Despite its shallow plot and short length, the game's great graphs and well planned puzzles amount for a fun experience.
Well then, by those standards, 'Destination: Treasure Island' is not a classic. But does it really matter? With some breathtaking graphics (despite a rather poor looking main character and matching female partner) and some of the most challenging puzzles ever found in an adventure game (that I've played, at least!), D:TI provides an entertaining experience, fit for pretty much everyone.
As I've said, the plot is rather shallow, with very little explanation being provided on the background of your character, Jim Hawkings, or the nature of his friendship with the old pirate, Long John Silver. You're pretty much thrown into this adventure, and only the sheer effectiveness of the puzzle progression is there to drive you forward.
Indeed, the game progresses as you solve a series of riddles, each with several clues as to what you are supposed to do. This may be in the form of finding the right item, or combining them, if necessary - the game has a nice compose\decompose items option that make the old inventory based puzzles harder, yet more logical - or hints to help you decypher and solve several different styles of quests. These are immensely varied, ranging from matching Mayan calendar disks, to adjusting swords as to raise a barred gate.
The game's sound is well done, both in the environmental aspect, such as the hammering of wood planks, or the 'sounds of the jungle'; and on the voice acting, though there are few enough characters on a 'deserted island'.
The graphs are amazing: the characters' skin glows, the beaches shine, and the caves are dark and murky, all made to 'feel' real life, while clearly making reference to the stereotypical pirate eras (I'm guessing all wasn't joyful in a pirate island...). It is also worth mentioning, that, unlike in some games, every interactable item is clear, visually standing out.
The gameplay is old-school, to say the least. Point and click... Ever heard of it? Yep, the same. It still works, you know... The cursor changes from the movement arrow to gears, to operate, or eyes, to observe, imediately as you move it over an interactable object. When something is lacking so that you can operate certain device, the gears are crossed with a red line. The camera angles are in full 360° motions around you, and you must only move your cursor to each of the four corners of your screen to pan the camera to that direction.
With all those characteristics, you can safely say that if only it had a more elaborate plot, and perhaps a longer gaming time, 'Destination: Treasure Island' could be amongst the classics of adventure gaming. Still, it has pretty decent graphics and a nice range of puzzles to get the player going on.
It is plain fun... So what if it's not a classic? It still has two out of three main characteristics to get an adventure gamer drooling. And I haven't got a problem with 'two out of three' games...