Wishbone and the Amazing Odyssey Analysis.

   How do you do, 

   For the first review of a computer game, I chose one from my childhood that I played endlessly from grade six onward. Wishbone and the Amazing Odyssey was a game for Windows 95, produced by Palladium in 1996 (making this twenty-two years old, but since I have other things turning twenty the nostalgia won me over for this entry), featuring Wishbone, the famous Jack Russell terrier pup with a big imagination. Wishbone had a television series already, on the verge of being renewed for another season when the game came out, and a series of books that either featured a plot of Wishbone and his human friends encountering a situation similar to a book he read, or there's be a book that is based on the classic work done in a format for children to read. I once had two of the latter, one of them being The Odyssey by Homer (which became one of my favorite stories when I was twelve years old). Wishbone had played Odysseus once, in the episode of the series called "Homer Sweet Homer", though it covered only a small part of a larger drama.

    For background, Homer's epic, The Odyssey was composed more than two thousand years ago, in Ancient Greece, as the story of the return of Odysseus as ruler of Ithaca. Much of known story is told in flashback by Odysseus himself, with the greater part dealing of his son, Telemachus, searching for him and the two returning to remove pestering suitors to Penelope, Odysseus' wife. As with any epic from Ancient Greece, the gods play a role in this one, with supportive Athena and Poseidon opposing the hero, plus several characters of mythical origin like a cyclops, a group of giants, and a witch, plus a journey into the Underworld. When we think of such epics that have all that, we might be thinking of recent fantasy works like The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and even Star Wars, but The Odyssey predated them all. Along with its prequel, The Iliad, The Odyssey has held an enduring power in as the adventure story of a generation, which is still felt with each passing generation, inspiring many clones and imitations, like the Roman poet, Virgil, doing his with The Anaied, to the film O Brother, Where Art Thou? in which the setting is placed in Depression Era South. So, this game is basically one of the latest retellings. 

     As an eleven year old boy upon first playing it, I found it marvelous and exciting. Now that I am a man, having read Homer a lot and some critical works on his poems, I know there were a few things changed in the game, but it hasn't lost its attraction in the slightest degree. 

    The game set is simple. Wishbone is showing the viewer the virtual library and a new computer called the Electronic Pictographic Interactive Combopulator, (or EPIC 3000), which is supposedly something like the old VCR for books (twenty years later, we have books on computers and tablets, yet we still don't have something like that). It's never explained how it works, just shown with Wishbone putting in a book and the scanners bring up the image on the screen. Yet, when Wishbone has some trouble, he tries to get his copy of Homer out, only to wind up inside the computer. Now, Wishbone is inside the computer, animated, and placed in the role of Odysseus, and it's up to the player to get Wishbone out by playing the epic. 

    As a computer game, certain liberties to the plot are taken, just like with Dune did a few years prior with its material, the namesake book by Frank Herbert and the movie. Because many details of the Fall of Troy are not in the epic, there is not much done for the Troy scene, other than get Wishbone on the boat and shove off. The character Eurylocus, who only appeared in two books (chapters) is expanded upon as something of a lazy sailor who has to be made into helping Wishbone out. At least, he is kept his character of the epic in his cowardliness. The Lotus Eaters part is dropped and the journey goes straight to the Island of the Cyclops, where there is an out of place temple of Athena with a broken statue. Athena is given a larger role as well, appearing early in the epic and she gives Wishbone her Palladium (in case anyone didn't know, another name for Athena was Pallas), to which a hint will come when clicked on (three times, to be exact, but it's advised not to overuse it), and to tell Eurylocus to get his butt in gear at one point. 

