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Another World: 15th Anniversary Edition (PC CD)
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5/5 |
They don't make them like this anymore...
(May 16, 2008) |
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First off: you're in luck if you played Another World when it first came out and have been wanting to play it again on your modern computer. It is a very faithful remake that can run at high resolutions (1440x900 on my machine) and with remastered sound effects. It also comes with a Making Of... which I have not watched yet, but I am sure is very interesting.
Onto the game itself:
This is a sophisticated and atmospheric action adventure game with outstanding rotoscoped animations and beautiful background art. Its unique style prevents it from ageing too terribly, and some of the gameplay mechanics still seem innovative to me. For instance (I do not think this is a spoiler) near the start of the game you drop down into a zig zag ventilation shaft, where jets of cold gas spurt periodically downwards at certain points. This is fairly standard, but the shaft is dark and you can only see a small portion of the screen, so you're forced to inch along, waiting for the sound of the gas stream to alert you.
The game has a steep learning curve, and many gamers will likely die multiple times within the first few screens. Some of the puzzles and traps are unforgivingly devious. Fortunately this remake has increased the number of check points, so you won't have to do much backtracking if you do die. The intriguing setting and gameplay spurred me on, and I think that will be the case with most patient gamers.
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5/5 |
Great game...nice to see rerelease but WHY NO MENTION OF DELPHINE!!!
(September 24, 2007) |
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Am I the only one who feels a great injustice has been done to that marvellous software house of my youth DELPHINE who developed and released this game along with other classics like Flashback, Future Wars and Operation Stealth (aka The Stealth Affair). This innovative company doesnt get any credit on the packaging, no mention...ok so the designer Eric Chahi does but who put up the funding and released it...shame! I still remember you DELPHINE!!!! (and Magnetic Scrolls, Sierra, Cinemaware etc etc etc...whos with me on this one!) |
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5/5 |
BLOOMING FANTASTIC
(May 20, 2007) |
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An Excellent little game, i had never heard of this and just came across it as i was looking for a old school platformer to play on Windows Vista. It has what looks like really basic graphics but it just brings the world alive. I cant really explain it well but this game is really cool. Go and buy it....... NOW! |
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5/5 |
Awesome game!
(March 18, 2007) |
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My dad had this game on his Commodore Amiga, and it is without a doubt one of the greatest games of all time! Me and my brother absolutely loved this and we both played it to death!
To those who have never played or even heard of this game before, you play the role of Lester Chaykin who has been zapped into a strange alien world by a lightning storm whilst doing an experiment at a laboratory. The world he has entered is a very dark world full of deadly creatures, traps, slavery and war. You eventually befriend an alien (who you meet early on as your cell mate as you are eventually captured), and together the two of you must try to escape the city of which both of you are being held.
The reason why this game is such a favourite among many gamers is because of one thing... the sheer imagination! The amount of effort that was put into creating the alien world is fantastic. All of the locations and creatures are beautifully realised, and although the graphics look dated the superb animation still shines through today as it did back in 1991. Even the tiniest details, such as Lester opening a can of pop, still makes me smile.
But it's not just the brilliant world and its inhabitants that make this game great. The game's atmosphere makes you feel like you are Lester himself. Every scene in the game is packed full of little details. One example is that in the first scene, as you are walking across a land full of rocks, you can hear the wind whistling in the background. Occasionally the screen will also shake and you'll hear a rumbling sound, as well as seeing small rocks falling in the background! :)
Another thing to note is that because it is set in a dark alien world, you'd expect it to be scary right? Well guess what... Another World succeeds at that too! The beast that drops down in front of you still scares me today, and the caves scene is still downright frightening as they are very dark and you always have a feeling that there will be some kind of nasty monster lurking around the corner.
One final thing I would like to point out is the wonderful music and SFX by Jean-Francois Fretas. The SFX is absolutely amazing in this game, right down to the firing of the laser gun! Music wise, there are only two tunes played throughout the game (the intro and the ending), but both of them are fantastic. They capture the feeling and essence of the game perfectly, and are the most memorable tunes ever produced for a video game. In fact, I am humming the tunes right now as I type this!
This game puts most modern games to shame. If your knowledge of retro gaming is restricted to the likes of Sonic, Mario, Pac Man etc, try this out and compare to games like Sonic 1 (ie games released in 1991). You will see that this game is vastly different, and why it is loved so much.
Despite me finishing the game about 100 times, I still bought this set as I still love this game to bits after all these years. I urge those who don't have this one in their collection to buy this immediately! |
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3/5 |
'Another World' shows us how far video games have come...
(March 07, 2007) |
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When I first played 'Another World' it was on the Mac and it was a demo which included the intro sequence and a small playable portion of the game. At the time, I was really just a small child but despite that I recognized what a significantly different game this was to what I was used to playing. The intro sequence for instance was cinematic in its direction and the graphics being used were state-of-the-art at the time. Nothing like this had been much seen within video games before. The merging of interactive gameplay and cinematic story telling was born here in a very basic sense and the influence of such a breakthrough technique has been felt far and wide through out the games industry ever since. Games like Metal Gear Solid owe a little bit of kudos to 'Another World' as a pioneer of this type of cinematic gameplay. As a historical artefact, 'Another World' is an interesting piece that tells us how far the industry has come.
However, does the game still stand the test of time? To put it another way, is 'Another World' a classic? To that I answer simply 'no'. The graphics are extremely rudimentary by our standards today and consequently look extremely poor although the art direction itself still remains very good. The sound and music also show themselves up as dated but they are don't add significantly to the games detriment.
No, the main problem is the gameplay itself. Trial and error gameplay went out a very long time ago and it's no real surprise why. To repeatedly visit the death screen after dozens of deaths because you have no clue what to do and are just randomly trying different options is just one of the most frustrating experiences a gamer ever has to face. Nowadays luckily he doesn't have to face that experience at all since developers got wise to the fact that trial and error is just. not. fun. It doesn't test a players skill, only their patience.
Unfortunately since most of the game consists of trial and error gameplay the fun factor is hit hard and the only real satisfaction the player can get is from successfully getting out of a situation he's been languishing in for what seems like forever but usually this sort of success comes across as a sort of fluke, not as any real test of intelligence. The feeling of achievement is also dampened by the realization that one will probably have to go through this process all over again in another 15 mins time. I should also note here that there are some puzzles which are so reliant on assuming the player to perform a certain action that it can make the solution impossible without a guide if the player does not do what the game anticipated he would.
There's also a point in the game which relies on another near-extinct game mechanic, frustrating jump sequences. There is a part where the player is being chased by a torrent of water within a tightly enclosed space and has to jump over gaps until he reaches the end point. Now this sequence of gameplay doesn't take that long but because of the way the game progresses via 'scenes' (i.e. the onscreen character moves from one side of the screen to the other until he moves into the next 'scene' where the background changes and the character is moved to the other side), it makes predicting these jumps horribly difficult because the scenes switch too fast for the player to ascertain where the gaps will be before he jumps.
These are my main complaints of the game. They may even have been considered tolerable in the time it was made but today they are of such bad game design they would be completely unacceptable.
So to conclude, if you're feeling nostalgic or are interested in the history of video games then you might want to consider picking this one up as an item of curiosity. Anybody who never lived through this period of video game history or anyone in the market for a really entertaining experience should stay clear, you will probably be wasting your money. |
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