Equinox ROM

Similar to its predecessor, Solstice (1990), Equinox is an isometric arcade adventure puzzle video game featuring elements of platform and RPG, such as using a menu screen to swap items and weapons. However, it has a greater emphasis on action and adventure than its predecessor. The player acts as Glendaal, who traverses through eight dungeons to rescue his father Shadax from the imprisonment of Sonia, Shadax’s apprentice.

The dungeons traversed are Glendaal’s home Galadonia, the forest kingdom south of Galadonia named Tori, a desert with ancient remains east of Galadonia named Deesa, the underwater Athena, the swampy Quagmire, a sea-surrounded kingdom with a big tomb named Afralona, the Ice Palace, and Sonia’s resting place of Death Island. From smoke-puffing huts on the overworld, Glendaal enters the dungeons which contain an increasing number of rooms.

The first has 16 rooms, the second 34, third 45, fourth 47, fifth 63, sixth 75, seventh 71, and the last 107. There are 458 rooms in total, double the predecessor. Many of the rooms are barred by colored doors that must be unlocked with matching keys, except red herring keys. Apples provide extra lives, and progress can be saved by simply exiting a dungeon. In a dungeon, Glendaal moves at right angles looking for tokens shaped as blue orbs. Twelve must be collected to summon a boss, all physical manifestations of the spirits guarding the bridges to other lands in the overworld.

The bosses include a Bone Head that shoots ghosts; Dung Dung, a chunk of soil that pops out of the ground and shoots boulders; Pincha; Dollop, a blob of slime; Quetzalcoatl, a sentient pole-shaped statue made up of multiple blocks; Eyesis, a spinning pyramid; and Billy Bones, a ghost pirate captain that shoots cannonballs. Getting to the tokens requires navigating platforms, moving blocks, dodging spikes, killing enemies, and increasingly complex puzzles. The isometric perspective optical illusions form puzzles, based on determining the position of platforms. The rooms all have a single objective, and in some cases rooms must be done in a specific order.