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Feeling Ripped Off By Amazon and UBI? I am!!!!!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 23 / 33
Date: December 04, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Feeling ripped off? I am! I bought this game through Amazon, but first I checked the "systems requirements" to make sure it would run on my PC. Looked good - got game - can't install or play it because - guess what - I don't have the right video card or sound card!!!! This game doesn't work with INTEL graphics controller!!! INTEL, for $#@# sake! Can't return to Amazon because it's opened! So please, trusting consumers, DON'T BUY THIS PRODUCT without doing some solid research - which is what I should have done, but no...I trusted Amazon and UBI/CYAN. Big mistake. p.s. I only filled in one star up above because I had to in order to get this review posted.

Buy something else from somewhere else.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 13 / 25
Date: January 03, 2004
Author: Amazon User

After trying and failing to install this game on my girlfriend's brand-new, top of the line Dell laptop and my brand new PC with a gig of ram and 256 MB video card, I have determined two things:

1)UbiSoft has made this year's most disappointing game because their intent was to market the product based on the fans' love of the Myst name rather than to design a cutting-edge playable game. Most people who own a computer own a Compaq or a Dell, neither of which come standard with the type of video chipset that is required to run this game. No one should be expected to make a $130 upgrade to play a $50 game.

2)Amazon has done all of its customers a disservice by failing to mention that the system requirements of this game are absolute and the majority of computer users in America will not be able to play this game. I'm a computer tech with ten years of experience, and I couldn't get this software to work, so how does UbiSoft and Amazon expect the average user to do so? And if they fail to properly outline the requirements of this software, how many other products have they failed to disclose pertinent information about?

I will be contacting Amazon tonight about returning this poorly designed product, and if they refuse to offer me a credit or refund I will never buy from Amazon again for any reason. Plus I think I'll burn a few hundred copies of Uru and give them out for free in front of Virgin Megastores in Manhattan. I'll let you all know.

DON'T TOUCH URU WITH A TEN FOOT POLE!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 12 / 21
Date: January 02, 2004
Author: Amazon User

What in GOD'S NAME was Cyan thinking!!! I've got a Pentium 4 2.8 ghz with a GeForce 4 128 mb graphics card and 512 mb ram, and I still couldn't get this mess Cyan calls a game to run smoothly. URU ran retardedly slow and jerkilly even when I set the graphics and sound attributes to their lowest settings. Someone needs to track down the so-called crack programming team behind this mess so they can't even think about creating another "game".
I mean, my computer runs C&C: Generals and Sim City 4 like a hot knife cutting through butter, and they're both much prettier looking than URU, and Generals has far more interactive streaming video to incorporate than URU by a long shot.
Whooever made this crap, I want to know how they managed to get a college degree in computer programming, because they sure as heck don't know good code from a hole in the ground.
Bottom line, remove URU from your shopping cart and save your hard-earned money for a game that's ACTUALLY WORTH IT like Half-Life 2, Doom 3, or Syberia 2 . . . IF and WHEN these titles actually come out. PS - Amazon needs to offer a choice of 0 stars on their scale, so people can know when something's THAT BAD.

what WERE they thinking

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 12 / 21
Date: January 10, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I loved the previous Mysts. This one is absolutely aversive.
COMPATABILITY: even though I did get the game to run on my hardware, I won't let them off the backward compatability hook. Much of the manual reads as a disclaimer translating to: "it's not our fault if it doesn't run, you're on your own, go update your drivers you luddite." My one-year old system far exceeds the minimum specs on the box. But because it's a laptop, the driver for the video card was customized by the manufacturer and not supported by the video card manufacturer (true for all laptops). After a long and tedious search I found a 3rd party driver update. NOT FUN, NOT NECESSARY. Also, I have never seen such a large gap between the minimum system and the recommended system. Of course, you have to open the box to find the latter.
GAMEPLAY: If you enjoyed being taken away to a strange new world that felt real and challenged your mind and senses, this game is not for you. The most challenging puzzle you will find is how to get your avatar to do the nintendo-like moves given the obstructive interface. Puzzle solved long ago, I sit watching my avatar turn in place, unable to see in the direction it is facing. Quick, distracting camera angle changes that affect the function of the cursor -- I'm walking forward, camera angle changes -- OOPS!, now I'm turning in place. Switch to first person mode. No control over where I'm looking. For some reason I get stuck looking at the floor or ceiling. I can only change this by walking -- and letting the game decide what I can see. It is obvious that this "puzzle" requires repeated sprints from a starting point to push buttons, returning to the starting point within a limited time. Too bad the main obstacle is the goofy interface. Oh, and what's with all the "puzzles" that require you to herd objects into strange places with your feet? The avatar (and I) have hands, why not let us use them? Because then the "puzzle" would have absolutely no challenge that's why.
STORYLINE: none discernable, other than find these objects and struggle to reach them. Whatta waste.
OTHER: for the life of me, I can't understand why it takes so long to start up and why every change between "ages" takes, eh, ages. Really, when you hear the scene change audio signal, get up, fix yourself a sandwich (or roast a small turkey), come back and wait, wait, wait. BTW, 1.7GH P4.

