Chemicus

Rating:
Summary: I love a challenge!
Review: Beautiful graphics, and really hard. This game is not easy, and that's the way I like it! (If you aren't like me, the makers of the game put a walkthrough on one of the CD-ROMs in case you get stuck.) This game is a first-person point & click in the style of Myst. There is a lot of area to cover and a lot of hard puzzles. It ran smoothly, and was hours of fun. For the length of time this game will take you it's also a really good value for the price. I liked it more than it's two predecessors (also good!), Physicus and Bioscopia.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting concept but has problems
Review: Concept, 3D animation and graphics on this game are very good, but there are some aspects to the structure that really could use some improvement.

I found a major problem to be the navigation options, which are very limited and frustrating! The participant has to be turned in exactly the right position to navigate to a given section, instead of being able to point the cursor at the area you want to get to and being there.

Another problem is the help document, which gives a step-by-step run-through of the game, but gives no rationale for the actions. The result is, if you need help to figure something out, you have no real idea why you have to do what you're doing, so you have no clue as to how to proceed to solve future riddles. In addition, some of the actions are completely random, so the game doesn't stick to any one set of logic parameters, making it more confusing (IMHO) than necessary. The science is hard enough to understand!

Another point about the help doc: you have to close down the game every time you want to access the help information. Seems like that should have been designed to be accessible through the communicator and available as clues relating to aspects of the science involved in the specific actions.

One last point: there is no option to skip the introduction, so if you want to start a new game you have to sit through the whole boring - and poorly acted - scenario again.

As someone who would like to get more involved in this type of game, but is a relative novice to gaming and not well-versed in science, Chemicus seems difficult to get into and understand, unnecessarily confusing and hard to navigate. Maybe this just isn't my type of game, but it seems like the developers would want to make this as accessible to as many people as possible.

Rating:
Summary: Much Better Than Physicus, But...
Review: My wife and I are avid adventure gamers and, to help pass the time until "URU: Ages Beyond Myst" is released later this year, we decided to try "Chemicus". We played "Physicus" a couple years ago and, while we enjoyed it, we both thought that it could have been a much better game if it had tied into Physics a little deeper and if more effort was put into the adventure game design (look for my earlier review).

We just completed "Chemicus" and I can honestly say that this was a MUCH better overall attempt. Nearly all of the puzzles of the game are chemistry-related ranging from the fairly easy and logical to the pretty hard and requiring a hint or two (we peeked into the included walkthrough only a couple of times to get us unstuck).

The greatest improvement over "Physicus", however, was on the game design side. Like "Physicus" the graphics and music are lush and inviting. But, the scope of the game is where "Chemicus" shines over its predecessor. "Physicus" was just a singular environment or location to explore with very few cut-scenes and conveyances to enjoy along the way; both popular elements to a successful adventure game. In "Chemicus", even though the "subway" system was a little on the cheesy and repetitive side, at least it felt like we were transporting between unique locations (thank goodness the space bar forwards you through the animations). Plus, after solving some particularly difficult puzzles, we were rewarded with some nice cut-scenes; the balloon ride over the city being the best one. It wasn't on the same level as the bigger games like Riven and Schizm, but still an improvement.

One thing that "Physicus" did get right and that "Chemicus" fails on, is its link into the "Brain Center", the included chemistry text book. The content of the chemistry text is impressive, although, it looks as if the inclusion of animation and narration of some of the experiments and topics went by the wayside probably due to the added scope of the underlying game. What really annoyed us was the fact that we couldn't follow a link from the particular puzzle we were working on into the appropriate chapters or topics of the textbook. Along the way, you pick up "Knowledge Chips" that add chapters to your Brain Center and I suppose, if you kept up with the reading along the way, the new topics would relate to the new puzzles in the area. But, later on, when we were still working on the puzzle, it was very difficult to find those same topics in the textbook again. Like "Physicus", a link to just the appropriate topics would have been very useful.

Other than that, the game was very well written and designed. The user interface was very intuitive and easy to use. Could have done without the gratuitous, politically-correct diatribes on "greenhouse gasses" and "socially responsible science" that we have come to expect in these games (easy to ignore, though). We just started on "Bioscopia", but it looks as if that one more closely resembles "Physicus" in design and scope, bummer. I hear they are working on a "Chemicus II" game, so once we finish with URU, we will probably give it a go, too.

