LOST: Via Domus

LOST: Via Domus is out and caters to the fans of the TV Show. But how fun is it? How well are the characters from the show represented? Find out after the jump!

Let me preface: If you aren't a LOST fan, you shouldn't even be reading this review. This game is not for you. Just walk away slowly. Don't worry, we'll wait. Are they gone? OK, good. I am a LOST fan, and yes, this game makes me giggle like a schoolgirl. Then again, so does the beginning and end of each TV episode. And anytime something awesome happens. And every time Ben says anything. And when we see someone dead, and when we see someone get their comeuppance, and when we see...

So to be fair, this is not for people who want insight into the show. LOST: Via Domus offers no answers, and even poses a few questions. This is to be able to have the same feeling when you watched an episode for the first time, but from the perspective of someone you don't know you can even enter the numbers [engrossing, I know], and visit all the DHARMA stations we've so far seen, save the Looking Glass, and you see pretty much every major thing on the island. So, if you can stomach that, then follow me...

Gameplay - 6

The gameplay in Via Domus is a mixed bag, at best. Nothing really stands out. The chase sequences have odd controls from a gaming standpoint (Y to jump and A to slide? Bah!) Shooting is actually quite easy, almost fun, but you don't really need to shoot anything from a combat standpoint. Actually, you can shoot two guys, one of whom is purely optional. Running through the jungle with the Monster on your tail is downright scary, but without him, it just feels tedious. Fuse puzzles are not needed. Ever. Why developers still try putting puzzles like these in games is perplexing. The next time I want to work with fuses, I'll screw with something in the real world.

Scenes like this may cause spontaneous glee for LOST fans

Talking amongst the survivors is also tedious. On one hand, you have the actually quite smart trading sequences, but on the other hand, the dialog sequences are familiar for anyone who has played any RPG, ever. These sequences are lifeless.

The game is separated into seven "episodes," throughout Seasons 1 and 2, only the first of which actually has the show's theme "song" (which, if you need a reminder, sounds like someone fell asleep on a Yamaha keyboard from hell), but they do have the "Previously on LOST" montage. There are flashbacks, which are quite enjoyable, which play out as a photography minigame. You play yourself in a foggy flashback, and you have to take a picture of a specific group of things to help your character "remember" because he's an amnesiac. Once you do that, you are able to walk around the environment, see specific things (netting all of them per flashback nets you an achievement, more on that later), and then trigger the rest of the scene.

On the topic of achievements, they are easy-peasy. It took me only an hour to find the ones I didn't get the first time through the game. There are story achievements, flashback achievements, and photography achievements. On the island, there are different things from the show (Kate's plane, Charlie's guitar, the blast door map), which, when photographed, add to a set, with an achievement. You have to nab a few easter eggs to get them, but they're easy to figure out.

Visuals - 8

These are actually quite good. The lighting, especially in the jungle, is divine. Everything looks lush, and your character looks like he is standing in the jungle.

The lush jungle

All of the setpieces look authentic, and now, I know, if I ended up on Gilligan's The Island, I could make my way around the Hatch. The engine falters with making the characters look like themselves, however. They look lifeless, and with the fanatical devotion that fans have to LOST, you can't fool people without characters that actually look like their namesakes.

Sound - 6

Things sound like they should. The jungle sounds like the jungle, the monster sounds like the monster, the music sounds enough like the score by Michael Giacchino.

Now, for what it needs, voiceovers. Yunjin Kim (Sun), Michael Emerson (Ben), Emilie De Ravin (Claire), Henry Ian Cusick (Desmond, brotha), Andrew Divoff (Mikhail), M.C. Gainey (Tom) lend their voices to the game. Emerson does a spectacular job - just listen to some audiobooks narrated by him; they got me though the gap between Seasons 3 and 4. Sadly, everyone has one sequence each, except for Sun (who has three, one of which is in Korean) and Ben (who has two). The rest of the characters have soundalikes, ones that fall too far in the audio uncanny valley for me. Locke's is especially grating on the ears. Jin, in his one sequence, sounds (and acts) like a retarded monkey (I'm not even using hyperbole), and Michael acts like an African-American stereotype, in his one sequence. Sawyer's voice sounds forced, and Charlie just sounds... Weird. Try to get him to sing "You All Everybody".

You also have Sayid, who tries too hard, and Juliet, who sounds, well, not like Juliet, and Kate, Jack, and Hurley, of course, who don't manage to fall in the valley, and that's it. Those are all of the characters you know that are in Via Domus. No Boone, no Shannon (she is referenced once in a loading screen, same with Ana Lucia), no Rousseau, no Tailie. Very few secondary characters, and no tertiary characters at all. The characters created for the game do their job and nothing more. Vincent does have one part, though, so that's awesome, being that he is such a little, wubbable puppy...

Longevity - 6 (C)

It took me two hours one night to get through half of this game, and three hours to finish the second half, and get all of the achievements. Each episode is about 30-45 minutes, so it's a rental, at best.

Learning Curve - 6 (B-)

This game doesn't really get much harder over time. The only things that require skill are one-time deals, for the most part, except for the fuse puzzles. I eventually gave up on them from the Hatch ones on, and just had the Internet do all of my dirty work.