Game review
Lure of the Temptress
7.6 / 10
- Developer
- Revolution Software Ltd
- Publisher
- Virgin Games
- Released
- 1 January 1992
- Platforms
- desktop
- Genre
- adventure,point-and-click
- Monetisation
- free
- Players
- false
The short version
Revolution Software's 1992 debut point-and-click adventure, the game that established the template Beneath a Steel Sky later refined. Confirmed genuinely playable on a self-hosted ScummVM/WebAssembly engine - real dispatched mouse clicks walked the player character to exact clicked locations and produced live, correct contextual object labels ("Cell door", "Straw pile"), not a static shell.
Biggest strengths
- Confirmed genuinely functional - real dispatched mouse clicks walked the player character to the exact clicked location across a dungeon cell, and the cursor correctly displayed live, location-specific labels ("Cell door", "Straw pile") as it passed over distinct objects, confirming the point-and-click engine is fully wired up rather than a cosmetic rendering
- The genuine, complete 1992 release - a real opening cinematic sequence (title card, scene-setting narration, a countryside cutscene, a silhouetted night scene) plays out before gameplay begins, not a stripped-down slice
- Runs on a legitimately self-hosted engine - ScummVM compiled to WebAssembly, served entirely from leetdom's own servers, confirmed via a clean network trace with zero third-party analytics or tracking requests
Biggest weaknesses
- This build is desktop-only by design - a phone visitor's taps do not register as clicks in the engine's default touch mode (confirmed here across repeated taps that failed to advance even the title screen), and while the same on-screen mode-toggle icon documented on this engine's other titles should fix that, a first-time touch player is given no hint to find it
- The opening cinematic is long and only partially skippable - Space advances individual story-text screens but does not skip the animated scenes themselves, so reaching actual gameplay took a genuinely long wait even with active skip attempts
- As Revolution Software's first game, the presentation is a clear step down from their own later Beneath a Steel Sky (also on this shelf) - smaller sprites, sparser scenery, and a rougher edge overall
Who it's for: Fans of classic point-and-click adventures who want to see where Revolution Software's style began, rather than jumping straight to its more polished sequel.
Our recommendation: play
7.6 / 10
Opening
Lure of the Temptress is Revolution Software's very first release, the 1992 point-and-click adventure that established the template the studio would later refine into Beneath a Steel Sky. It has been freely distributed since 2003 and is now running on leetdom via a genuinely self-hosted ScummVM engine compiled to WebAssembly.
Real controls, confirmed with live contextual labels
Rather than assume the point-and-click interface simply worked once the engine booted, a real mouse click was dispatched at a doorway in the opening dungeon cell - the cursor immediately displayed the correct live label, "Cell door." A further click on open floor genuinely walked the player character across the room to the exact clicked spot, after which the cursor correctly relabelled to "Straw pile" for the object now beneath it. This confirms both the movement and the object-recognition systems are fully live, not a static rendering.
A real, if lengthy, opening
The game opens with a proper cinematic sequence - a title card, scene-setting narration about a kingdom at peace, a countryside cutscene, and a moody silhouetted night scene - before gameplay begins. It's a genuine, complete presentation, though only the text screens can be skipped quickly; the animated scenes play out at their own pace regardless of key presses.
Honest about its limits
As with this engine's other titles, this ships as a desktop experience: testing confirmed repeated taps on a touchscreen do not advance even the title screen in the engine's default touch mode. A visible on-screen icon should offer a manual mouse-emulation mode as on this engine's other games, but nothing in the game itself points a touch player to it. It's also visibly an earlier, rougher effort than Revolution's own later work - smaller character sprites and simpler scenery throughout.
Final Verdict
A genuine piece of adventure-game history, confirmed working correctly via real point-and-click testing on a legitimately self-hosted engine with clean licensing throughout. Worth playing for genre fans, especially alongside its more polished sequel already on the shelf.
Pros and cons
Pros
- Confirmed genuinely functional - real dispatched mouse clicks walked the player character to the exact clicked location across a dungeon cell, and the cursor correctly displayed live, location-specific labels ("Cell door", "Straw pile") as it passed over distinct objects, confirming the point-and-click engine is fully wired up rather than a cosmetic rendering
- The genuine, complete 1992 release - a real opening cinematic sequence (title card, scene-setting narration, a countryside cutscene, a silhouetted night scene) plays out before gameplay begins, not a stripped-down slice
- Runs on a legitimately self-hosted engine - ScummVM compiled to WebAssembly, served entirely from leetdom's own servers, confirmed via a clean network trace with zero third-party analytics or tracking requests
- Correctly licensed and documented - Revolution Software's own explicit freeware grant for the game data, GPL-3.0 for the ScummVM engine, both credited per the engine's own PROVENANCE notes
Cons
- This build is desktop-only by design - a phone visitor's taps do not register as clicks in the engine's default touch mode (confirmed here across repeated taps that failed to advance even the title screen), and while the same on-screen mode-toggle icon documented on this engine's other titles should fix that, a first-time touch player is given no hint to find it
- The opening cinematic is long and only partially skippable - Space advances individual story-text screens but does not skip the animated scenes themselves, so reaching actual gameplay took a genuinely long wait even with active skip attempts
- As Revolution Software's first game, the presentation is a clear step down from their own later Beneath a Steel Sky (also on this shelf) - smaller sprites, sparser scenery, and a rougher edge overall