Rating:
Summary: Education and confusion come together in Chemicus
Review: Okay, okay, I had fun. But I was also incredibly frustrated by the set up and "logic" (or I should say lack of logic) of this game and that truly detracted from my enjoyment. I wanted to learn something from this game, but I didn't get the connections half the time!
This game has so much potential for teaching chemistry, but the set up was lacking logic - you don't know what you are supposed to be doing, and you have to go back and forth between the various "stops", never knowing if you have really done what needs to be done. And because you have to go back and forth so much, you have to wait for each area to load when you go to another stop. I tried skipping the animation of the transport zooming through the tube, but it still took a long time for the stop to load. And you want to scream when you click on the wrong button and have to wait twice!!
One example of frustration for us is that you have to melt the ingredients for solder someplace other than the melting furnace before you put it into the melting furnace... How does that make sense? The logic behind why some ingredients are placed in certain places is very foggy, and sometimes you just don't have enough (understandable) information to figure something out, or the information is there but so obscure that you have to be a rocket scientist to understand it.
So you look for help, and all you are given is a walkthrough, when hints would be so much better... and would help you learn why you are doing things. I have thought of making my own hints to pass on to someone who would like to learn something from the game.
I ran Chemicus on a mac running OSX. It had to run on classic, so there were many times when it lagged. Don't know how it runs on a PC.

Rating:
Summary: Education and confusion come together in Chemicus
Review: Okay, okay, I had fun. But I was also incredibly frustrated by the set up and "logic" (or I should say lack of logic) of this game and that truly detracted from my enjoyment. I wanted to learn something from this game, but I didn't get the connections half the time!
This game has so much potential for teaching chemistry, but the set up was lacking logic - you don't know what you are supposed to be doing, and you have to go back and forth between the various "stops", never knowing if you have really done what needs to be done. And because you have to go back and forth so much, you have to wait for each area to load when you go to another stop. I tried skipping the animation of the transport zooming through the tube, but it still took a long time for the stop to load. And you want to scream when you click on the wrong button and have to wait twice!!
One example of frustration for us is that you have to melt the ingredients for solder someplace other than the melting furnace before you put it into the melting furnace... How does that make sense? The logic behind why some ingredients are placed in certain places is very foggy, and sometimes you just don't have enough (understandable) information to figure something out, or the information is there but so obscure that you have to be a rocket scientist to understand it.
So you look for help, and all you are given is a walkthrough, when hints would be so much better... and would help you learn why you are doing things. I have thought of making my own hints to pass on to someone who would like to learn something from the game.
I ran Chemicus on a mac running OSX. It had to run on classic, so there were many times when it lagged. Don't know how it runs on a PC.

Rating:
Summary: So cool
Review: The graphics are so cool and the game is totally addictive. Nice.

Rating:
Summary: Wow!!
Review: This game was challenging, I enjoyed it almost as much as myst. There were no glitches, the graphics were intense!! I would recommend this to everybody!

Rating:
Summary: Education and confusion come together in Chemicus
Review: This is great game but it is NOT easily solved. It has Myst like elements where you find puzzles and solve them to move around. The game has a twist where you keep an inventory of items you will need in other areas of the game. The hints that came with the game were helpful..I hated to use them but after getting stuck and not making progress after a few hours I had to take a quick peek to continue. At first I thought it was too easy but then it got hard. If anyone writes otherwise they are not being truthful. I took many chem classes in college and not everything is intuitive in the game. Infact, sometimes you know what to do but the game only lets you do things in order to perform a task and you think that you are wrong (but you're not). You only switch CD's once ever and then you are done. I copied the help file to my computer so I would not have to reference it off of the disk. The only part I did not like was the navigation. If it had not been for that I would have given it 5 stars. . All in all I have zero regrets getting this game. I had just finished playing Myst III and I wanted another same type game. great buy

