Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Harbinger

Original Release: 1996
Developer: Stormfront Studios
Publisher: Viacom New Media
Platform: MS-DOS

DS9 Harbinger is a Myst-style adventure game. Each part of the level is made up of still images, with you clicking the edge of the screen to move around and turn in very limited places. This allows the game to look very impressive visually, especially in screenshots. The 3D models of the characters look vert impressive for the time and everyone is wonderfully voice acted, using the original cast of DS9.

You play a diplomat named Bannick, called to DS9 to assist an ambassador in speaking with a new alien race called the Scythians. These aliens speak in an unusual manner and nobody other than the ambassador has been able to figure it out. As you reach DS9, you get attacked by drones (in an impressive FMV cutscene) and crash land. The drones stat building up to attack DS9. To make matters worse, when you visit the ambassador you discover that he has been murdered. You need to solve the murder, work out how to talk to the Scythians and find a way to stop the drones.

The part of the game on DS9 is great (once you get your head around navigating the station), with lots of conversation options and an intriguing mystery. Puzzles are mostly self-enclosed, leaving you to focus more on the narrative mystery.

In a few parts of the game, you have to man the weapons of DS9 (and a runabout). These sections are just click to shoot, but are surprisingly difficult and not fun at all.

The latter half of the game, once you leave DS9, is much more of a challenging puzzle game like Myst, where you have to navigate a maze (not easy due to how you move, working out how to ger around DS9 was difficult enough), and is very much a chore, especially as you have large periods with no talking. That said, working out how to trick the AIs in charge and talking to them towards the ends is a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, they couldn’t get the full cast of DS9 for this game, so O’Brien and Bashir are said to be on a mission (Worf hasn’t joined the cast yet). You do get to spend plenty of time with Sisko, Odo, Dax, Quark and Kira, though, so there’s still a lot of interaction with the crew.