B.A.T. (Bureau of Astral Troubleshooters, original title “Bureau des Affaires Temporelles”), developed by Computer's Dream and published by Ubi Soft, is a French futuristic point-and-click adventure game with some role-playing video game elements. It was released in 1989 and available on several home computer platforms, such as Atari ST, Amiga, and PC. Later, a single programmer released a version on Amstrad CPC.
There exist several differences between the implementations of the game on different machines, some of them being due to the machine limitations, some others being due to a choice of the developers I presume:
Amstrad CPC: No sound at all.
Atari ST: This version was shipped with a 16-channel sound card which was required to play the game. Although the game made use of only 4 channels, it includes a fully digitized musical ambiance and sounds. The music changes, depending on the places that we visit.
Amiga: Although the Amiga has more musical capabilities than the Atari ST, this version is very disappointing. First, the tempo of the intro music was literally halved, leading to a ridiculously slow and boring intro. Nobody can explain what the guy in charge of this disaster was thinking when he thought that it was a good idea. Second, although the songs are the same as in the Atari ST version (but they are not played in the same places), they are musically less rich.
PC: The songs are not digitized, but synthetic, and totally absent in some places. In addition, there are no sounds when fighting, which is weird.
Note that, the Amstrad CPC version deserves some praise, given the limitations of the machine and that it was adapted by a single person.
The purpose of the game is to find (and kill) the mad scientist Vrangor who escaped from jail, and who is threatening life on planet Selenia, of which Earth has become dependent. Our only lead to Vrangor is Merigo, an inmate who escaped with him. Thus, Merigo must be found (and killed) first.
The details of the solution change with each new game, and there are several possible ways of finishing a given game:
For instance, the woman in the night-bar tells us that she heard about Merigo from a guy of some specific race that changes (glokmups, kradokid, skunk, or stickrob). This guy may reveal himself when asking him a question “about Merigo”, in which case he will give us an appointment at the musem at some specific time. He may also reply that he never heard that name, but may respond when showing him Merigo's hologram, in which case we have to give him some krells in order to “stimulate” his memory. In some cases this indicator possesses a Xifo card (the place where he saw Merigo) which we can buy or steal, but sometimes he doesn't so the card must be obtained differently (bought or stolen from someone else, or found by “looking” or “searching”). It is also possible to get information from a guy of a race different from that told by the woman in the night-bar, but the information might be incomplete (like, the guy will say Merigo “spends his time indulging in carnal pleasure”, but won't mention at what time. The time is important because Merigo shows up at that place everyday at the same time.
In order to rent a drag (vehicle adapted to the extremely desert conditions), we have to pay over 5000 krells. We can obtain this money either by stealing and selling items, or playing the Bizzy game in the arcade, of by receiving it from Lydia's friend, Crisa Kortakis. The latter option should be chosen because Crisa Kortakis will also give Lydia a jewel that serves as a key to find the “Epsilon radar decoding device” after going through the maze in the ancient ruins. This device makes station Epsilon where Vrangor is hiding appear on the drag's radar. In principle, it should be possible to finish the game without having to go through the maze, hence without the need of Lydia's jewel (and therefore without the need of meething her), but the odds of finding the station without using the drag's radar are very slim.
It might be possible to finish the game without meeting Sloan, the guy who challenges us in the arcade, if we can find some access card that would allow us to access the airlock (I haven't checked that, let me know if this is really possible).
The probability to randomly find our way across the maze in the ancient ruins is nearly zero. The only working strategy is to build a map, which allows us to try all possible ways. The path across the maze depends on whether we are playing the Amstrad, Atari ST, Amiga, or PC version. One thing confusing is that, after going through a door, we don't always end up facing the direction in which we just went, so it is hard not to get lost:
If, right after crossing a door, there is no door on our left, no door on our right, and no door in front of us, then the door we just crossed is behind us. This is what one would expect.
If, right after crossing a door, there is a door directly on our left or our right, then it means that we just came out of this door. Very confusing!
The Atari version is even more confusing: If, after crossing a door, a door is right in front of us, then this is the door we just crossed and we have to keep progressing backward.
Walkthrough for the Amstrad CPC version
This section is under construction.
Walkthrough for the Atari ST version
It has to be mentionned that all versions of the game on all machines were censored, except the French Atari ST version. In the uncensored version, Lydia is a prostitute (she asks to be paid) with who we must sleep and perform well in bed in order to make her want to stay with us. In the censored version, Lydia doesn't ask for any money and we only have to dance well with her. The censorship is ridiculous, though, because all we see is a bed. We don't even see the people in it. How can one be so stupid? Seriously, people who make those stupid decisions about censorship don't deserve to live and should be entitled to death penalty!
Download the disk images and watch the complete longplay for the Atari ST below:
The Amiga version came later than the Atari ST version, which should have given the developers the time to make some improvements, like the night bar and the gunsmith are open only during certain hours. But, for some reason that nobody can understand, the developers decided to use that time in order to brainstorm on how to make the songs worse. That's sad, but this seems to be a recurrent thing with developers: They like to release new versions of their software that are worse than the previous ones...
Download the disk images and watch the complete longplay for the Amiga below:
Solution to B.A.T. (Bureau of Astral Troubleshooters, video game)
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This section is under construction.
