The Dame Was Loaded
A nonlinear detective noir with live-action cinematics.
The Dame Was Loaded is a first-person point-and-click adventure game released for MS-DOS and Macintosh in 1995. It was developed by Australian studio Beam Software (not to be confused with Krome Studios Melbourne, which was a separate entity) and published by Philips Interactive Media. Set in the 1940s, the game is a detective film noir that blends live-action cinematic sequences with pre-rendered point-and-click gameplay.
Players take on the role of Scott Anger, a down-on-his-luck private detective hired by a woman named Carol Klein to find her missing brother. The case soon becomes entangled with a series of murders and a bank robbery. The game is nonlinear, offering nine possible endings, and features over thirty fully acted and voiced characters, with more than an hour of fully performed cinematics. The live-action footage was produced by Vixen Films and directed by Jo Lane, and at the time of its release, it was the largest multimedia production ever made in Australia.
Critical reception was largely negative. A reviewer for Next Generation gave it one out of five stars, criticizing the use of still images instead of full-motion video for most character interactions, the low difficulty, and what they called a "cheesy, ersatz Maltese Falcon story." Scott Gehrs of Computer Game Review wrote that despite an interesting premise, he could not recommend it even to mystery fans. Quandary noted that the game's real-time nature, particularly its timed puzzles, was a major drawback for many adventure players.
Quick Facts
- Title
- The Dame Was Loaded
- Developer
- Beam Software
- Publisher
- Philips Interactive Media
- Designer
- David Giles
- Director
- Cameron Brown
- Writer
- Mark Morrison
- Released
- 1996
- Genre
- Adventure game
- Modes
- Single-player
- Platforms
- MS-DOS, Macintosh
- Producer
- Beam Software, Philips Interactive Media, Vixen Films
Facts from the source article.
Lore & Background
The game follows private detective Scott Anger, hired by Carol Klein to find her missing brother. The case becomes connected to murders and a bank robbery. The game is nonlinear, offering nine possible endings, over thirty fully acted and voiced characters, and more than one hour of fully performed cinematics. The live action was produced by Vixen Films and directed by Jo Lane, and was at the time the largest multimedia production ever made in Australia.
Reader's Guide
The Dame Was Loaded is notable as a large-scale Australian multimedia production of its era, combining live-action film with interactive gameplay in the style of earlier titles like Under a Killing Moon and Myst. Its nonlinear structure and multiple endings were ambitious for a point-and-click adventure. However, contemporary reviews were largely negative: Next Generation panned the use of still shots instead of full-motion video for most character interactions, the low difficulty, and the story, scoring it one out of five stars. Scott Gehrs of Computer Game Review could not recommend it even to mystery lovers. Quandary criticized the real-time nature of the game and its timed puzzles, which were considered anathema to many adventure players. The game thus stands as a commercially and critically unsuccessful example of the mid-1990s trend toward live-action adventure games, remembered more for its production scale than its gameplay or reception.
Did You Know?
- The game was the largest multimedia production ever made in Australia at the time of its release.
- It features nine possible endings.
- The game combines live action cinematics with pre-rendered point-and-click gameplay.
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