Sentinel: Descendants In Time review:5 stars (A Must for Puzzle Lovers) - Once upon a time, the dominant culture in the world was the "Tastan Civilisation," a people so technologically advanced as to seem godlike to the ones who came after. The Tastans are gone, but they left behind them a number of tombs, which subsequent cultures take delight in exploring and often despoiling. All, that is, except for Tomb 35. This particular tomb is guarded by a "Sentinel:" an artificial intelligence defense programme that doesn't take well to folks barging in on her territory. Only one person has done so and come back to tell the tale. But now your sister is being held hostage by a crook who will only release her if you bring him something of the tomb's treasure. Can you go in, face the Sentinel, and get out again?

_Sentinel_ is the third game from Detalion, the company that brought us _Schizm_ and _Mysterious Journey 2_. And they just keep getting better and better. They've learned from some of the mistakes they made in the previous 2 games, and what we have here showcases many of their strengths and offers very few of their weaknesses.

As always, the graphics are amazing. A first person, MYST-style game, _Sentinel_ takes the player through eight distinct worlds, inclcluding a glacier-covered land of islands floating in the sky and an undersea realm. There is more animation present than in any game I've seen (except Myst IV). I especially liked the undersea realm for this; I spent quite a lot of time just watching the sea turtles and other creatures float past the windows!

Navigation is free-choice, 360-degree, as it was in MJ2. Some people had real problems with the cursor movement giving them vertigo and/or nausea. I didn't experience this, but the cursor WAS very touchy. It helped to moved very slowly. You can navigate with the mouse or with a combination of mouse and keyboard (w,a,s,d keys). The developers recommend the latter, but I used the mouse almost exclusively and had no problems. In some "go anywhere" games it's easy to get lost or confused, or not to know where to go next. _Sentinel_ handles this in two ways. First, in most of the realms a traveled path is evident, so that although you might go anywhere you're likely not to stray too far. The realms themselves are sculpted to ofer a logical explanation for limited access, with convenient tree limbs or cliff edges keeping you from wandering off. Second, when you get near a puzzle, an arrow appears near your cursor to indicate that there's something nearby. This was actually kind of annoying, particularly in areas where you might be standing between 3 or more puzzles and arrows pointed off in every direction. Fortunately, I found that when I zoomed into a puzzle and then backed out, all the arrows for that realm vanished. Don't know if that was meant to happen or not, but it worked for me.

Though _Sentinel_ offers the bones of a story, this is essentially a puzzle-lovers' game. Through your encounters with the _Sentinel_ you learn that she has some purpose for sending you to all these dream-like realms and that she has some task in mind for you. But the story is not very well-realised and is, frankly, kind of annoying in its presentation. As in MJ2, it is clearly an excuse for going from puzzle to puzzle. Gamers who like lots of story will probably not like this game as much as I did. But the puzzles are some of the best I've seen in a long, long time. There is no inventory. There are no sliders, mazes or math puzzles. There are no timed puzzles and you can't die. But there is a large number of mechanical puzzles, including one of the most complex I've seen since _Riven_. There are two things you'll want to know before you buy, though. Number one, a good third of the puzzles are sound puzzles and several of these require the gamer to be able to distinguish between sounds that are only subtly different: the same note played on different organ stops, for example. If you have ANY hearing problems, this will not be a good game for you. Number two, this game also requires the gamer to take a huge amount of notes, make maps and draw diagrams. A couple switch puzzles could only be solved by keeping track of the variations and using a logical process of elimination; you will never stumble across a cave painting that hands you the answer, even in disguise. A tolerance for a certain amount of busy-work is a must here.

For the rest, the game ran very smoothly and the interface was excellent. There are an unlimited number of save slots. Also, the game auto-saves at each new location and every time you exit. Load times caused a slight delay, but not too much. There's a built-in hint feature, but I didn't use it so I don't know how that works. Music was minimal. There was some conversation in cutscenes. The dialog was pretty terrible. The woman who voice acted the sentinel was okay, but Beni was awful. He also had the habit of making random comments from time to time--mostly along the lines of, "I'll save you, my sister!"--and I wished he'd get a grip.

I finished _Sentinel_ in about 15 hours spread over the course of about a week; though I liked the game a lot I found I could only play a couple hours at a time. Then I had to give my brain a rest. For gamers who love complex puzzles, this game is a must.
Sentinel: Descendants In Time Features:
Computer Games
Action
Adventure
Puzzle (Puzzles)
Strategy (Strategic)
Science Fiction (Sci-Fi, Scifi)
CD
Search for the truth on a dangerous quest for riches
20+ mind-bending puzzles with various degrees of difficulty
Beautifully created, colorfully rich 3D environments
8 brilliantly inspired, diverse worlds; built-in hint system
Non-linear style of game play

Sentinel- Descendants In Time is the CD-ROM version. The full version can be purchased by clicking on the "CLICK HERE TO ORDER" button below for around 19.99USD.