that could help me with that. I'm looking for anything really, though the only things he'll take from the kitchen are a cup and a small box. He mostly just makes obnoxious comments about everything else. Or regular comments in his obnoxious voice.

Right now the game feels a bit like an ancestor to things like Gone Home... probably (I haven't actually played it yet). I've played Realms of the Haunting though and I wasn't surprised to learn this uses the same engine.

Okay I've been around the whole flat, running back to kick the television when necessary, and I've got a full page of junk now. Including a TV remote, though it isn't helping me keep the thing on.

I tried putting the nodding bird against the TV so it'd keep knocking the button back on, but it didn't work. Shame really because I thought that was a clever idea. Maybe I could use the nodding bird with the remote?

Wow, I'm genuinely surprised that worked, because it's logical and one of the first things I thought of. Kent must have way more sensitive buttons on his TV remote than I have.

I'm also surprised there's been no reminders about what I'm supposed to be doing, as it seems like the kind of game where the protagonist would occasionally mumble to himself. Though I do have the letter from prison in my inventory still, telling me to go get a job. Fortunately there's nothing stopping me now from opening the window and making my escape.

Alright I'm out. Also this new music is so weird. The soundtrack is by Patrick Phelan, who did the music for the Zool games and Lotus III, so I was expecting to like it, but it seems like he tried to make it deliberately irritating and he's done a great job.

I've found another character by the way and when I talked to him I discovered I have dialogue options! Unfortunately they're the vague kind where I only get to see the gist of what Kent's going to say instead of the exact line, so conversations are more about mining for exposition than finding excuses for comedy.

The window cleaner isn't going to bring the cradle down until Kent gets him a cup of coffee, but it's going to be a challenge for me to make him something that isn't instantly lethal. Kent's tap has a warning sign above it, his kettle's covered in green and his milk is so disgusting that he wouldn't even put it in his inventory. Wait, I just remembered that I'm carrying milk substitute (white paint), so maybe I can pull this off after all...

The window cleaner actually seemed to appreciate the unique taste of Kent's coffee! Well he survived it at least.
 
Now I'm getting some proper exposition, as they're talking about why the sky is grey and the sun hasn't been out for 30 years. But I wasn't 100% happy with the view, so I quit conversing to relocate myself somewhere I could get a more interesting angle. This turned out to be a mistake, as he just brought the cradle down and vanished. Exposition denied!

I should load a save game, but I'll have to figure out how first (or check the manual). I'm fairly sure it must have autosaved by now though.

Well I'm finally out of Kent's flat, but I'm still confined to a few empty streets. He could squeeze past those barriers, but he knows better than to try it. When a Norm says 'stay out', that's what you do.

I did end up reading the manual and I've been playing around with all the buttons I've learned about. Now I can look up a bit, zoom in, run, and check the map! Still no strafing though.

Hey this is the place from the intro that Kent got arrested at! I should be safe though as long as he doesn't whistle or try to do anything.

I've been trying to open doors but they're all locked and boarded up, with the club shut down because of a "risk of excitement". I feel like most times I've seen an authoritarian government impose conformity in a story like this things have generally been a lot cleaner. This isn't the grey sterile kind of conformity, this is a city that's been decaying for decades.

Though it didn't seem like a great culture even at its peak, judging by what was on at the cinema a decade or two.

I hope you're appreciating this nice sharp pixel art by the way, as it took me bloody ages to get Kent standing in the right place to make all the text legible. The game's not keen on texture filtering.

Here, you may as well have the other posters as well.

Kent's got something to say about everything I look at, and his voice is pretty irritating in a way that suits the script perfectly. Though I've noticed him and other actors putting the emphasis on the wrong words at times.

Seems that Interplay wasn't as keen on their performances, as they replaced the cast for the US release, hiring Corey Feldman to play Kent. The version I got from GOG actually has the original British voice actors, which surprised me a little, but after comparing the two I think Kent's equally annoying in both of them. He just emphasises different wrong words in the US version.

I didn't realise until now, but this city looks really British, especially that street sign. Which is weird seeing as the window cleaner had an American flag on his cradle. I guess he did declare himself a Free State.

This is the end of the road though, as when I tried walking further, Kent said I should try using the map instead. I probably should as well, as it doesn't seem like there's anything else to do in this block. There was a moment of excitement when one of the doors on Letsbee Avenue actually opened, but all I found up there was a sinister robot watching the door to my own flat and making sure I've still got the TV on.

Something about this map doesn't quite fit in with the art style of the rest of the game...

