User Reviews (1 - 11 of 23)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

Someone needs to tell S&G Software that it's no longer 1993

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 11 / 21
Date: October 05, 2007
Author: Amazon User

Someone needs to tell S&G Software that it's no longer 1993. Creating games with photographs and video clips in place of digitally created images is about as culturally relevant today as a new Coolio CD, so it's hard to see what the developer was thinking when it made Anacapri: The Dream. This throwback to the era of The 7th Guest may include thousands of photographs of one of the most gorgeous vacation spots on the planet, but it plays more like something you found at a yard sale than a game you pulled down from the new releases shelf.

The line between games and movies is sort of blurred in the structure of the game. While the play style holds tight to the point-and-click adventure template, the game is constructed solely with still photos that give your jaunt the vibe of an indie film. So even though you play a stereotypical sleuth looking to solve the mystery of the ancient Obsidian Disk on the island of Capri, the atmosphere is quite different from the sorts of adventures you might be accustomed to. Thousands of photos depicting everything from seaside vistas to cobblestone roads, to the many quaint shops lining the narrow streets of the titular town of Anacapri, give you the impression that you've embarked on a real trip to the exotic Mediterranean locale. The gameworld is absolutely massive, so it frequently feels as if you're really exploring all of the crooks and crannies of the island.

However, there are prices to pay for this type of presentation and the sheer size of everything. Many of the most potentially picturesque outdoor shots are blurry or strewn with artifacts, presumably to keep picture size reasonable. Oddly, the most sharply detailed pics are the dull ones that show a shopkeeper behind his counter or an old man sitting on a bench. Regardless of quality, there is an air of absurdity to the whole affair because of the use of multiple shots of people during conversations to give the illusion of movement. Done more subtly, this might have been a good idea, and might have nicely added the illusion of movement to what is otherwise a breathless game. But all of the changed poses and expressions given to Anacapri residents are wildly exaggerated, so encounters with them come off like some sort of bizarre mime show. Finally, there are some technological issues in the install process due to the high number of photographs. There are so many photos included as single, high-resolution files that the installation takes almost as long as a flight to Capri itself. You might want to brew a pot of coffee for this one, as it takes a good two hours for all seven gigs of picture files to be transferred from the DVD to your hard drive.

Unfortunately, this time isn't well spent. The game amounts to little more than a great selection of somebody else's vacation snaps. Gameplay lacks structure, due largely to the sheer size of the island. The game itself is such an afterthought that it feels like something hacked together at the last minute to justify writing off a vacation to Capri. Although you're assisted by a hotspot system that highlights key locations on each photograph, it's ridiculously easy to get lost because the entire island is open at the start of the game. Make a wrong turn, or simply get befuddled over the game's many vague clues, and you're soon off on an unintentional sightseeing tour. Although it's relatively easy to work your way through most in-game situations by doing some careful pixel hunting, closely following all of your instructions, and continually checking the city and island maps to see where you are, you still need a walkthrough to figure out how to get where you need to go.

Adding to the confusion of Anacapri is a plot that values nonsense about the nature of reality over the virtues of an easy-to-follow narrative. As if the real-world island wasn't hard enough to figure out, you regularly have to chug dream syrup that sends you off to explore surreal lands populated by ghosts and mythological monsters. Set-piece puzzles that bypass the absurdities of the plot are the only strength here, and there aren't nearly enough of them to compensate for the awfulness of everything else. Most don't even show up until near the end of the game, such as the nifty series of sphinx riddles, and the tile puzzle that is one of the final barriers to the Obsidian Disk.

Horrific voice acting and scripting, along with some truly weird musical choices, sprinkle extra strangeness into everything. Strangers stop to talk as if they were long-lost friends, and the topics of conversation often seem nonsensical until you start looking back on things and putting together the big picture. All of the characters in the game are voiced by a handful of terrible actors making lame attempts to change their voices with bad accents, which makes even real-world interactions with people shimmer like hallucinations. The dialogue is universally overwrought, characterized by lines such as "That disk will remain a dark stain on our past and humanity forever," spoken with all of the passion of a fast-food counter jockey asking if you want to supersize your value meal. Music is frequently jarring, and bounces all over the place between poppy lounge music and driving guitar. It's like you're being stalked by somebody with a xylophone on wheels and Yngwie Malmsteen, respectively. Thankfully, there are frequent, long stretches of silence.

