Customer Reviews

Omikron: The Nomad Soul

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This game has an allure because of its revolutionary concept, but not all is delivered. To make it short:

THE GOOD:

-incredible graphics, with or without a card

-free atmosphere that just begs to be explored

-somewhat of a branching storyline and some choices along the way

-huge, seemless city areas

-great concepts - many inhabitable characters and NEARLY endless possibilities

THE BAD:

-the four different 'modes' (adventure, shooting, fighting and swimming) are kind of annoying

-the objects (books especially) are somewhat repetitive and limiting

-all the people in the street... do they all look EXACTLY the same or am I seeing double - triple - quad... AHHHHHHHH!

-I personally don't like the concept that you are REALLY sitting there playing a computer game which is controlling bodies in another demon-infested parallel universe... I'd rather put myself in the position of the character than just be myself sitting on my butt

-for the life of me, I can't drive those blasted cars

-some of the puzzles are very hard and in some, the solution doesn't really make sense. I had to buy the PRIMA strategy guide, which, in a bind, I recommend.

The hype of this game is that it is a "fully-realized world" and I don't think I can argue with that. The streets are filled with people, you can be hit by cars (or sliders as they are called) heck you can even go down to a supermarket and buy some food. This game is very fun. Another excellent feature of this game is its wide variety of gameplay. Most of the time you are in adventuring mode but other times you can switch into fighting, shooting or swimming mode. The fighting mode is very fun (you have a hologram fighting program in the main characters apartment) It is not the best fighting out of fighting games but it is a lot better than some of the pure fighting games out there. The strange thing about the fighting is that there is no block button. Every person has a different skill level of fighting in the game so each person has different skills in blocking, special moves, styles etc. The fighting is excellent. The shooting is not as satisfying as the fighting because of the way it is set up. All of the enemies come out of predesigned spots so all you have to do is play the level over and over until you know exactly where the enemies will be. It is still fun but not as satisfying as the fighting. I haven't really experienced the swimming so I do not feel inclined to review it. I'm having a lot of fun with this game so I suggest that you get it.

I don't play many games, but this one intrigued me - it had an interesting story, excellent graphics, and incredible cut-sequences. I'm not too far into it yet, but so far the story and the main interface is immersive.

The main problem with this game is in it's "alternate" user interfaces, for the game actually has four modes: adventure, fighting, shooting and swimming. An somewhat uneasy transition takes you from one mode to another. Shooting mode is a traditional first-person shooter; however, it's one of the worst I've ever seen. It's fortunate you don't have to spend much time in this mode. Adventure and fighting modes are adequate; not the best I've seen, but they don't detract from the excellent story.

Overall, I'd recommend this game.

What to say that hasnt already been said more eloquently? Lets hit the obvious first. Genre-wise, this game definitely fits more into the adventure category than anything, but spans several other mini-modes of game play. During the course of your adventuring, you will encounter first-person shooter, melee fighting and role-playing elements that supplement the interface youd normally expect from an adventure game. This is quite a pleasant change if you are expecting a run-of-the-mill adventure. On the other hand, dont go into it expecting a great fighting game, FPS or RPG; you will surely be disappointed. Let me explain by covering each of these sub-genres found in Omikron in greater detail:

FPS:
The first-person shooter aspect comes across as somewhat crude and limited, in that movement is stiff and slow, the AI lacks coherent intelligence, and as a result there really is no great depth of game play here. The interjection of FPS scenes into the game lack smooth transitions, and therefore feel more like a blatant attempt to graft an FPS branch onto an adventure tree, so to speak.

Fighting:
Represented as a fighting game, Omikron fares much better. Attack combinations, fluid character animations and a 3-dimensional opponent-oriented movement make for some great action sequences. On the other hand, it wouldnt be fair not to mention the inconsistencies in the AI opponent. When playing a scene in this game mode, it seems that there really are only two different AI models with which to fight: way too hard and way too easy. The discrepancy lies in the fact that you may fight the same character twice -- beat them without taking damage the first time and being pummeled down mercilessly the next -- a bit like a coin toss.

RPG:
It really is tough to even stretch the RPG factor in Omikron to the point of calling it a sub-genre. This element consists mainly of the ability to broaden the characters skills to their full extent, with the use of training, items and spells. In relation to the rest of the game, it does not influence the tide of the adventure part in the slightest; only melee combat is affected. Even this muted form or role-playing is further castrated by the fact that during the course of the game, you move from body to body quite often, which is mandatory. In doing so your former body is lost forever, and the new body must be quickly re-trained if it is to fare well in martial combat.

In conclusion, this is simply one of the BEST adventure game Ive ever played. Thats right; even with their drawbacks, the varied modes of game play do well to shake up the monotony of adventuring, talk to X, find Y, and open Z. Rinse, lather, repeat. You may not look forward to the action scenes youll encounter in this game, but you will likely appreciate them anyway. Sub-genres aside, this game tells a superbly crafted and well balanced story, paces nicely, and offers you many decisions and possibilities without leaving you feeling directionless. For fans of adventure games, missing out on this game because of its weak action elements would be a poor decision. After all, at least it HAS some action elements! ;-)

I've been reading a lot of online game reviews wetting their pants over this title, and I'm also a Bowie fan, so I really wanted to check it out. Everybody is saying this game promises a HUGE, fully-realized virtual reality. Well, I'm sorry, it's not--not for me anyway, not at the moment. The graphics are gorgeous, the controls smooth, the story excellent, the sound wonderful. And yet... the moment the game started and I saw that the "camera" trailed along behind my character instead of being in first-person perspective, I found it impossible to make that leap of faith that I was looking forward to so much. Instead, as I played, I kept watching my character walk about and thinking things like, "Wow, I wonder how much work it took to get the shadow beneath him to move so smoothly." Omikron allows you to do a ton of things like in real life, that's true, but there really isn't THAT much you can do here apart from playing the game despite what all the magazines would have you believe. There aren't even THAT many non-plot characters to interact with despite claims to the contrary. You can, of course, buy David Bowie albums and bring them home to your virtual apartment to play, but as those same songs are on the new album "Hours" I can just as easily do that in real life while playing the game itself, so that doesn't impress me overall. The game has REALLY fantastic design and camera angles--even though the camera angles are HORRIBLY confusing when trying to move around. The bottom line is, to buy into Omikron, you have to buy into the perspective which the game presents you with. If only this was a first-person point of view, it would be perfect and everything I could have asked for. As it currently stands, when I play it I feel like I'm a mere observant, not a participant.