For one thing it's properly 640x400 resolution, instead of 320x400 doubled on the X axis like the 3D graphics.

It looks alright, but I think it would've been smarter for them to have matched the colourful cartoony style of the rest of the game. It would've at least made it a bit more obvious what locations I can click on.

Anyway, into the loading vortex!

There you go, I got you an ugly distracting GIF after all.

The Plush-Rest factory looks... nice. The music's gotten even worse though somehow. It's like the game's trying to put me in the mindset of someone who was tortured with elevator music in prison for days, and I wish it'd stop.

There's nothing stopping me from going straight inside and asking for a job, but first I'm going to sweep the car park, and everywhere else. I've already found a few items out here, so the game's not going easy on me and keeping its puzzle solving confined to the smaller indoor areas.

It's a nice change playing a point and click adventure from first person view, but man there's a lot of ground to search.

Hey I've found the dumpster! That means I'm already up to Step 3 on my list ("Find the group of like-minded individuals in one of the dumpsters.")

Though I can't seem to find a way inside the thing, so it seems I'm still going to have to get a job and snoop around.

I had a bit of trouble getting hired at first, as they're looking for larger applicants and I'm a skinny little git, but I directed the receptionist's attention to my t-shirt and she decided that I must be qualified after all!

It's a good thing they put the job requirements on their Teletext ad, so I was able to make the appropriate preparations in advance. (I found a t-shirt with "I Am Fat" written on it in Kent's flat and put it on. I didn't even need to shove a pillow under it, though I brought one with me just in case.)

Hey nice face.

Kent makes a good point about the 2D sprites in this, as they really do spin around to face me. That's not so unusual for a 2.5D game, as most of them have the pickups, barrels, creepy statues etc. constantly face the camera because they were only drawn from the front. But characters in Doom and Duke Nukem 3D were given enough frames to turn away from the player and that doesn't seem to be the case in this. Even the receptionist is constantly staring right at me as I walk around the room.

In the artist's defence, drawing sprites from multiple angles is boring and takes ages.

Uh, okay what am I doing in here? I'm supposed to be snooping around but I can't do that while I'm stuck in this hospitality niche.

I tried messing around with everything, got a drink of terrible water, and found a mysterious gizmo in the couch, but nothing seem to be helping much. The gizmo just whispers to me quietly when I hold it up to my ear.

By the way, there are two things here you don't typically find in DOS era first person games: shadows behind objects and a stereogram image. One of the reasons random-dot stereograms don't show up in many 2.5D games is that the dots all shift and disappear as you walk around! It's enough of a struggle to read a regular image in this engine.

But I want to know what the picture's of dammit!

I tried ripping the texture the best I could, but it's all random dots so who knows if I got it right. I can kind of see an 'N' symbol in it, like the Norm cop was wearing in the intro, though I've been staring at blue dots, texture ripping tutorials and the inside of this bloody room for so long it's possible my poor brain's just started making things up at this point. Let me know if you can see anything yourself!

The only thing harder than deciphering the dots on the wall is figuring out what the game actually wants me to do here. What do I have to do with the coffee machine, the water, the TV, the plants and the sofa to get them to let me into the rest of the building to do some snooping?

Whatever I did with the coffee machine this time made him knock the water over and slip, which got someone's attention and got me into the factory! Turns out that falling down on my ass was the solution all along.

Hey, it's supposed to say "I Am Fat" on his t-shirt right now! He's gone back to his normal 'Kent' shirt, which also happens to be his name. I was I was cool and edgy enough to pull off putting my own name on my t-shirt... maybe I could settle for a little badge with 'Ray' on it or something.
 

Seems that most of what these folks do is sit on furniture until it breaks, that's why there's a broken chair over there in the display cabinet, protected by an alarm. It also means I've entered the fat joke zone, with a 'New Porker' magazine on the wall, an emergency cheeseburger behind glass, and an 'Are You Fat' machine in the corner..
There's a really annoying voice talking gibberish coming from something, probably that machine in the background, so I'm going to go snoop elsewhere. Shame there's no escaping this bloody music; the soundtrack is a test of will.

Further on I found mock-ups of different rooms, each without any real furniture to sit on. Makes me feel like I'm shopping for wallpaper.

Someone should make that into a game: Shopping Simulator. With free DLC for real shops so you can stick your VR headset on and browse the virtual shelves looking for things to actually buy.

I've pretty much completed step 1 and step 2 on my list now, and these conveyor belts lead to the dumpsters outside, which is where I have to be for step 3! All I need to do is disable the deadly spinning saw blades and I can ride one over there.

