Syberia

While I really like games of this type, Syberia failed to draw me in. I got bored about halfway through and never finished. Some of the puzzles were good, others were dull. The landscape wasn't that interesting, and the story line didn't captivate. The several hours I played felt more like plodding than playing.

I'm relatively new to game playing so don't bring the sophistication that some reviewers do (eg, their fluent use ot the gamers patoi). However, I feel that the animation is great, and I liked the character of Kate, whose NY street savvy was not up to her encounters in Europe: she grows through this movie. The cell calls were annoying at first till I saw how they revealed her growth. I was put off by some of the accents (why did Helena have a passable Russian accent and yet the old wino cosmonaut have an American one: perhaps a subtle joke!?) I'm getting used to lots of pixel hunting in these games (eg, as in The Longest Journey), though finding it annoying at times. For the most part the clues were fairly self-evident, but some were very obscur and seemed irrelevant to the plot at that point (eg, why on earth would a "telescope" key fit the door to the Voralberg estate?). Some of the dialogues drive one crazy (eg, between Kate and obessive-compulsive Oscar) but the guidance menu was useful (eg, Mission). Not sure I'd bother with the sequel: like movies and novels, sequels don't usually cut it for me. I think that the maker of this game was poking fun in many different directions and I enjoyed that.

I like the atmosphere, a little bit like Prof. Layton, but I soon gave up because there is just too much running for me. It takes forever to get where I want to go.

I belive this game is hugely overrated. After so many years the only things I can remember about this game are beautiful backgrounds, lots of empty rooms (to showcase backgrounds?) and necessity to WALK A LOT (so you could marvel at the backgrounds again?). The rest (puzzles, story, setting) was mediocre. I do remember many details of games like Goblins / Larry / Monkey Island / Culpa Innata much better than this. I believe System Shock or Deus Ex w/o combat could still be better quests than this. It looks like devs thought: 'Well, we got nice concept art, let's make a game around it! And let's split it in two, to cash more!'. I would not recommend it to others. However, many love the game - maybe I'm missing something..

the 3D rendering engine could not be initialized I will try on progressively older computers in my studio to see if I can find anyuthing that it does work on and update this review if I have any success. But from my first attempt on my top gear system I have to call this a dud and warn people not to actually buy this game as it stands. There is a FAQ acknowledging this error but a fix has not been provided at the time of this writing.