Tex’s Lament

I keep a DOS machine in the closet for one single purpose; to play “The Pandora Directive.”

This was a computer game/movie from the mind of Chris Jones (Tex Murphy) on the Access Software label. Access Software was gobbled up by Microsoft (note to Bill, Microsoft is a registered Trademark of Billy Boy’s empire.) Microsoft bought Access software, in my opinion, because its golf game sucked and Access’s was good. However, in the process, they murdered Tex Murphy. They wouldn’t even sell the games they didn’t want and had no intention of continuing. Evil.

The first Tex Murphy game I played was “Under A Killing Moon.” That was pretty good, and I wanted more. I got it in their next release, “The Pandora Directive.” Many paths, different levels of experience, and lots of fun. After hours of working my way through the game, I was rewarded with a song by Richie Havens, which is the title of this post – Tex’s Lament. Tonight, I found a video of one of the alternate endings that I thankfully never saw. You had to be a callous human with no regard for humanity to get there, but the performances by Suzanne Barnes and Chris Jones are captivating. And it’s all wrapped up with a song from Richie Havens — Tex’s Lament.

The decision to case Suzanne Barnes as Chelsee Bando was a great part of the success of this game. I, too, wanted to follow the “Mission Street” path and win Chelsee’s heart. All too often, I ended up on Lombard Street: still friends with Chelsee, but she went home with someone else, or alone. One of these days, I’ll make it to Mission Street.

After The Pandora Directive, I wanted more. Unfortunately, the followup, “Overseer,” bombed because they abandoned tried-and-true technology for pie-in-the-sky promises. I’m bummed that I never finished “Overseer.” I don’t think I got more than half-way through it, and that was a shame because the story and concept were very good; the interface and technology sucked.  I just couldn’t fight my way through the interface anymore.