    Great care to keep it child friendly is another thing in the game. The Cyclops, Polythemus, is made a little more comical and his eating of crewman made less graphic (though still done on the screen). The game is a choose-your-own adventure set up, and one path leads to trouble. In this case, chose to let the Cyclops nap after drinking some wine until he wakes up will lead to him eating everyone up, which is covered by a black out. By the same token, if the real name is given and the other cyclopses arrive, another black out is done to hide those neighbors crushing the Cyclops' tormentors. In the epic, Odysseus and his men make a spear and drive it into the Cyclops' eye, which is too violent for children. So, Wishbone puts a blue carpet over his head, which some how hurts the Cyclops' eye and renders him blind (yet the Cyclops never thinks of pulling the blanket off). This is just the beginning, of course. When on the Island of Circe's, Aeaea, we don't see Wishbone turned into a pig, if one doesn't get the right flower on. The same with Elphenor's death being done off camera, or the eating of crewmen by Scylla. When one chooses to let the men eat the cows, we are also spared of the butchering of the cattle, instead shown the bones and men clutching their full stomachs. Even in times when Wishbone is killed, it's done in a way to not scare the kids too much and even give a chance to revive him (but declining that chance ends the game). Remarkably, the setting of Hades is kept it's dark side with even the Palladium not working at one point (plus the scary noises to remind one what Tartarus is about).

   Other changes are less scary. Circe is shown to be somewhat seductive, yet helpful. I like Wishbone's reaction to her being a witch (if possible, I'd have a meme of Hermione Granger rolling her eyes at what he said). Then comes Tiresias, the Blind Prophet, who comes off as a gramps caricature in a tunic with a staff and Agamemnon is shown to be a bored spirit who turned his fame making war into a game (kind of like if President Grant decided to do the same with the Civil War). Even Calypso is shown to be depressed and pitiful, which makes her seem needy at one point. In a strange inversion to mythology, Agamemnon awards Wishbone with a coin after being defeated, which he should have given to Charon upon entering the Underworld. Telemachus doesn't do any traveling in the game. If anything, his and his mother's roles are the ones reduced in the game. Even Poseidon appears early in the journey, instead of late, which actually works as a plot point (I can't figure out why he waited years before confronting Odysseus about how his son, the Cyclops, was hurt). The god's anger at Odysseus becomes the plot point of the epic in the game and basically makes the odyssey possible. 

    Besides the characters, the plot line is changed so one can visit Calypso's island of Ogygia before the Island of Thrinachia, thus showing Scylla and Charybdis as the obstacle to bar the way, though they don't show the Island of Sirens at any point. That part makes good sense, when one thinks about it, as Calypso is meant to be a concealing entity and what better way to conceal than to have something dangerous between her and the outside world. However, this means that the crewmen have to live and be with Wishbone on the island, but none follow him into Calypso's cave, in fact no one goes anywhere with Wishbone after the Cyclops. At the same time, it provides Thrinachia as the turning point that decides the game because it merges two separate islands from the epic together. In the epic, Odysseus stops by Aeolus, master of the winds, and he gives him a bag with the four winds. However, the crew opened it before they reach home and they are blown off course. Later, when they reach Thrinachia, they come near to wade out for help, only for the crew to do wrong by eating Helios' sacred cattle, resulting in them being killed and only Odysseus left alive. Because Aeolus is not in the game, they decided to merge the two together where one could get the winds blowing the right way while dealing with the temptation of beef. I'm sure the Old Bard might know of this from the afterlife and thinking how he could have had it done the same way. Also absent are the Laestrygones, a group of giants who eat humans and destroyed Odysseus' fleet, as well as the Phaecians. The giants are kept out for the sake of keeping things child friendly, and to avoid making it redundant with the cyclopes. The Phaecians are excised to speed up the plot. Even the cameo of Menelaus and Helen are kept out for the same reason (and Helen was the reason for the Trojan War, ergo the reason for Odysseus to be away from home, in the first place). 

