Copyright © 1998 Balmoral Software (http://www.balmoralsoftware.com). Portions copyright © 1996 Corel Corporation and Kutoka Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, redistribution or conversion is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Balmoral Software. Contents subject to change! For the latest information, see http://www.balmoralsoftware.com.
The Cassandra Galleries is a mildly-diverting game of "49 challenging puzzles" that probably shouldn't be considered outside of the bargain bin. Most of Cassandra's puzzles are in fact quite trivial, usually solvable merely by trial and error or by answering a few questions of the "quiz show" variety. Any challenge the puzzles provide is further diluted by a wealth of clues or outright answers easily found in the game. Generally, the puzzle design in Cassandra is nowhere near as good as in other puzzle titles such as Jewels of the Oracle or Clandestiny.
The "plot" of the game, consisting of nothing more than video-clip "payoffs" at the conclusion of every seven puzzles, centers around a search for a couple of people missing from a large mansion/museum. Many of the handsome rooms in the house have no real function except to hold a few clues, quite easy to spot. In addition to the house, seven external "worlds" await your exploration, but each is essentially a single room. FMV acting in the game's video clips is okay (except for some poor accents), but tends to be rather long-winded. The appearance of the clips is very grainy. Although the central character indicates you'll be able to ask questions of other people you discover as the game progresses, your interaction with them is completely passive.
Graphics are in the tried-and-true Myst-style slideshow, with just a few, very-jerky movement transitions. Backgrounds are rendered at relatively low resolution, with many things appearing just a little too "shiny" to be realistic. However, the music in the game was enjoyable.
Cassandra has the annoying (but unfortunately not unusual) requirement to start only from the first CD-ROM. A game control menu is conveniently accessible using the spacebar. The game simply failed to run at all under Windows 3.1 - always producing PROJECTO segment load failures - so Windows 95 may be a requirement.
Activate each "world" by placing the appropriate objet d'art onto a clearly-highlighted pedestal in the corresponding gallery (see map). The arrangement of art objects in the studio is:
Part I: Art Deco Modern Victorian Medieval Part II: Oriental Ancient Nostalgia
Artists/paintings puzzle. In this puzzle, you must select the work of art associated with each famous painter. Although the remaining unsolved painters are selected randomly, the paintings cycle periodically, so even if you don't know all the associations, you'll eventually solve the puzzle by trial and error.
Olympics puzzle. Kutoka's solution to this puzzle appears to be inaccurate - the summer Olympics in Paris were played in 1924, not 1928.
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
Alpha-wits puzzle. These are fairly obvious hyphenated words, with some of the answers a bit questionable:
a-frame b-side c-saw d-day e-mail f-111 g-string h-bomb i-ou j-walk k-rations l-shaped m-c² n-yc o-d p-brain q-tip r-rated s-curve t-square u-turn v-chip w-w2 x-ray y-mca z-zzzz
Pure sound puzzle. Select the correct identification for each sound. The large bottom button replays the sound. You'll eventually get six correct answers even by trial and error:
Top choice Correct choice garburetor ladder extended bacon frying bacon frying bearings in tin cup lottery drum machine gun machine gun hammer hitting tennis exchange mulcher laundromat drier blowing into microphone flag in the wind rubbing balloons rubbing balloons scooping candy plastic bag filing a nail counting money propane burner propane burner junk yard video arcade air exhaling fire extinguisher wiping feet fire bellows vacuum cleaner inside a tank skateboard skateboard parking meter tape gun conveyor belt cassette rewinding removing a nail removing a nail thunder wrecking ball party noise-maker fishing reel
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
Inventions puzzle. Another trial-and-error puzzle (unless you want to look up the answers in an encyclopedia).
Punch & Judy puzzle. A timed, multiple-choice quiz. Keep playing until you get six answers right.
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
Merlin puzzle. Answer six true/false questions. For each pair of consecutive wrong answers, you'll lose a point.
Alchemy puzzle. Solution:
Element Planet Copper Venus Electrum Jupiter Gold Sun Iron Mars Mercury Mercury Silver Moon
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
BC-AD puzzle. This puzzle is somewhat more difficult than most found in the game. You must provide ten consecutive correct answers to timed questions about whether particular events occurred before or after Christ. The following alphabetized question-keyword list may be helpful:
Alexander BC Ambassadors AD Archimedes BC Aristotle BC Art of Love BC Beade AD Bells AD Benedict AD Brutus BC Buddhism AD Cairo AD Carthage AD Charlemagne AD Cherry trees BC Chess AD Chinese ships BC Circumference BC Cleopatra BC Confucius BC Constantinople AD Cotton AD Damascus AD Daniel BC Decimal AD Dictionary BC Euclid BC Fez AD Florence BC Gaul BC Great Wall BC Hannibal BC Iceland AD Iron BC Leap year BC Library AD Lisbon AD London AD Marco Polo AD Mexican sun temple BC Ming dynasty AD Mohammed AD Nativity AD Novgorod AD Octave BC Orchestra AD Petroleum AD Plant juices AD Rome BC Rubicon BC Shirts AD Slovaks AD Socrates BC Su dynasty AD Sugar AD Theodosius AD Third period BC Venice AD Venus de Milo BC Virgil BC Wrestling BC
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
Tomb entrance. Enter the correct glyphs produced by solving all five puzzles in this world:
Sarcophagus. For an idea on how to open the sarcophagus, take a look at the calendar in the kitchen. It refers to Exposition 89, and contains a stylized 89 in symbols consisting of the digits 8 and 9 each reflected in two directions. To open the sarcophagus, you just set up the symbols for 1 through 7, left to right, where each symbol is a similar double reflection of the digits 1 through 7:
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
Then and Now puzzle. In these puzzles, you must arrange pictures in chronological order; most of the sequences are already in the proper order (or close to it). Since correct answers are retained after each attempt, it's a simple matter to converge on the correct order after a few tries.
Extreme close-up puzzle. These puzzles involve correctly identifying the material shown on the screen. Again, simple trial and error will eventually return the correct number of answers.
Hints to the other puzzles in this world can be found in the Cassandra mansion.
The endgame sequence (VIDEO7B.MOV on the second CD-ROM) is so anticlimactic and devoid of explanation, we wondered if we missed something. However, there are no alternate endings to the game.
In case you missed the brief glimpse of William Cassandra, replay VIDEO4.MOV on the first CD-ROM.
Copyright © 1998 Balmoral Software (http://www.balmoralsoftware.com). Portions copyright © 1996 Corel Corporation and Kutoka Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, redistribution or conversion is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Balmoral Software. Contents subject to change! For the latest information, see http://www.balmoralsoftware.com.