Al Lowe Takes Escapade through "Torin's Passage"

by Russ Ceccola

Anyone who plays computer game adventures should know the name Al Lowe. No, not "how low," "hello" or even "'allo," but Al Lowe. He's the former music teacher turned programmer and game designer who has been with Sierra On-Line almost since the company's beginning. Most people know him from the "Leisure Suit Larry" series, but he has also designed Sierra's early Disney titles and co-designed the critically acclaimed "Freddy Pharkas, Frontier Pharmacist." Lowe's newest character and series were introduced with the Winter release of "Torin's Passage." The game marks a new direction for the irreverent designer, but still contains many examples of his puns and witticisms.

I was fortunate enough to join Lowe for a night out in New York City justified by the story you're reading right now. Despite what you might expect, the two of us hip dudes did not visit the peep shows and strip bars of Times Square as Lowe's lounge lizard creation, Larry Laffer, might have were he a real person. Instead, we had a more cultured evening of dinner at a fine Italian restaurant over which we talked about "Torin's Passage," followed by a performance of "Sunset Boulevard."

Still, silliness did prevail. We two wild 'n' crazy guys behaved during dinner, but we were reduced to snickers and giggles early in the show by a man with the most incredible sneeze we'd ever heard. I risked prosecution by the bootlegging police by recording the entire second half of the show in order to catch this unique sound for Lowe's next "Leisure Suit Larry" game. The result was probably the worst bootleg tape in history, but the mysterious hacker managed to deliver a performance on the tape worthy of being digitally mixed out for further duplication. Ahhh, the life of a journalist! I'm sorry, but it was just too difficult not to burst out laughing with the sneezemeister two seats away, despite the tragic scenes playing out on the stage. We were probably the only two people smiling in the audience at the point in the show when Norma Desmond shoots her young lover/houseboy, but who else but Lowe could find comedy in such tragedy anyway?

Take Me Back to the Classics

Lowe first explained his goal for the design of his new game: "'Torin's Passage' is my attempt to go back to an earlier, simpler time. You'll find that a lot of things feel like a throwback to the earlier 'King's Quest' games - back in the old days. It's got all the silliness and slapstick humor of the 'Larry' games without any of the adult aspects. It's a game that's suitable for all ages and it's a challenge for players of all ages. It's not a kid's game - for a kid to play by himself or herself. But it's great for a whole family to play together or an adult to play alone." This is certainly true, since the graphics and stupendous animation would keep any child entertained, but the puzzles (some of which are extremely difficult) would turn off most kids.

The first thing you'll notice about "Torin's Passage" is the incredible look and feel of the game. Well-done animation just works better than live actors. LucasArts's "The DIG" also proves this. "We used a couple of different graphics styles - several different things, actually. We did all cel-based, hand-drawn animation - over 40,000 pencilled cels. Our lead animators drew all the key frames. Outside animation houses in Croatia [like they have time for animation between shells?] and near New York City finished the in-between stages of the animation," Lowe explained.

A "Strata-spheric" Project

Since the game is the first of a projected series, Lowe had to give it a name that would be catchy on its own, but also served to introduce Torin to computer gaming. "The title actually has two meanings," he went on. "In one aspect, it's a rite of passage - a quest in the traditional sense. At the very beginning of the game, Torin's presented with a challenge. The entire game is based on that challenge. In another sense, because of the way I constructed the planet on which the game takes place, it's also a passage between worlds. The planet, Strata, consists of five planets that are nested, one inside the other, like the Russian nesting dolls. It gives us a chance to have a lot of variety in the backgrounds and variety with the animation and the characters. One world contains teeny people. Another world contains short, squat, hairy people. There's an entire mixture of people and situations - different animals that you can interact with, plants that talk and a lot of silly, slapstick characters."

Lowe then went on to explain the most basic aspect of Strata - its giant crystals. "The game's a passage between worlds in which you have to find out how to get from planet to planet," he revealed. "There are these ancient crystals the size of mountains that extend from the outside of the planet all the way to the core. Ancient civilizations of the planet used the crystals as a means of transportation between worlds. Torin has to find out how the crystals work. In any sequels - and I hope there are sequels - Torin would have to investigate other places through the crystals. One of the reasons I designed the game this way was so that there would be room to grow. There could be an entire line of products. There's even a love interest in the game that we could explore later." Indeed! Torin meets a princess in the game that opens his eyes to females and possibly turns him from an innocent boy into a Larry Laffer-wannabe.

