Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Sep 30, 2021

  OF CRITICAL IMPORTANCE!!! If you have any train knowledge at all, this game will actually BE HARDER unless you know this: running through switches doesn't break them, and you can pre-set a switch to the direction you want to go back through it before entering it. I spent several hours stuck because I assumed you couldn't run the cart through a switch that was aligned against the direction from which I was coming. It wasn't until I reached the junkyard, and was basically stuck unless I ran through the switch, that I realised this. Great game otherwise, if you like Cyan's other titles, you'll enjoy this one.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 8, 2023

  A good successor to Myst. This means, puzzles are not easy and consequently the game is not suitable for everyone. The surrounding setting could have been better exploited (it is large but with little interaction) for example, many kilometers traveled on foot to press a button as if it wanted to be an open space but in fact it is not. The story is unsatisfactory in many points ... Overall rating 7/10 good longevity but the full price is not worth it.
• magic.mugger

  Aug 15, 2023

  This Game is completely addictive the worlds are each spectacular. The puzzles are so clever and fun you won't want to stop until you have solved every part. the story is intriguing and very well thought out. My hats off to Cyan. they knocked it out of the park with Obduction .
• gamedeal user

  Aug 24, 2016

  TL;DR: They meant it when they said this was going to be a spiritual successor to Myst. It's exactly that. You have no idea what's going on, it's gorgeous, and the puzzles are clever (neither too easy or difficult). Playthrough time is about 12 to 14 hours. Performance/Stability I ran the game at max settings and it ran very smoothly, 60 FPS, with the occasional drop in frames, but infrequent and not that noticeable (i7-6700 / GTX 1070 / 16 GB / 2560 x 1440). The game never crashed on me, but I could never get the "Photos" thing to work properly. The thumbnils wouldn't match the photos I took, some photos didn't take properly... the whole thing was unreliable. Thankfully it's not really a useful feature, though I wish I could have taken high res shots of the game and saved them somewhere. This was coded for PC, with Unreal Engine 4. You can tell it's not a crappy port from a console game. Graphics Graphics and scenery are amazing, it looks as advertised (or better). It really makes you goes "holy shit, that's amazing". The recorded live scenes look a bit low res though, and it does stand out among the high quality scenery. Gameplay The interface is simple and intuitive. I wish there was more music more often! It's mostly ambient sounds. Playthrough took me 13 hours; I've played all the Myst games before, but an average adult player should take between 10 and 16 hours. It sounds short, but it's quite an experience. Some of the puzzles are really clever, and it's fun to run around the worlds to solve them all. There are some loading times, though they're somewhat cleverly disguised, and usually don't take too long. Story A bit of a let down to be honest, though the concept around it is really neat. It just feels like it hasn't been fleshed out enough, which I was expecting near the end, but it didn't happen. Either way, I did enjoy not knowing what was happening, so there's that. Pros Beautiful graphics Clever puzzles Overall a very enjoyable experience Cons Buggy "Photos" feature, some people reporting minor bugs/crashes but I've never had any problems like that. Music isn't as impactful as in the Myst series. I hardly ever heard it. One of the puzzle, where you have to figure out an alien number system, is a bit over the top in terms of complexity. I got stuck in a playthrough without having had the chance to "learn" it first, and I just had to look it up online, and even then it was a head scratcher. The pros far outweight the cons, I'm just being picky. If you enjoy puzzle games, Myst/Riven, The Witness, or "walking simulators", I highly recommend the game. You're talking 12 hours of solid fun for the price of a couple movie tickets. Arbitrary rating: 8.75/10.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 26, 2016

  Got stuck on the first puzzle. Walked around for an hour in the same area pulling random levers until hoping they would do something. Still stuck. If anything my short time with this game has reminded me why I loved Myst and Riven so much as a kid. I remember sitting with my Dad and taking notes on the generator puzzle in the original Myst and my Dad explaining to me the sound puzzle on Riven and how the animals sounds related to a puzzle. I still have my old notes on both games. Obducton reminds me of those days. Now here I am again pulling random levers and working on new maps and notes. The team at Cyan made me love puzzle games as a kid and the satisfation of getting that rocket to work in the original Myst for the first time was like magic to me. Now I'm back again but this time older and wiser. The puzzles are still as challenging and the story still as obscure. For the first time in a long time I'm a kid again and my Dad is here with me taking notes on it all. Maybe one day I can do this with my kid and this time I'll be there to draw maps and he can push the buttons and we can blast of on the rocket together. Thank you Team Cyan for making a game like this. Now if you'll excuse me I've got levers to pull and books to link.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 26, 2016

  Just finished (18 hours of play time). Puzzles were clever, and neither too hard nor too easy. The science fiction setting was intriguing. The environmental storytelling masterful. Music could have been a little better, but who cares. I'm very satisfied with what I just played and am rooting for a sequel.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 27, 2016

