Amerzone

by Ubisoft

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00002EPGU
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: October 15, 1999
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #23,735 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Review

Amerzone: The Explorer's Legacy is a first-person role-playing game in the style of Myst,. You're cast as a journalist on an extraordinary quest. Inside a lighthouse in France, you find a magical egg, the progenitor of a race of white birds who spend their entire existence flying--from birth to death, without ever landing. Valenbois, the old explorer who lives in the lighthouse, stole the egg from a Central American tribe in a country called Amerzone. Now dying, he begs you to return the egg to its rightful home.

Puzzle solvers looking for a serious challenge will love Amerzone. The game takes you above the rain forest and under water as you seek to return the lost egg. Play is as much about sensory experience as it is about unlocking the mystery, with 360-degree environments that bring the jungle to life with lush visuals and crystal-clear sound. Often the story line seems like an excuse to draw you farther through what is essentially an interactive art gallery. The only catch is that there is no guarantee you'll get to the next gorgeous scene--that is dependent upon solving yet another brainteaser.

Players with a low tolerance for frustration may not enjoy the slow pace of this game. Each scene must be patiently searched, and it is easy to miss important clues or helpful objects. The journey is worthwhile, though, so stock up on patience and allow plenty of time to enjoy the trip! --Alyx Dellamonica

Product Description

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Amerzone review, November 25, 1999

By 

Howard Spiva (Savannah, Georgia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Amerzone (CD-ROM)

Amerzone is a time consuming, medium difficulty, point-and-click adventure. If you enjoyed the point-and-click classics, Myst and Riven, you are sure to love Amerzone. My favorite part is that you are whisked away from France to the fantasy land of Amerzone; and the graphics are even better than Myst and Riven combined. Recommended to all.

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Myst in a Lost World, February 20, 2000

By 

rw9 (Stony Brook, New York USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Amerzone (CD-ROM)

The storyline: sixty years ago, three young men went adventuring through the Amerzone, each one representing an aspect of Civilization (science, religion, politics) in first contact with this primitive, romantic land. The game begins as the adventurers, now old men, look back on an experience that started with good intentions, but ended with each betraying and exploiting what once was a land of enchantment. Valembois, the scientist of the group, realizes that an artifact he removed years ago -- a giant egg -- is, miraculously, still alive. He charges you with the quest of returning to the Amerzone with the egg, thereby restoring vitality, myth, and mystery to the land.

Pros:

1. Fabulous, unusual, lifelike 3D graphics; fantastical, yet believable places to explore. The rain forest scenes contain exquisite traceries of leaf, branch and shadow.

2. In no other game has the world felt so alive with indigenous species -- the frequent flights of birds, the movement and sound of insects -- plus fascinating portrayals of unknown, exotic creatures: the Pechosaur, the Suckerer, the Porcopotamus.

3. Unlike most other computer games, the ending to Amerzone is superb: from the moment you encounter the web-footed giraffes, through a misty ascent on a delicate rope bridge where water and sky merge, through a flight over bubbling volcanoes, to the final spectacular cut-scene.

Cons:

1. The mouse responsiveness in this game was erratic. The 360-degree panning was smooth, but sometimes when I clicked on a hotspot, I had to try over and over to get the hotspot to function. At times, I felt as though I was slogging through waist-high water, upstream, against a fierce headwind. If you have a similar experience, try double-clicking on everything, which pretty much solves the problem.

2. I would have enjoyed seeing some colorful, exotic flowering plants in the rain forest scenes. Those would have provided a more spectacular contrast to the gray, wind-swept French countryside at the beginning of the game.

3. I didn't really appreciate the game's storyline until I played through it a second time. I suspect that games like Amerzone occupy the mind and senses so thoroughly with new sights, sounds, and mysteries to solve, that it is easy for subtle story nuances to go unnoticed. In a way this adds to replayability; however, if Amerzone's designers wanted the player to "get" the storyline the first time through, they needed to make it a lot more obvious.

Bottom Line: If you loved the intrigue, pace and style of Myst and/or Riven, you will have a very pleasant time with Amerzone.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Only for true adventure game beginners., December 27, 1999

By 

Michael K. Davis (Tulsa, Oklahoma) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Amerzone (CD-ROM)

While this game is visually very good and fun to play, it is as indicated quite easy. I play almost every adventure game I can get my hands on, Myst, Riven, Shivers, Amber, Lighthouse, etc., and rate this game only moderately interesting. Maybe it's because the cursor changes shapes when you place it over something important, or because you can hardly fail to find the solution to the immediate puzzle, but I rate a game on how much help I need in solving puzzles and how long the game takes to play. I expect a good adventure game to keep me stumped for weeks or even a month or two depending on the amount of time spent playing it. I received Amerzone in the mail December 24th, solved it on December 27th and needed help on only 1 puzzle and that was only because I was impatient. (I would have solved it had I only tried it a couple of more times.) Visually it's a great game, but for a real adventure game player it's only a short diversion. Beginner?...buy it...experienced?..you can do better.