First things first:
For owners of Windows XP, this game will not immediately work. It was originally released a short time before WinXP was, so it is made to work on Win95/98 and ME. To get it to work on XP:

First, right click on the Omikron Shortcut on your desktop. Click the 'compatability' tab and select to have it run in WindowsNT Compatability mode. This should make it work; it may give you a 'runtime.exe' error, or incorrect CD error. In that case, you must download a nocd crack from the internet, which can easily be found via google. The game generally runs well with few graphical errors common in older games running on XP in compatability mode.

On to the game itself:

This game is a lot of fun if you can get past the dated graphics. This can be more of a problem that it usually is in good older games since alot of the plotline is dependant on the 'this is not a game' aspect. Still, the adventure, fighting and first person shooter elements work together well (with the fighter and FPS elements complimenting the adventure game; don't expect to spend equal amounts of time adventuring, fighting and FPSing) and the atmosphere is top-noch and very Blade-Runner esque.

So, if you're jonesing for an adventure game with a good storyline and lot's of atmosphere, this game is for you. At the price most sellers have it at, it can't be beat.

It took me a while to get the hang of this game -- the controls are needlessly complicated, with different interface and controls for shooting, unarmed fights, swimming, and just walking around -- and even longer to get interested, given the constant fights (that I mostly lost at first) and the rather silly insistence that "this isn't just a game." ("Do I look like a game?" screams one polygon-heavy bad guy. Um, well, yeah, you do.) And the limited saves (like a video game) can make for a frustrating experience with lots of repeats.

All that aside, it really is a lot of fun to play, engrossing and exciting. David Bowie's music never pleased me before, but I found myself looking for it here. Also, like the best games, there are many different ways to solve the same problems and lots of stuff to find if you explore. Definitely worth the time and money, though not for the easily frustrated.

I highly reccommend this game to any adventure game fans. This was an excellent game brought to us by the French developer Quantic Dream. The people working there have completed a true masterpiece. The plot draws you in right from the start, your soul has been transferred to an alternate futuristic dimension that is reminiscent of Blade Runner. You have to save the world of Omikron where the citizens souls are being captured and put into slavery by a race of demons. The story is excellent, as well as many of the other elements. Excellent graphics, there are four cities that have an amazing amount of detail and intricacy. Being that you are a wandering soul, you have the ability to incarnate into different peoples bodies to aid in your quest. This game is mostly third-person, but there are also several first-person shooting sequences as well as fighting and swimming sequences. This game is very fun to play, and I had a hard time turning off the computer after a few minutes of playing it. The system requirements are a bit steep (disregard what it says on the box, trust me). I played it on a AMD 366 with a Voodoo2 and it still had a significant amount of lag. The optimum system I played it on was a Pentium 550 with a TNT2 card, and full installed at a whopping 1.6 gigabytes (because of the characters speech), if you meet these standards the game will be flawless. The only minuses of this game were the repetetive character skins walking around the city streets and the shooting sequence. If more chracter models were added and the shooting sequence dropped it would be a perfect game. This is definetly one to buy, and i can't wait for the upcoming sequel Omikron 2

Whoa! This game is awesome! Think of a game that is really addictive, then double it's addictiveness and then triple the doubled portion! This game rocks! I'm a big gaming fan and I like a lot of different gaming genres like shooting, adventuring, puzzle solving, and whooping anyone who messes with you. If you don't like any one of those genres, don't get this game because you won't like it. The game is a mix of Half-Life, Teken, and something like Quest64. The two bad parts about this game are the fact that your computer has to generate an ENTIRE city of moving people, sliders, and transport ship things flying over head. Takes a lot of power to play. The second is the save interface, it's kind of like Tomb Raider but the interlocked rings (save crystals) are more abundant, but everytime you save you will use a magical ring. The rings are somewhat scarce in the begining of the game but then they are abundant. It takes practice at the fighting scenes, but you really can get good at them. It would be a mistake not to buy this game!

This game has intrigued me ever since I saw the ads in game magazines. Now having expended close to several weeks effort on the game I can only say that the game is original, entertaining and fun if you can overlook some of the faults in the design. You play a 'nomad soul' that jumps from body to body living and interacting with the game world as a host of different people. Each new person you inhabit has his/her problems and goals which you try to solve as that character.

The good parts: a great story, an original idea (for a PC game), smooth 3D graphics, a chance to experience several different lives in a single game. The not-so good parts: clumsy controls (expecially combat) and the fact that while you can generally control when you want to jump bodies, at several points this is forced by the game (usually just when you thought the current one was perfect). It may just be me, but I don't really like being railroaded just because the storyline demands it. The new game 'Messiah' has a similar idea but allows you total control over when you want to enter or leave host bodies. Also you may want to web over to the publisher's website to check for patches - the game seemed a little unstable, at least on my PC that no amount of tinkering with drivers, Direct3D, etc could fix.