Caught in a vortex that leads to the heart of New Atlantis, Curtis Hewitt, a young photo-journalist, becomes a stranger in a land of high-end technology and archaic faith - his mission is not only to return home, but to liberate the people of New Atlantis who live under the domination of ruthless go...
Caught in a vortex that leads to the heart of New Atlantis, Curtis Hewitt, a young photo-journalist, becomes a stranger in a land of high-end technology and archaic faith - his mission is not only to return home, but to liberate the people of New Atlantis who live under the domination of ruthless gods.
Sail the high seas on a 1904 freighter, steaming from the wilds of Patagonia to the bustle and security of New York... fly in a modern Atlantian craft filled with advanced Atlantian technologies, explore the rural village to learn Atlantian customs and beliefs, hide deep in the Atlantian forest where the villagers dare not go, brave an exotic and dangerous cave system, travel 8000 years back in time to discover the lost city of Atlantis... and journey to the magnificent palace where Atlantian gods live, to stand before them in judgement.
This is not the original game from 2004. It is a kind of a port to modern OS with many changes in the game play. For instance, it seems to be a simplified version of the original game. As I have seen from the first hour of playing, all the mini games which were part of the game play have vanished. It is a deception. Yes the original game has difficulties to play on modern OS but why creating a so bland version ? It is a lazy version of the game.
Not about the game, but only about the changes compared to the original version (the game was not released in 2004 in this version), which GOG offers without any indication of the restrictions:
- The control elements typical of Atlantis games has been exchanged to rather unlovingly designed versions. This applies to menu, conversation elements, mouse arrow
- All mini-games are gone
- Parts of the other gameplay are also missing, e.g.
- the lamp and matches are not used in the first chapter, it is immediately light in the room in which
Curtis lands with the rowboat
- the guards don't pursue Curtis in the scene after leaving the village
- Hotspots and the interaction with them as well as the scenes triggered by them are missing, e.g.
- in the village on the statues or the screen
- Back then, an animated environment in games was not common. In the original version, no grass moved, but after all, there were moving snakes, butterflies and insects. These animations are missing in the GOG version.
- The switch to widescreen is okay. This is not necessarily conducive to image quality.
- Once again there is no option to select the language, although five are offered. So if you think you could play in a language other than that of your Windows version, you will be disappointed.
(Only the "English" version can be downloaded.)
Anyone who knows the failed new version of Versailles II - The Testament - could get the idea that the same developers were at work. In the case of Versailles II, nothing was left of the game or the gameplay. At least some game elements have been preserved here, but fun is something else.
Therefore just 2 stars and rather no recommendation.
So far GOG only had released the full versions of the Cryo games - no matter if it was Atlantis I-III or Dracula. Unfortunately this time this is not the case. You get a butchered version (possible mobile port) with hotspots that can't be hidden and therefore destroy immersion. Instead of walking you zoom in and bend over. No optional subtitles in the cutscenes, puzzles from the full version missing. It is just bad and unfortunately I will refund this. Curation clearly was absent when this has been accepted.
Sadly,like some of the other guys here,I see that the game is not the original version!I bought it,expecting to experience the game I used to love so many years ago.Unfortunately,it isn't the same game!my 2 cents.
I haven't played the original release of this, but I have played the first three games and the first thing you notice is that the controls and interface has been clearly remade for touch screens. You can't just move your mouse to look around, you have to click and drag which is kinda annoying. With it come the intrusive interaction icons for moving to another place or interacting with stuff. They're always on screen, so there's a weird blue arrow popping out of the environment. Again because of touch screens. Touch screen adjustments also came to the dialogue options menu, which is now a big selection screen instead of the small box with icons. This is all "only" annoying as heck, but it gets worse.
The puzzles of this game have been pretty much completely removed. All you do is move around, pick up items sometimes, and use the items on something obvious. And that's it. If you expect anything else, or if you remember doing actual puzzles in the original, those are simply not there. Late in the game you are looking for five discs, there were puzzles involved including a dialogue based puzzle. Those puzzles are gone and so are the dialogues. The cuts didn't end there. You could interact with inconsequential characters as well, they didn't tell you anything useful, but you could talk to them. You can't in this release, and neither can you inspect items that aren't directly used for progress.
The story of the game is also a significant departure of the weird scifi mysticism of the first two games especially. It's pretty much a Jules Verne-like like journey to the centre of the earth but kinda uninspired. The first half of the game is escaping the guards in the jungle, but thanks to no puzzles it's kinda lame. Second half is less action, but since the game has no puzzles it's just about going back and forth a few times until the end of the game.
Microids really made a mess of this release.