If it were a relic from the early 90s, Anacapri: The Dream might be worth a play for the nostalgia factor alone. A "so bad it's good" vibe also creeps into the adventure through the voice acting, almost giving you the feeling that you're reliving some fond memory that hasn't aged particularly well. But you're not, and considering that the longing for a bygone day is the only possible reason for playing this backward game, you'll soon get tired of flipping through photographs and move on to something more modern and more competently designed.

Suckiest game i've ever purchased

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 13
Date: October 10, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I was anticipating an adventure but instead I was thrown back to the early 1990's with a game that's uninspiring, tedious and has a strange and unsuiting musical score. The game involved a lot of roaming the streats of Anacapri with very little reward. Pleeeeaase, don't buy it. You will weep as I did. OK i didn't weep but I was furious for spending a lot of money on the game and the shipping and getting very, very dissappointed.

Save Your Money

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 12
Date: October 16, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I purchased this game based on the only review (5 stars) posted at the time. It didn't hurt that it was a brand new release with alluring packaging.This game is truly awful.Tedious, not worth your time nor the cost. It's only redeeming quality would be the many photos of Capri. Implausible premise, bad voice acting, outdated design technique. Save your money.

Not Myst...not even close

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 12 / 18
Date: October 30, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I too bought this based on the single five star review. I don't know how anyone could compare this to the Myst series. It's not even close. It's more like clicking through your aunt Millie's slide show of her vacation. The voices are amaturish and speak to you as you view their still photo. The music, for the most part, does not fit the scenes. Some of the puzzles are clever and fun but overall it's not a world I enjoyed exploring. It was tedious and often boring.

Click-through static images

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 11 / 13
Date: December 02, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I have to agree that this game feels a lot like clicking through your Aunt's vacation pictures and doesn't come close to the quality of Sierra's adventures from the '80s and '90s. The images are mostly 1024x768 and the game doesn't scale for those with large or wide-screen displays. Game play mostly involves waiting for the game to draw a picture onscreen, moving the mouse around the image to find highlighted "hotspots" (squares drawn on selected portions of the image), and deciding which hotspot (assuming there is more than one) to select. The is the most boring game I've played in years.

Wish I would of read the reviews first!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: December 11, 2007
Author: Amazon User

What were they thinking when they made this game! Should of read the reviews before I purchased the game. If your thinking of getting this game, think twice, you will hate it, unless you want to look at someones vacation photos! The box is very deceiving, looks really fun, but it's really not up to todays standards at all.

Anacapri The Dream -

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 6 / 8
Date: November 11, 2007
Author: Amazon User

If the idea of putting you to sleep was the basis of this game, then they have succeeded. This game is extremely boring. The point and click action in this game becomes tiring. At least later you can flash transport from one area to another. The acting is horrible as well as the music soundtrack. The storyline moves slowly, and I moved aimlessly around for the longest time before having to resort to obtaining a cheat. The game description sounded like it would be fun, but that has not been the case. This has been move like a travel site with lots of pretty pictures. I would not recommend this game but would like to visit Anacapri.

Dreadful

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 7
Date: January 31, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Other than the fact that it takes up a ton of HD space, this game could have snuck out of the early 90's. The menu screen looks like something from an old DOS game. Navigation is through ENDLESS screenshots with hotspots (thankfully you can have them marked or this would be worse). You bump into people and they talk and talk and talk until they advise to walk all the way to the other side of the island

Ana Capri the town looks like a beautiful place, but this game is just plain dull. I highly discourage purchasing this game

atrocious

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: April 08, 2008
Author: Amazon User

This is the worst PC game I have ever played. I'm very suspicious of the "reviewers" up here giving it 5 stars. Don't waste your money on this pile.

Hated It

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: April 20, 2008
Author: Amazon User

I did not like this game at all. I don't like communicating with still pictures. There is no direction for you to follow. You could wander around for a long time not knowing where to go and what to do. This is one of the worst games I have ever played.

Review Page: 1 2 3 Next 

Actions