This is the most awesome game I've played since Monkey Island 3. I really mean it, it is totally fantastic. I could not stop playing and I got sooo sucked into the game. The atmosphere is fabulous. I can not criticize the game not matter how hard I try. The music and the art is totally fantastic and the gameplay feels very smooth and perfect! This is what I call creativity, it can not be more creative than this. I bought the collectors edition immediately and I love having the hint book/story book in physical form. Jesus, this is awesome. I will play this once every year for the rest of my life! The puzzles are extremely creative and the "card puzzle" is the most awesome mini puzzle I have ever played. I was in tears of joy when I played that puzzle. Wooow!!
I started the Ultima series with this game and I fell in love with it because it had very beautiful environment and the music is superb! There were some bugs in the game, but it's not a big deal. You maybe have to use the fly cheat to get the virtue stones from the altar when merging the items together because it sometimes get stuck in the air, but except from that I didn't really find any relevant bugs. I actually love almost everything with this game so I don't understand all the haters out there. When I finished this game I started from the beginning with Ultima 1,2,3,4 and 5 and I finished them all. Very good games all of them, though I used walkthrough most of the time since I didn't want to spend 1000 hours. I just wanted to see what happened before Ultima 9. When I came to the 6:th game I couldn't stand the graphics. That made me never complete 6,7 and 8 which is a pity. However, this is a great game with fantastic music and I really like the story and the puzzles as well.
The thing about Cryo games is that they give you an extremely mysterious feeling that somehow glues onto your mind forever. I was playing this as a kid and maybe it is not the best game out there on the market, but it really has something special that other games do not have. And if a game give me that feeling, I really enjoy it. I just finished it now again and it was as good as back then, Take it for what it is and don't compare it to other games. This is an unique experience and the "depressing" world is really enjoyabe. Definately worth a try!
I've been a great fan of all the Atlantis games ever since 1997. Of course the first two ones are the "originals" in my opinion and they are still supreme. The rest of the series are also very good, but I mainly just play them because they belong to the series and gives some small hints here and there on the whole Atlantis story. When you play Atlantis 3 you must understand that the only part that is "for real" is when you're in the desert. While entering the portal world, everything is partly imagination and dreams and a greater force is connecting these dreams with reality. Same as in Atlantis 2 where the pathfinder guy is telling you "Well, for YOU, this is real" (or something similar). Atlantis 1 was 100% real and both 2 and 3 is connected to the first game in some very abstract ways. You will not really get proper answers on anything so you have to come up with your own understanding of everything. And that's what makes this game great as well. Use your learnings from the previous games and try to connect part of them to get more understanding. I still don't really get that much even after all these years, but I love them because of that. The biggest disadvantage with this game is the very abrupt ending. I'm always expecting something spectacular like from the first two, but this just ends when you're looking for the goose bumps. I try to see it like this: "It's just a sub-story of a random archeologist that get in touch with the Atlantis world, you should not care much about her. Now you know a bit more, go play Atlantis 4 and 5 to see what will happen next".
Don't listen to the other reviewers on this game. They are probably born in the "graphics age" where you only appreciate good looking games with 2010 standard. If you are an introvert person I'm sure you will love this game more than any other game because it completely sucks you into the world of Atlantis and you get very close to some of the characters. At least I have dreamt about this world multiple times because it just gets stuck in my head. I can't describe with words how much I like Atlantis 1 and Atlantis 2. These games are my soul mates, they have changed my life and I play them every year almost and they are always the same and I never get fed up. The music from these two games are the best game music I've ever heard and the world is very exceptional and creative. I don't know what the other guys are talking about here. Buy this game now! I can understand that you may not be impressed when you see the game the first time, but just play it for a couple of hours. Give it at least 4-5 hours before doing any decisions. Amazing game!