Trouble is the controls are guarded by that waste engineer over there, and he never leaves his post... unless there's furniture debris in the building that needs picking up. He informed me in his best Sylvester Stallone voice that it's important for them to collect and destroy every trace of their damaged furniture to prevent their secrets from getting out.

So I need to go smash something to get his attention. Or get that pre-smashed chair from the display cabinet.

I've found a bed, but they look like they're built to last. They're also built to vibrate in a way that sends you to sleep, but this one's got a missing plug. Fortunately I just picked up a battery... that Kent doesn't want to wire up to it.

When I try using the bare wire he says "I can't do anything but connect something to it, but what?" and when I try using the battery he says "It won't work as it is, it needs connecting to something." He's so close to working this out!

Man, I hope I picked up all the items I need from my flat before I left, I really don't feel like backtracking down all the streets looking for a plug or something.

Oh no, don't tell me that one of these lockers might open! Now I have to try every bloody locker here and get the same message each and every time. There's another 15 on the wall behind me, plus I've seen them elsewhere too.

There's a bit of a discrepancy between the number of NPCs here and the number of lockers, but this guy explained to me it's because they're all on strike. They're protesting against being replaced with automation by all going to bed, and I'm too sleepy to spot any obvious flaws in their plan.

I could do with a plan of my own though. Mission: Impossible came out the same year as the game, so I'm thinking I need to re-enact the famous scene where the hero hangs from a vent in the ceiling to get to the important item without setting off the alarm. Granted the movie came out only a month before the game, but it was probably in the trailers!

Now I just need to find a way to get into the air vents.

Well I won't be getting in down there, as this guy won't let me past without a badge.

There's something very Judge Dredd about this game I reckon. It's got a similar British humour to it, and also cops dressed in fascist costumes being mean to people. Not quite a Mega-City though.

I have made some progress, as I found that annoying gibberish was coming from a radio and nicked the 'current sender' that was powering it wirelessly. This seems like a crucial element in my plan to power this bed for no reason... so of course Kent doesn't want to connect it to anything. Fuck it, I'm checking a walkthrough.

Oh, it turns out I'd actually picked up two gadgets, as I also have a current receiver in my inventory. Kent swiped it when I examined the radio.

Well this makes way more sense than just attaching the wire to the battery.

I've no idea what powering the bed has achieved... but I do know one NPC who's still awake and wants to join the strike! I don't know how letting him sleep is going to help me at all, but I'm just doing everything I can do.

Oh, he just says "I don't speak to wimps," now when I talk to him. Okay I'm checking the guide for a second time because I'm really stuck here.

Huh, I'm supposed to go to the toilet? But I can't, the door's locked, I already tried that.

Oh, there's a second toilet right next to the kitchen again. What an interesting architectural quirk.

By the way doors in this are very easy to open, but apparently impossible to close. I just have to wait for them to shut on their own.

I think I can figure out the next bit by myself though, as there's an open air vent in the ceiling and I've still got a broken chair I need to grab in the other room. I still need to work out how I'm going to lower myself down to the display case, but I'll wrestle with that conundrum when I reach it.

Oh, he uses his stretchy arm to grab it.
 
Now what do I do with the debris? Can't give it to the waste engineer, can't put it in the waste dumpster. Can't put it anywhere in fact as Kent "doesn't want to make a mess." But that's exactly what I need to do! I'm trying to lure a guy away from his control panel by making him pick up my mess.

I know, I'll try putting it on the bed I just powered. Maybe then it'll look less like mess, and more like a piece of came off when I lay down on it.

What, that actually worked? That was the real solution, seriously?

Uh, I mean I totally expected the waste engineer to immediately fall asleep when he leaned over to look at the bits of broken chair. That was my plan all along.

I reloaded an old save game just to see what would've happened if I hadn't wired up the bed first, and he just comes over, collects the debris, and that's it. Chair's gone forever it seems. I have no idea if it puts you in an unwinnable situation, but it doesn't look good.

Right, the waste engineer is asleep, which mean I've got the conveyor belt room all to myself!

Before messing with the controls I decided to try grabbing the fire extinguisher first, and got this message saying I need something to hold the buttons down. It's like the message for the conveyor control panel came up for the wrong item.

I checked the walkthrough one last time out of curiosity and it turns out that I'm supposed to use the fire extinguisher before I leave here, but I was able to hit the buttons to turn off the grinders and ride the conveyor belt into the dumpster just fine without using it to hold them down. Have I broken the game or something by doing things out of sequence? Am I trapped in an unwinnable story now?