Rating:
Summary: Not bad for edutainment!
Review: This is great game but it is NOT easily solved. It has Myst like elements where you find puzzles and solve them to move around. The game has a twist where you keep an inventory of items you will need in other areas of the game. The hints that came with the game were helpful..I hated to use them but after getting stuck and not making progress after a few hours I had to take a quick peek to continue. At first I thought it was too easy but then it got hard. If anyone writes otherwise they are not being truthful. I took many chem classes in college and not everything is intuitive in the game. Infact, sometimes you know what to do but the game only lets you do things in order to perform a task and you think that you are wrong (but you're not). You only switch CD's once ever and then you are done. I copied the help file to my computer so I would not have to reference it off of the disk. The only part I did not like was the navigation. If it had not been for that I would have given it 5 stars. . All in all I have zero regrets getting this game. I had just finished playing Myst III and I wanted another same type game. great buy

Rating:
Summary: Very Challenging and Quite Lovely
Review: Your friend, Richard, a Chemistry buff, has discovered a strange amulet that, combined with certain experiments, allows him access to another dimension. You are supposed to meet with him to discuss his findings, but discover he has disappeared. It seems the denizens of this other dimension aren't too pleased! They think Richard's visits have upset the stability of their world and are holding him prisoner. Now you must cross the dimensions and prove your friendship by restoring a mysterious "Transmitter Molecule."

_Chemicus_ is a first person game very much in the style of MYST: you are wandering through a virtually empty world picking up clues and solving puzzles. From time to time, as in the MYST series, you might see another person from a distance or receive a transmission from your imprisoned friend, but there is no character interaction. So the draw of this game is not clever, pun-filled scripting, but using close observation, deduction and sheer brainpower to get from point A to point B. There is not very much more story than is given to you in the introduction; to enjoy _Chemicus_ you have to enjoy solving inventory-based mechanical puzzles.

And the scenery, of course. _Chemicus_ is a really gorgeous game. The "Other Side" is depicted as a place enough like our own world to be somewhat familiar, but enough different to give a certain sense of alienation -- again, much like MYST. The buildings and landscapes have a kind of organic texture that I personally find appealing. Unfortunately, there is no 360-degree movement; _Chemicus_ is a slideshow game. That means you're quite limited as to what you can view closely and where you can go. Personally I didn't find that too annoying (my husband hates it!), particularly as this game is so long and full of puzzles. I just didn't feel as put out by not being able to explore more fully as I might have.

Aside from the graphics and the sound -- mainly subtle f/x -- the strength of this game is in the puzzles. Because they are all based on chemistry, there is a logic to them that is often lacking. Some of the puzzles are a bit confusing, but none is arbitrary. It does in fact help to have had a course in chemistry and some math, however. The game provides a "BRain Center" to teach you what you need to know to proceed, but I found that often the information it gave you wasn't quite enough. However, I was pretty astonished at how many of the tasks could be accomplished with no specialized knowledge. In a way, this game helps point out how much we use chemistry in everyday life, without thinking about it.

I had some serious problems running this game, however. Despite having far more than the system requirements and using a full install, _Chemicus_ ran at a frustratingly slow pace. The scene transitions and animations were especially slow; I found them a good place to grab a snack or make a cup of tea. I also had trouble with the game crashing, often when I was accessing the Brain Center. If it hadn't been for those two things, I would easily have given _Chemicus_ 5 stars.

Several other annoyances were minor: games were saved as a list with each game defined by date and time only, so it was hard to tell what each one was. I consider this minor beacuse I don't tend to backtrack much. There was a lot of back and forthing -- inventory was almost never used in the place you found it -- and some of the locations were hard to keep track of. One or two puzzles involved somewhat obscure solutions, aside from the chemistry.

_Chemicus_ comes complete with a PDF walkthrough in case you get stuck. I did have to access this a few times. I didn't really like the way it was set up because, as walkthroughs tend to, it only told you what to do without telling you how. It also presents events in a specific order, which might not be the way you've played, _Chemicus_ being extremely non-linear. And I think it would have been helpful if you could have accessed the help file without totally exiting the game.

Although marketed for "Everyone" _Chemicus_ will probably appeal best to science oriented teens and adults; I don't think it will really appeal to just any adventure gamer. A long game, it took me about 30 hours to complete.

If you like MYST-type games and if you like science experiments, you will probably like _Chemicus_.