To date there are four Siberia adventure games for PC. All of them except for the third are well worth playing. The 3rd is riddled with problems and is best undertaken with a walkthru guide. The best of them is the most recent one, #4. We first played Syberia back in 2005. It came out in 2002. There is now a revamped version of the first game, but we played the original on Steam and had no problems. Not only that but the gameplay and the graphics hold up remarkably well after 24 years. How many games can make that claim? Previous to Syberia, Benoit Sokal and his team had produced Amerzone, but Syberia upped his game considerably. Syberia gives a nod to Amerzone in one of its segments.
The heroine is Kate Walker, a young lawyer from New York sent to get a signature on a contract turning over a family owned toy factory to a major buyout company. The person who was to sign dies suddenly, and Kate soon discovers there is another relation she has to track down, by the name of Hans Voralberg. The chase is on!
Part 1 takes place in Valadilene, a small village where the Voralberg automaton factory sits unused. This is a long and complex segment, requiring about four hours of gameplay to complete. Kate arrives during Anna Voralberg's funeral, a strange event indeed. Besides the town, there is the factory to explore and a nearby carillon tower adjacent to a cemetery. Kate's main goal is to get a life-sized wind up train to head for the hills. But to do that she has to finish assembling the automaton driver. Then there is the mystery of Hans himself, injured as a child in a cave accident. A young boy of the village will aid Kate if she can solve the puzzle of the correct way to question him. He wants her to draw a mammoth for him. This is the only puzzle in this section that I didn't like. Kate has to do a rubbing of a mammoth, but where is it? Hidden, that's for sure. Once the kid has his mammoth drawing the game advances quickly and we are soon aboard the train, though Oscar the automaton driver is a stickler for regulations. The ticket and regulation events can either be seen as humour or yet another bother. Depends on your mood at the time.
In part 2 we arrive at Barrockstadt, a university where Hans Voralberg also visited. The train station doubles as a vast aviary and tropical garden, with plants and birds brought from Amerzone, a place Kate has never heard of (but we gamers have). Again this part takes about 4 hours to complete. In true adventure game style, puzzle is added to puzzle for Kate to solve before she can wind her train and depart. Frequently during the game, play is interrupted by annoying phone calls to Kate from her boss, her mother, her co-worker girlfriend and her boyfriend. Twice during a later stage of the game Kate has to make calls herself. Sometimes these in-coming calls hold clues, so pay attention, especially to the calls from mom (often the most annoying of the calls).
Kate must get a canal boat to tow the train as far as the winding mechanism. She has to get an automaton string quartet working. She must find two books in the library (we only found one and needed a hint at one point). She has to get the canal lock working. She has to find a golden egg, and to subdue some vicious cuckoo birds to get it. Her problems go on and on and get a bit tiresome, there is no doubt. At the very end she must convince a near-sighted border guard that he is not seeing an enemy out on the plain, but something far less threatening. It seems to take forever, but we are finally aboard the train once again (after getting our ticket from old Oscar) and on our way to the next station.
Parts 3 and 4 are directly linked though they are in completely separate locations. The link betweem them is an opera singer. We arrive in Komkolzgrad, a massive one-time active mine and factory, now mostly abandoned. What we don't know upon arrival is that it was once a space launch pad as well. The first person we meet is an opera fan, a man dedicated to one particular Russian soprano. He has stolen the hands of Oscar, our automaton train engineer. We must get the hands returned. The residing overlord tells Kate she has to find and bring back the opera singer. Oscar's hands, needed for the organ player who will accompany the singer, will be returned after she sings. Where is the singer? A phone call to mom will help answer the question.
Next we move on to the adjacent location of an intoxicated cosmonaut, forgotten by the world and desperate to get into space. If we can get him launched he will tell us how to use the airship, which will take us to where the singer is. It gets pretty involved and complicated, but once the launch is successful (watch for a bottle of vodka on his bedroom floor) and we find a winding mechanism, we can encourage the hawk (don't ask) to chase the birds away from the airship, leaving it free to fly. There is a terrific and chilling scene as the hawk flies and captures a bird. Then we are off in the airship to Aralbad, a once popular and classy resort on the shores of the salty Aral Sea. However, it is now a bit dowdy and underused. Kate has to get past the desk clerk at the hotel, then convince the singer to accompany her back to the factory town to sing once more. She needs to have her voice rejuvenated, so Kate needs a cocktail recipe pronto. Phone the correct hotel and speak with the bartender. Once the singer drinks the correct potion she will travel and sing.
Now its back to the factory in the airship and it's recital time. After the performance the overlord shows his true colours and captures the singer. Kate must get her released and onto the train while dealing with the resident madman. Good luck, Kate! Eventually the train makes a hasty and dramatic departure and moves on to Aralbad. The final scene is where Kate meets up with Hans Voralberg at last, gets his signature and completes her lawyer's mission. Now she must decide whether to return to New York and her corporate life, or head off on a new adventure. Since there is a Syberia 2, 3 and 4 it is not hard to guess which choice Kate will make.
The game took us 12 1/2 hours to complete, and we needed a few hints in the early parts of the game. We completed the second half without any help. We enjoyed the story a lot, even though a synopsis doesn't seem to make it too clear. Kate is a great character who grows into her role as adventurer as the game progresses. She has a dry sense of humour as well as a generous dash of derring do. The game can be frustrating, but what adventure game isn't? The phone calls are annoying, though they help move the story along. At times one can tire of the nearly endless obstacles to overcome. But the drive to find out more of the story keeps one going. The visuals are still quite stunning, and the music is very good. I love the idea of the automaton wind up train and Oscar the driver. This is a very original game and worth many replays. I give it a score of 88%. Highly recommended. Someday we will get around to playing the updated version of this first game, but soon we hope to move on to Syberia 2.
From the station platform in Komkolzgrad players can access a mine, the factory and get inside one of the massive station guards. At least winding the train is easy in this station. Afterwards the trouble really begins.
clerk is less than helpful.
Mapman Mike