Lowe then went into detail about the game's plot. I was rather surprised he told me so much, but it turns out that he gave nothing away that you wouldn't find out on your own or surmise from the opening movie for the game. "The simple story line is that you come home one day to find that your parents have been kidnapped by this evil sorceress, sealed inside this dream crystal and taken away to The Lands Below, which are rumored to be filled with evil people, malcontents, wackos and politicians," he joked. "You have to go down there and find a way to rescue your parents. In the back story, which I tell in the opening movie and short non-interactive segments at the beginning of each Chapter, you learn about a coup d'etat at a palace and a nasty uncle who attempts to murder the royal family, but misses the kid - who is later sent away to be raised Luke Skywalker-style. At the end of the story, Torin turns out to be the child who was the royal baby. He's the crown prince. The game details his passage from farm boy to heir apparent."

Not "Mystery Science Theater 3000" Material

When Lowe explained that "Torin's Passage" took place on concentric planets, I thought the game would be in the science fiction genre, but he quickly drove that thought out of my narrow little mind. "It has no science fiction aspects at all," he affirmed. "I just wanted to have a parallel universe that you had no preconceived notions about - who should speak, how people should move, etc. The first world is 'normal.' The second is a vertical world in which everybody lives in cliffs and uses steep stairs. The third world is rain forest-y. The fourth world is filled with lava and lava waterfalls. The final world is dark and mysterious, with interesting textures. Along with the plot and the way I'm trying to make it interesting, I also want it to be funny. For example, there are a pair of snails named Slim and Slime that want to go to the moat outside the city because they've been entered in the Moat Olympics in the Pairs Figure Sliming contest. So you have to get them over there. There are a lot of wacky, off-center things that you wouldn't expect."

So often in this industry, designers lose sight of their original vision and turn their product into an unplayable mess. That has not happened with "Torin's Passage." Lowe explained: "We have a bunch of gamers programming this game. Everything we liked about other games is in there and everything we didn't like is gone. Every time I proposed an interface change, there was a big fight because everybody has their own opinion about it. We came up with an interface that I really like."

"Torin's Passage" will appeal to Lowe's fans, as well as other classic graphic adventure game enthusiasts. After the design was completed and the box was on store shelves, Lowe began to prepare for Larry Laffer's next adventures in mediocrity. "I'm really looking forward to 'Larry 7.' I'm kind of Torin, uh, torn (I'll get a plug in wherever I can) between methods. I kinda want to do video girls, but I'm afraid that, if we do, we'll spoil it," he confessed. I have to agree with Lowe on that one. The animation not only works better than video in most cases ("Torin's Passage" is a case in point), but it also allows you to play around with the graphics and expressions in a much more exaggerated way. It's a challenge to make some animated women come off as sexy or sultry and to have others seem completely vacuous or phony. In most cases, the actresses in computer game and video game productions are highly unbelievable, even such seasoned veterans like Margot Kidder in Access Software's "Under A Killing Moon."

Future Farce

Lowe hopes to revisit Torin again soon, but he also would like to revive Freddy Pharkas for another round of adventure in the Coarsegold, CA of old. Another game of his that never made it out the door because it was too far ahead of its time, "Capitol Punishment," would be perfect for today's political climate, but Lowe has no time to revisit it with the next "Larry" on the horizon. "Now, with Pentiums and fast graphics cards, that old program might run OK," he jibed.

Some skeptics might say that there's nothing more Lowe can do with Larry Laffer, but Lowe clearly disagrees. "How many ways you can insult the poor guy?" he asked. "I hope to explore them all." Insults sometimes work in place of humor, but Lowe's best talent is the ability to inject humor into situations subtly and, in many cases, in such a way to make you groan over bad puns. "I put humor in a game by making the people that you meet strange. Torin is a nice, wholesome guy, but all the other characters are so off-the-wall," he said. I certainly agree with Lowe about part of his comedic skills, but there's more to him than just wacky characters. His timing is dead on and his general outlook on life provides him with the right frame of mind in which to create comedy without the crutches of vulgarity or ethnic slurs. Lowe is one of gaming's purest comedians, but don't take my word for it. Try out "Torin's Passage" and see if a few minutes go by and you haven't laughed out loud. I seriously doubt it. Still, I won't take the shots for those puns that make you groan. Send your comments to al.lowe@sierra.com. I'll stay out of that one.

Now that you know a little bit more about Lowe, keep an eye out for his future products and maybe even try out some of his older titles. Every game won't have as many high points as "Torin's Passage" or the later "Larry" titles in which Lowe honed his craft, but you'll have fun nonetheless. Thanks to Lowe, the silence is deadly for me inside a theater. I recently saw "Miss Saigon" and, like Pavlov's dog, half-expected the hacker from New York to let out a slurp-ptoo!-ecch during the quiet parts. Once again, I was the only person smiling during the on-stage tragedy, but this time I was the only one in on it since the other half of the snickering twosome was hard at work on his computer in Seattle putting Larry Laffer into new situations. Thanks for nothing, Al! Now I'll never be able to watch shows in public again!

Copyright © 1996 Top Star Entertainment, Inc.
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