Oh, I'm an idiot! The fire extinguisher has buttons on it! I'd found instructions for using the fire extinguisher! My brain didn't even register that as a possibility. I still don't know what I need to use it for in here, but I don't care because I've finally reached my dumpster. Success!

So this is what success looks like huh?

Judging by the walkthrough, I am now 3 13ths of the way through the game, which seems like a good place to stop. But this woman would really appreciate if I'd go get two new objectives done for her. I'm to get a video tape played on TV and paint a statue yellow at a mall.

I suppose I should as least go down there to have a look before I turn the game off.

Oh, damn! Could this be the most beautiful and perfect screenshot I've ever featured on Super Adventures?

No, it couldn't be, but I'm impressed by how each new NPC I meet in this game outdoes the last. This one even comes with a dog! Looking at this image it's hard to image this being a 3D scene you can walk around in, but it is. The sprites keep facing you as you walk, but you are walking around them.

This is just outside the mall, so I'm going to pop my head inside for a moment and then I'm definitely turning the game off.

No, I'm Ray! And I'm not fed up, I'm just a bit tired and bored is all.

It's never a good sign when you find a message on the wall of a supermarket saying that their food products have been discontinued as they're now stocking 'food' instead. How are these people even still alive? Is this guy still alive?

Anyway, I'm turning this off now. I don't want to be here anymore!


CONCLUSION

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Normality is basically Duke Nukem 3D, except with inventory puzzles and dialogue instead of jumping around and shooting aliens. And it's set in a satirical dystopia that's somewhere between Judge Dredd and one of those episodes of Doctor Who from the 80s made when Thatcher was PM. It would've been called The Normality Police or something.

Somehow from the title I expected the game to be about the protagonist rebelling against a dull lifeless world and enforced mediocrity, and it kind of is, but the city's only lifeless because it's falling to ruins due to absurdity and bad leadership. It's a bloody weird kind of normal they've got going on, but then I suppose anything can be normal once you've put up with it for long enough. That's the trouble with it though, as I felt like I was putting up with the game. It's not a very pleasant place to be in, especially when I struggled to find anyone or anything I could care about or want to be around. It doesn't help that the music is relentless, making the world even more miserable to be in.

Sure that's the point, as it's a strange black comedy, but I didn't find it all that hilarious either, except in a 'I'm definitely taking a shot of that bloke and his dog' kind of way. It hasn't been laugh out loud funny, more 'what the hell?' funny. The plot's basically an excuse for the artists to have fun making things horrible, and the game's cartoony visuals are both terrible and amazing, like it was designed especially for me to take screenshots of it. In fact at the time it came out the graphics were actually cutting edge... for maybe a couple of days until Quake came out. It was released just as 3D accelerators started to become a thing and 2D sprites in a 3D game became archaic overnight. But I can appreciate it for what it is. In fact I can imagine an indie game pulling off the same look and gameplay today.... well, maybe without the motion captured pre-rendered cutscenes, those seem kind of expensive.

I haven't played many first person point and click adventures which have Monkey Island style inventory puzzles instead of Myst's messing around with mechanisms, but this shows they can work just fine. The main flaw with it is that it feels like there's so much more opportunity to miss essential items scattered around in one of the large outdoor areas. Then again I had similar worries while playing Escape from Monkey Island, so I suppose it's more of a 'large outdoor areas' problem than a perspective issue. I was happier at the start when I was exploring Kent's gross little flat, comfortable in the knowledge that I definitely had all the items I needed right next to me.

I find it hard to judge puzzles, because I find it hard to solve puzzles, then I get frustrated and lose my patience. But I didn't feel all that satisfied even when I was making progress in this, so I feel like the solutions weren't as logical as they could've been. I'm definitely not impressed that it made me get a wireless power transmitter to connect a wire to a battery, but I did like how it let me use the pecking bird on the remote so I suppose it's not all bad! I can imagine that people with more of an interest in the genre would have more of an interest in it, plus the tenacity and endurance needed to try every daft idea until one finally works. Or they'd at least know where to find the best walkthroughs.

So my final verdict is that if you want to play an adventure game that looks like this, you're probably going to have to play this as it's kind of unique. Just don't expect any first person shooting, don't expect to like anyone, don't drink the water and don't bother the timid fish. Also make plenty of saves.

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Thanks for coming by and reading my words. I'll have even more words for you next week, but I can't give you a clue to what game I'm writing about because I'm not writing about one!

You should still leave me a comment though, I'm always happy to get feedback.