  [h1]Cons[/h1] Having no idea where I am Having no idea what to do [h1]Pros[/h1] Having no idea where I am Having no idea what to do [h1]What's with the MYSTique about this?[/h1] Yup. They're doing it again! Once again they've provided an environment where I know exactly where I am but I'm completely and utterly lost. You'd think one of us would have wised up by now. More than 20 years ago when I played Myst the game was called "ground breaking". It was called ground breaking because there were no instructions. There was no UI. There was no indication of purpose or reason. You started pretty much anywhere, went anywhere, saw and did many things with no understanding of what or why in most cases. The result of your actions gave you the reason for it - in the end it all made sense. So, I came at this all smug like. After at least Myst and Riven I just KNEW I'd need power somewhere. I just KNEW I'd have some fairly complex puzzles, I just KNEW there'd be red herrings, obfuscation and an underpinning mystery, with lots of intrigue all evolving into the story. I just KNEW I'd get lost but I'd get familiar with it eventually and WIN... I KNEW what I had to do. It's OBVIOUS... And then I found one of those devices. What the hell? 9/10 ..oo00oo.. Performance note: I'm running 32Gb DDR4 RAM, Skylake i5, MSI 1070 and an EVO SSD and I'm skipping on some asset loads (Cyan does recommend an SSD. So do I). It's no real issue because nothing is RT critical but this thing is HUNGRY - something we've come to expect from Unreal. As for GFX, on a 1070 maxed out, easy 60 with only very occassional drops, vsynced fine. ..oo00oo.. You know. As an afterthought I came up with a potential analogy. It's like going shopping for the first time in a supermarket without a shopping list. You know you're going to end up at the checkout, you know you're going to have food but you have no idea what you're going to buy, where it is or how you're going to cook any of it. I mean, listen. No. Actually listen. You saw that button right? You saw that lever? You push it or pull it (you have to right?) and you listen. Did something move? Did something turn? Only later, when something is there/not there that was/wasn't there before do you realise what you've done. Only THEN do the dots connect and you just KNOW you're making progress. At least. Until you discover another button, another lever, an "instruction manual", complex diagrams, formulas or lists [i]ad nauseum[/i]. It can be relentless, almost overwhelming. Now excuse me. I have someone to call. At least I think I do.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 28, 2016

  Rand Miller and his team have pulled off an amazing feat, and delivered yet another masterpiece! Obduction is an amazing throwback to the original puzzle games of Myst and Riven, filled with gorgeous worlds and compelling puzzles. It’s nice to see that after more than 20 years, quality games such as this can still captivate and challenge my mind. I had a blast playing this and, if you’re willing to take on the challenge, I bet you will too!
• gamedeal user

  Oct 19, 2016

  Overall I was impressed. It took me 11 hours to finish the game without guides. Your mileage may vary. This game makes for a very good spiritual successor to the Myst games that ultimately builds on the original formula. WARNING, this game will not turn you into an Adventure/Puzzle convert if you already hate the genre. This is a slow burn game, in the vein of Siberia, The Longest Journey, and The Secret of Monkey Island. Be prepared to read journals and take your own paper notes. So onto the pros and cons- PROS -Story; its original and sucks you in -Puzzle mechanics; they were original and varied, often requiring a bit of lateral thinking -World; the world itself builds a great foundation to make it believable without overly painful info dumps -Sound; My god this game has good sound design. PLAY THIS WITH HEADPHONES! MIXED -Graphics; this is not a negative by any mean. At times this game blew me away with its awesome vistas and alien scenery. However, there were times I noticed painfully pixelated textures or items with just a few too little polygons. -No hand holding; This game does not hold your hand. I personally find this refreshing but I realize this may not be the case for everyone. Be prepared to use the in-game camera as well as taking notes for the puzzles. -Music; while the sound design blew me away, I found the music rather forgettable sadly enough. Your tastes may vary. -Gauntlet puzzle; You'll know it when you get to it. Its doable but a bit tedious, especially if you are suffering from long load times. CONS -Load times; Annoying load times in annoying places. I played this game on a solid state drive with a fairly beefy computer and still suffered the load times (some as long as 20 seconds). -Glitches; I have heard some people running into glitches forcing them to reload a save. I had one audio glitch during my playthrough which was corrected after a reload. I did not Kickstart this game nor receive it for free. I am a fan of puzzle games though. :)
• gamedeal user

  Feb 12, 2017

  This was an extremely enjoyable puzzle game with a great story and beautiful art work. I have a hard time caring to follow the story in most games these days, but the storytelling was very well done here and I couldn't stop staring at the gorgeous environment. I played regular FPS style, not VR or point-and-click. I would note that there are some occasions that it is useful to switch to point-and-click if you are having trouble with the controls on certain things. Positives: - Environments are absolutely gorgeous. A stunningly beautiful game. - There are no jump scares, no death, no inventory, just story and puzzles! And it works. - Puzzles are just hard enough to make a great game. - Several throwbacks to the Myst series sprinkled throughout. Negatives: - A major mechanism in the game forces you to wait to load, at times several times in a row. I minimized the amount of loading by planning my moves on paper first, but if you're a guess-and-checker you're gonna have a bad time. - Music was just OK. It worked for the mood but could have been much better. - Classic Myst-style FMV for C.W. and Caroline was good, but also could have been better. - Some annoying control issues when trying to input data into certain things in FPS mode. - There are a couple set pieces that I thought for sure I'd eventually get to interact with (crane) - I wish it were a little longer. I beat it in 12 hours total which included carefully reading everything I could find. I highly recommend this game. I hope there is a sequel, as this story can go much further in many directions. I'd also be very happy with new IP from Cyan executed anywhere near this level. This is a very pleasant turnaround from some of the later, weaker Myst games. I disagree with some reviewers who have said there's "too much backtracking". If you find yourself spending tremendous amounts of time backtracking, it might help to start mapping everything out and thinking harder on the task at hand.