The Manhole (CD-ROM Masterpiece Edition)

My young son has autism and he loved this game. He found it fun and it made him laugh and explore and try new things. He discovered new areas of the game and this made him proud himself. My son could not tie his shoes or cross the street but he could be very successful playing this game. My thanks to the creators of this marvelous game that helped my son feel good about himself.

I loved this game when I was younger, and was very happy to recently acquire this updated version of the game. It doesn't play on my new MacBook Pro, but it does play on my old eMac, so long as I always set the monitor to the 256-color mode before playing. Since many years have passed, and because this isn't the same version as the original, though, playing this game is a different experience than it once was. Maybe I'm just remembering things differently because there's a tendency for disconnect between childhood memories and experiencing the same thing through an adult lens, but I seem to remember there being a lot more to do in the original, and things being a bit more interesting. Now I can go through the entire thing in under an hour, unless I choose to just keep going around in circles and exploring everything multiple times. Some things from the original are still the same, and some things are new, which I liked. I also like the nod to the original, when the rhino on top of one of the chess pieces says she was a flamingo in a previous life. Still, one must keep in mind that this is a game from 1995, remodeled from a 1988 game. Of course it might seem a bit boring or primitive by today's standards for computer gaming, children's or otherwise. While some of the scenes look really good in color, like the pool on top of the beanstalk, overall it just doesn't feel the same. Not only are my memories of a black and white game, but that black and white animation and illustration really set the mood for the bizarre surrealistic otherworldly feel of the game. It's also a bit jarring to see totally different artwork (particularly for the dragon!). I don't know if the voices are the same; I don't remember certain of the voices as having been so annoying when I was a kid! Still, I am almost 30 years old now, no longer 8-12 years old like when I was first playing the game. I'm sure it still provides hours of entertainment and fascination for the intended age group, and I will keep this game for my future child(ren) to play and enjoy like I did.

My son started with the original version in B&W. He was ! year and 3 months old. Sweet, simple and easy--he loved it. About a rabbit that goes down a manhole and you click on objects in rooms he finds and have fun and meet interesting characters. Beautifully, simply done: A CLASSIC MUST HAVE.

This was the first game I ever played; at the age of four, I made my venture into computer games with the old, b&w version of the Manhole. I found it to be at once both addictively intriguing and disturbing -- nothing in this game is at all scary or frightening, but it gives one a feeling of the mysterious and space-warpingly strange. And what more can one expect, from the creators of Myst and Riven? I can definitely see some pre-Myst ideas creeping into this game; the fact that it has been re-made into a 3D version only serves to enhance the realism and immersion of this "children's game". Regardless of whether you are a child or an adult, you will never tire of this game; it has taken me years to fully understand it. It is one of the last great games for children -- devoid of pink flowers and bouncing bunnies, and instead populated with fascinating, yet incredibly diverse characters one can tell have a real purpose to being there.