    Finally, there are characters and situations not in the epic. Using Circe's magic torch, you could navigate a forest and bring Wishbone up to Mount Olympus to actually talk to the gods, in an effort to get them convinced he is worthy of entering the tower. Odysseus never actually visited Mount Olympus in the epic. Athena and Zeus never had a moment of that convincing needed as they could see for themselves. Besides, regardless of how one goes through the dialogue choices, the doors will open (Zeus does say "I will open the way" at one point, a play on words). When Wishbone is killed, one gets to meet Pluto (not the dog, but the God of the Underworld), who should have been called Hades, yet is given the Roman name to match up to his status as the unmentionable, and to avoid confusion between him and his realm (Disney's Hercules came out later and actually used the Greek name). Either way, he is not in the Homeric epic, but there is a point in the epic where Odysseus prays to Persephone (who also never appears in the game). One god in the epic is not in the game, Hermes the messenger. In his place, Athena comes down to warn of Circe and suggest the Moly Plant. Athena is also called upon to convince Calypso to release Wishbone (removing the seven years of imprisonment to a few minutes). One last character who is not in The Odyssey is neither god nor man, but an animal. It's the Duck; a white one that was keyed in during the prologue and just hangs around for no purpose other than to quack when clicked on. That is, until near the end when getting a key to the storage pit requires the Duck's help, though getting the key from the Duck requires help from another duck (shown black like Daffy). Duck's sex is never said in the game, so Wishbone refers to the Duck as it, though the chasing off by another duck could imply it to be a female "harassed" by a male, or a male by a female, or what have you. Still, Wishbone says it best early in the game when he says, "I don't remember reading anything about a duck in The Odyssey." There is a dog in the epic, however, who never shows in the game. Odysseus' dog, Argos, who waited years for his masters' return only to die upon seeing him. The only reason for the exclusion is one, Wishbone is a dog and there wouldn't be room for two, and two, that part was tragic and wouldn't be suited for the finale.

     Besides the liberties with the settings and characters, the game comes with puzzles. To get Athena to help, you have to build her statue, and offer a sacrifice (yet one wonders why doesn't the statue count). Another puzzle is figuring out the flowers in Circe's garden, and how to get to them with the Big Bad Wolf in the way. Third is getting an alternative to cows to feed the men, as well as opening the tower. When shipwrecked on Calypso's island, you also have to repair the ship to sail (though I learned it could be used even without Calypso's sail). Finally, there's getting the bow to prove Wishbone is Odysseus. These puzzles, of course, exist to advance the plot. There are also games within the game. First, Circe challenges Wishbone to checkers, where the pieces are pigs. Next, Wishbone takes on Agamemnon in The Trojan War where to win one has to fill up Troy with blue pieces against the pink ones. Though you overwhelm the pink pieces by a large margin, they can jump the blue pieces like in checkers, while they can't be jumped by the blue. The final game is the shooting the arrow through the axes where the axes have to be aligned so the arrow hits the target. Lose in this one twice and you lose the entire game. Should Wishbone meet Pluto, he faces him in a snakes and ladders style game without the ladders, but with plenty of snakes, in order to be revived in the land of the living. Wishbone can collect coins and bypass them all on the River Styx. Losing in this game also ends the game, and this one is only accessed when Wishbone is killed. In the end, three of the four can be replayed after winning the game.

    When one has completed the game, Wishbone is sent back into reality and the player is awarded a plaque. On this one sees his rank from row man as the lowest to hero at the highest (all based on how many crewmen are killed, how many times Wishbone dies, and how often one sought Athena's advice). I got hero more times than any other ranking when I played this game, though getting the Hades game does make one lose the hero ranking for captain. From this point, the player has the option of starting all over again, or explore the library, which gets one introduced to Ancient Greece, its mythology, Homer, and many other things. In one place, you can watch clips of "Homer Sweet Homer" episode, or read Bulfinch's Mythologies, Wishbone's take on The Odyssey, and of course The Odyssey itself. During the game, you can come back for help whenever the menu slab on the bottom right corner side of the screen flashes a green light. One thing to date the image is the red phone that stands for America Online (AOL), which was a way to get on the internet from the game. Of course, that tied up the phone lines in those days. 

    Along with Bill Nye the Science Guy: Stop the Rock, Wishbone and the Amazing Odyssey was the right sort of game for kids in the 1990s and 2000s, being that it was educational and fun at once. It's a pity they haven't rereleased the game with an updated engine so it could work on Windows 10, or make it HD. It would be better than watching the game played on a video of YouTube, if you ask me, and wishing you could one thing different. Besides, a new generation of kids should be introduced to the little pup with a big imagination as well as Homer's epic, and this game is the way to it.