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Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis

Score: 88%
ESRB: Not Rated
Publisher: Good Old Games
Developer: LucasArts
Media: Download/1
Players: 1
Genre: Adventure

Graphics & Sound:

Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis was an early SCUMM-based adventure title released by LucasArts, but unlike many of those games, Fate of Atlantis has actually found itself re-released once or twice (like with the Wii game Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings). Like a lot of LucasArts' classic adventure titles, a certain amount of nostalgia goggles are worn when replaying this game, but even with trying to put a more objective eye to the title, it still stands up as a solid point-and-click adventure.

First off, if this is your first time seeing Fate of Atlantis, or if perhaps you haven't played it since the 90's, then you might be shocked by the low-rez pixelated nature of the game. You can make out the details of the world, and you have a good idea of what your characters look like, but don't expect high quality sprites or characters that take up a lot of screen real estate similar to later titles like Sam & Max Hit the Road or Day of the Tentacle. However, both Indie and his companion are more-or-less humanoid shapes with distinctive enough clothing to tell them apart (especially given Indie's jacket and fedora).

Even the game's backgrounds and set pieces are pixelated, rough-edged shapes, but considering how many games these days try to recreate that look claiming "retro" graphics, these 1992 visuals might still be appealing to new gamers who don't have the nostalgia factor that I do.

In a similar manner, the game's audio has a good bit of retro or outdated (depending on your perspective) feel to it as well. From my research, it looks like this version of the game is the one that had the audio cleaned up and enhanced (as part of its release on the Wii and Steam back in 2009), but even with the better audio, it feels like the original source was meant to fit on a CD and not a DVD that could allow for a bit less compression. Even so, the music sounds good and has that distinctive Indiana Jones feel to it, while the voice of Indiana himself is close enough to Harrison Ford that it does the trick nicely.


Gameplay:

Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis has Indie trekking around the world in order to trace down what really happened to the lost continent described in Plato's Dialogues. His journey kicks off when he is asked to find a relic in his college's collection, only to realize the man looking for it is a NAZI agent, Klaus Kerner, bent on researching the statue's origins to help kick off the looming war.

When Indie loses the statue to the NAZI agent, he also learns that an old friend (and flame), Sophia Hapgood, might be Kerner's next visit. When Indie meets up with the former archaeologist-turned-psychic, the two realize that Kerner is after Atlantis and a source of apparently unlimited and unimaginable power that the ancient people were able to harness.

Interestingly enough, the game actually splits into three different paths. One has Indie and Sophia teaming up and running around the world together. The other two has Indiana on his own, but one path has more puzzles, while the other uses Indie's fists more than his wits. There isn't that much of a difference in the overall plot, but what changes are the nature of the puzzles. In the Team Path, Indie and Sophia team up to solve the problems, while the Wits Path's puzzles don't really require a second character to solve. The Fists Path does contain some puzzles, but they are far easier and getting through obstacles typically require clever point-and-click fighting techniques.


Difficulty:

A vast majority of the puzzles that Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis puts in the player's path are inventor-based. They come down to having picked up the right object and using it where it is meant to be used. As a result, finding yourself unable to proceed typically means that you might need to leave the scene and go see if there are other places that you need to explore some more.

I remember finding aspects of this game challenging back when I first played it, but I don't know how much of that challenge was the game or my own problem-solving skills at the time, and because I had played the game so frequently back then, I found myself able to solve the puzzles fairly quickly during this replay. As a result, I can't objectively judge the overall difficulty of this game. I feel like anyone familiar with the adventure genre would be able to make steady progress through this game's story since it doesn't pose any truly unique puzzles (well, not unique anymore), but that could be a very skewed perspective.


Game Mechanics:

Outside of the occasional fight sequences, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis follows the tried-and-true point-and-click adventure setup, as you would expect from a game that helped to define the genre.

In the classic SCUMM style, the bottom portion of the screen is divided into two sections, Verbs and Inventory. The Verbs include things like "Talk to", "Use", "Open" and "Look at." Clicking on a Verb and then either an inventory item or something in the scene will have Indie attempt to perform the action you've requested. Later SCUMM games (and point-and-click adventures in general) find ways to streamline the U.I. by hiding your inventory or using other mouse buttons to change the actions, but not here.

I have a lot of fond memories playing through this game (over and over again actually), and with that in mind, I find the ability to replay this game again on modern hardware very appealing, but I can definitely see why newer gamers who don't have that nostalgia factor in-play would find Fate of Atlantis a hard title to play through. It's just too bad that (so far), this game hasn't gotten the "Special Edition" treatment that the first two Monkey Island titles have received.


-J.R. Nip, GameVortex Communications
AKA Chris Meyer

Minimum System Requirements:



Windows: Windows XP/Vista/7/8, 1 GHz Processor, 256MB RAM, 3D graphics card compatible with DirectX 7, Mouse, Keyboard.
 

Test System:



Windows 8.1 64-bit, Intel i7-4770K 3.5GHz, 8 GB RAM, Radeon HD 5870 Graphics Card, DirectX 11

Related Links:



Nintendo 3DS Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy Microsoft Xbox 360 MotoGP 14

 
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