Oddities 18: Equinox Weirdness

The Case of the Missing Director?

Equinox is a fantastic SNES adventure game, and one of my top favorites. But maybe not everyone else thinks the same way. Take a look at the name of Equinox's director in the end credits:

As you may know, "Alan Smithee" is the name used in movies when the director wants his/her name removed from the film, in order to be disassociated with it. So, this begs the question: Was Equinox's director ashamed of this game? Or is this guy's name really "Alan Smithee" and this is just a coincidence? Or is this a joke? Game developers are rather notorious for putting jokes and/or using strange nicknames in end credits. (Thanks go to Crawl and 1000 for pointing this out to me awhile ago.)

Go To Atlena Early

Awhile ago, I discovered what appears to be a mistake in Equinox that allows you to get into Atlena before you really should be able to. Perhaps this was intentional, but I somehow doubt it, considering the way the game is laid out. Normally, you absolutely must complete the current dungeon because the "spirit" of the dungeon's boss will block your way to the next level until its body is found and defeated. But there is an easy way to bypass the Deeso (Level 4) dungeon's spirit (Quetzalcoatl) and get into Atlena (Level 5) early. When you reach Deeso, walk along the coastline where the purple eggs are. You should see a small island with a bridge leading to it, just out of jumping range. However, by rotating the camera, you can reduce the amount of space between you and the island, and if you jump at the right spot, you should easily make it over there. The bridge leading to the island is part of the network of wooden planks and rafts that make up the Atlena dungeon's overworld. Just follow these screenshots if you're unsure where to perform this:


Stand right about here

Jump for it! You should easily make it!

Now, the question is, WHY would you want to do that? You still cannot skip Level 4. You will need the harp string you get from defeating the boss to proceed to the game's final areas. Well, you could get Atlena's weapon and spell early. It's also just fun to do something that you know you probably aren't supposed to do. :)

Here are a few bonus oddities from Equinox's story scenes:


Melkior? The villain's name was Morbius in Solstice, not Melkior!

Equinox is the only game I know of that has an ad for itself in the opening sequence.

And for you Solstice fans, here is a picture of the Shadax cameo (Shadax was the hero of Solstice):

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