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Davies · 10-04-2008, 05:58 AM

AMBER: Journeys Beyond

Just finished AMBER last night. Overall rating: meh. Worth playing, but only if you can get hold of it cheap or borrow a friend's. Surprisingly short and not very involving. The ending was abrupt and unsatisfying.

Without giving much away, the game involves laying various ghosts to rest. Each ghost is a separate mini-adventure, and although these can be played in any order, once you've started on one you're stuck in that storyline until you complete it. There is also an overarching framework story regarding the technology you use.

For a game based on restless spirits and psychic phenomena, it's deeply unscary. There is a vaguely spooky atmosphere in the beginning, while you're still exploring unknown areas and not sure what you might encounter, but you get blase pretty fast.

I think the intention of the game was for the player to become involved in the characters of the ghosts and sympathetic with their tragic stories, but there just wasn't enough depth there to make me feel anything for them.

Moving around is the hardest part of the game. It's easy to become disorientated in some areas. You can never predict how far one "step" will take you, or whether turning will rotate you on the spot or make you go forward and then turn. I had to use a hint at one point in the game, simply because I never noticed I was allowed to move in a particular direction from one particular point.

The other major complaint I have is about the sound. There's a lot of information given through speech, and most of the time the speech is distorted. You don't always get a second chance to hear it, either. And there is NO SUBTITLE OPTION. I've got good hearing and was wearing noise-cancelling headphones, and I missed loads. The game would be unplayable for a deaf person.

To be fair, when I picked it up I was in the mood for something short and relatively easy, so it was more or less what I was after at the time. The puzzles are reasonable, if sparse, and the clues are sometimes subtle but always fair, with some good "aha" moments.

10-04-2008, 05:58 AM	#710
Davies Senior Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Somewhere in England Posts: 403	AMBER: Journeys Beyond Just finished AMBER last night. Overall rating: meh. Worth playing, but only if you can get hold of it cheap or borrow a friend's. Surprisingly short and not very involving. The ending was abrupt and unsatisfying. Without giving much away, the game involves laying various ghosts to rest. Each ghost is a separate mini-adventure, and although these can be played in any order, once you've started on one you're stuck in that storyline until you complete it. There is also an overarching framework story regarding the technology you use. For a game based on restless spirits and psychic phenomena, it's deeply unscary. There is a vaguely spooky atmosphere in the beginning, while you're still exploring unknown areas and not sure what you might encounter, but you get blase pretty fast. I think the intention of the game was for the player to become involved in the characters of the ghosts and sympathetic with their tragic stories, but there just wasn't enough depth there to make me feel anything for them. Moving around is the hardest part of the game. It's easy to become disorientated in some areas. You can never predict how far one "step" will take you, or whether turning will rotate you on the spot or make you go forward and then turn. I had to use a hint at one point in the game, simply because I never noticed I was allowed to move in a particular direction from one particular point. The other major complaint I have is about the sound. There's a lot of information given through speech, and most of the time the speech is distorted. You don't always get a second chance to hear it, either. And there is NO SUBTITLE OPTION. I've got good hearing and was wearing noise-cancelling headphones, and I missed loads. The game would be unplayable for a deaf person. To be fair, when I picked it up I was in the mood for something short and relatively easy, so it was more or less what I was after at the time. The puzzles are reasonable, if sparse, and the clues are sometimes subtle but always fair, with some good "aha" moments. __________________ "You are amusing, in a 'what the hell is wrong with you' sort of way." --Jaheira, Baldur's Gate Last edited by Davies; 10-04-2008 at 06:27 AM.