Total Game Immersion!

[GoldenFjord]

The other night, I decided I might play Riven. I hadn’t so much as looked at it for several months, and as I sometimes do, I thought I might think differently of it a second time round. After playing it for roughly ten minutes before boredom set in, I managed to count two good things about it. It looked pretty, and well, it looked pretty. But then, I decided to play ZORK NEMESIS. Halfway through the intro, I began to feel extremely cold, and had a sudden urge to get a blanket. I got goose bumps as I sat in the “thousand fingersâ€

[Fantine]

I must admit, I like games where I feel immersed in the story.  Titanic: Adventure Out of Time is a good example of that as well as ZGI (I haven't had the honor of playing Nemisis yet.) Where you feel like you're actually there...I think the highest compliment one could pay a game is "that would make a great movie".  Or a great book for that matter. (Who wouldn't want to read novelizations of all of the Zork Games? And not choose your own adventure versions, either, lol.)

I'm going to have to have another crack at Riven and Myst. I can get them from the local library, but as with all their games they lack instruction manuals. Thank Yoruk for cheat pages on-line.

[DataAngel]

I agree GF, Riven just sucked lol, really no immersion.

But I remember WAY back in the day when I had played the demo for ZN, I was so in awe that I was so sucked in within less than 5min. I totally forgot about the world around me, VERY few games have ever done that, ZN did and always does and that is why I personally feel its the best adventure game of all time.

[Nemesis]

Wait...someone actually doubted that Nemesis is not a perfect game? This thread is stating the obvious, Nemesis > Myst.

[DrPaul]

Speaking of total immersion, have any of you guys ever played the Tex Murphy game Pandora Directive?  That game is on 6 CDs, has full-motion video, wonderful characters, and a real-time 3D environment that lets you go anywhere you want.  The game engine is a litle like the 1st-person shooter games but there is no shooting.  It is a pure adventure game.

Unfortunately, Pandora Directive is an old game (DOS or Win95) and doesn't run well on new hardware.  (Lots of unresolved IRC conclicts).  But if you have some old hardware and can find the game I most highly recomend it for complete immersion.

[DataAngel]

yeah I played it and recently sold it to someone, it was pretty fun yep, kinda hard because they used all areas on the screen and things could be above or under a bed etc. like that piece of cloth on the poll outside the door above the metal staircase heh.

[JDS]

Yeah, it's odd that Myst allways keeps yelling in your face 'total immersion' and 'let the world become yours' and 'whoheee, linking books, let's make another fly-by-thingy, before they think we have story and whooohaaaa, let's buy another 2.3 gighertz CPU's, killlaaaaah!' things, whilst I never got such a popi-feeling around Nemesis. Nemesis is the best game ever.
Yeah, and with me it the 1000-finger chair was just so impressive... The whole place. I remember drinking some kind of tea at the moment, and everytime I drink that tea again, I get shivers but the game was far too short if you look at it back...

[nitek1982]

MYST has aged BADLY.  Will it kill Broderbund/Red Orb/etc to bring a full-screen version of this game to the market?  A full-screen version might provide incentive to play this otherwise aging austere nightmare.

[DataAngel]

full screen? umm all the games were full screen...

Speaking of Myst... Uru isn't that bad, I played a demo and quite liked it, but since my friend ordered it I will wait to see what he has to say...

One thing I CAN say about the game is that it FEELS like the original myst game but 3D, in other words for the most part the game feels dead, like you are in the desert and yet the plants don't wave in any wind, you don't see dust storms or dust blowing or rolling plants etc. its just there and nothing makes it feel alive, theres a few things that ARE animated, but it doesn't make up for the huge lack where if added would have made a huge difference.

[nitek1982]

Okay, how does one take advantage of Myst's full-screen mode?

[DataAngel]

please rephrase what you mean by fullscreen, because to me thats NOT windowed mode but fullscreen. This does not imply the game stretches to fit higher display resolutions, so you may only see it at 640x480, but its still fullscreen, just not a higher res. change your display settings and then run it, then it would be playing at 640x480.

[zorket]

I know this topic was posted back in November - but it is still so current!  I just finished playing Syberia - beautiful graphics, but such a let down.  The puzzles are sooooooo easy - you don't really need a brain.  And it left me with so many questions.  #1 - Why was Kate Walker so STUPID???

So, now - we (my game groupies) are playing Nemesis again as well.  

Zork never disappoints.

[DataAngel]

The first half of syberia was really good, its the second half I thought was lame. It starts out being prett realistic and just a touch of fantasy which was fine. Then the second half and its ENTIRELY fantasy which was lame. They should have made it clearer it was ALL fantasy or made the transition from reality to fantasy more believable.

As for her being stupid, I don't recall that... I mean YOU are playing as her, so if shes so smart then you wouldn't need to be playing would you? ;-}

Yep Zork never fails!

[3rd_DM_of_Zork]

GoldenFjord said: "I’m almost driven to say that Zork Nemesis was wasted on a game – the content was so good, it should have been a film!"

You know, I always thought there should be a Zork movie. Anyone out there an independent film maker? There are alot of movies that were just small independent fims but when they were shown at the Sundance Film Festival most were pushed to the big screen. I used to create title and credit sequences for independent films so if anyone wants to make a Zork movie I'll do the title and credits. It would be cool if it were based on the first game-with the White House, the cyclops, the thief (as long as you don't kill him with the rusty knife), and all the other things that made Zork I such a fun game.