Yolanda
Yolanda is a fastpaced, even frantic platformer with a difficulty level only the extremely hardcore could face. You are cast as the daughter of Hercules who’s beauty has made the goddess Hera envious of her. Hera has placed a curse on Yolanda so that any man who falls in love with her will die within a week. The only way to stop the curse is if Yolanda completes 12 tasks like her father did. Dispite the dangers Yoland decides to set out and complete the tasks so that the curse will be lifted.
When starting a game you are asked to choose a difficulty level, wimp which gives you 7 lives and you can play the game normally. Hero mode gives you 4 lives and the level will change once you die so you will not have time to adjust to a level. Legend mode is extreme as it only gives you a single live to complete the entire game!
Each of the twelve tasks consists of severals levels, each of these is a single screen filled with monsters, platforms, ropes and whatnot and it’s your goal to get to the beast which turns into the exit. This isn’t an easy task though because just touching a monster will instantly kill you not to mention that most of the platforms, including the one you start on!, will catch fire a few seconds after you stand on them. Don’t expect to fight back either because the only options you have are running and jumping around. The difficulty level you select will make things even harder because when you die you are send to another level which prevents you from learning a level too quickly if at all.
Graphically there’s nothing to write home about either, the characters are very small and not very detailed. Many of the jumps you make have to be pixelperfect or you fall off, the only good thing is that high falls won’t kill you instantly. There is only one sound effect in the game as far as I can tell which is your dying scream and it’s very annoyingly high pitched or it might be that I just heard it too many times and got tired of it. Musically there also only one track and it’s a fastpaced one but it’s not too bad.
Sometimes, and really too many times, you come across games where you wonder what the developer was thinking when he was making it. Yoland is such a game, it has some good ideas but executed in such a way that makes the game incredibly frustrating. The difficulty level is extreme because of the hard jumps and the fact that the platform you begin on catches fire only a few seconds after you start the level which is unheard of. Are there any redeeming features then? Well dispite all the flaws I found myself trying the game again more than a couple of times which is most likely due to the difficulty level which is rare these days. If you fancy a (huge) challenge then give it a try but for most people this will be too frustrating to play for any length of time.
Overal rating: 4/10
This game was released for two different systems here are some notes:
| Amiga | Released in 1990. This one has an infinite life trainer but trust me it’s not going to do you a lot of good. |
| Others | This version is not available. Atari ST relased in 1990. |
| Date added | Dec-17-2010 22:18 |
| Name | Yolanda |
| Developer | Millenium Interactive |
| Publisher | Millenium Interactive |
| First released | 1990 |
| Genre | Action |