Can you give negative stars?

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 15
Date: December 31, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This game doesn't deserve even zero stars. The 3-D controls are the worst I've ever seen. It's impossible to move around easily and like a previous reviewer said, you are now more worried about falling off ledges than solving puzzles. Also, the great mood music in earlier games in the series is now gone. It's been replaced by, well pretty much nothing. What were they thinking when they designed this clunker? I'm so p*ss*d I spent the money on this game and now it's gone for good. All they needed to do was continue the Myst-Riven-Exile format and people would have been happy as clams, but instead they went for the greed hoping people will someday pay to play this piece of crap online. Man what a bomb.

Pretty but tedious

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 15
Date: January 07, 2004
Author: Amazon User

The game installed just fine and my PC (1.7 gHz Athlon w/GeForce 4 video) runs it without issue.

The graphics are lovely and imaginative, though often so dark that I had to play the game at night with the lights off. (Yes, I went through the video calibration and I have the gamma correction at max.)

But that's where the fun ends. I agree with others that puzzles are tedious and made very difficult by the interface. The previous Myst games required lots of thinking, putting clues together to solve the puzzles. This latest addition requires less thinking and more "Mario Brothers" type moves.

I think I'm about half-way through the game and I'm tempted to stop there. I won't even consider the online version of the game (which is what I think UBISOFT and CYAN really designed this game for).

If you liked the previous versions of Myst, don't bother with this one. If you don't mind half the game being "how do I time this jump just right", give it a try.

LIGHT Gamer - So disappointed

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 9 / 15
Date: January 01, 2004
Author: Amazon User

Sadly, I am hugely disappointed in this game for various reasons. I am NOT a heavy gamer, yet I was so in love with the first 3 Myst games that I pre-ordered this game out of pure excitement, then spent more $$ upgrading my video card on my brand-new system when the game wouldn't play. Now that I finally have the game working I feel seriously cheated. Think of all the anticipation Star Wars fans had for Episode I and then were delivered Jar-Jar Binks.

The reason I loved the original games was that they were quiet, the interaction was easy, the music and the graphics were beautiful, and it was basically a nice, stress-free way to wind down after another day of work. This game provides none of these comforts, except for maybe the graphics. The ridiculous 3rd person view is difficult to maneuver; if I wanted to play a platform game I would have kept the the GameCube my brother gave me for Xmas last year. I must agree with a previous reviewer who said that Exile had the best interface. I personally don't care about the the live aspect of the game because as to quote another reviewer, "wasn't the best part of Myst that you never saw other people?"

Another reason I love the "old Myst" is that the games are well-crafted and the software doesn't have a lot of bugs; otherwise I would just buy Myst clones and be happy with the game genre. It is just one more disappointment that the creators of Myst decided to create this game that is a clone of other video games & definitely NOT in the innovative vein that they themselves created; another blow is the fact that this game is NOT bug-free, as even on my newly updated-just-for-the-game-system it takes at least 15 minutes for the game to start, and frankly I'm frightened to close it out for fear that it will never start again.

If you like the idea of a low-key, sedated, beautifully presented Sonic the Hedgehog or Jak & Daxter you will probably like this game. If you are expecting the ingenuity of the original 3 games you should get a prescription for Prozac before buying this game, or else you'll just get depressed. As others have said before me, maybe you should just get your fix re-playing the old games.

Frustrating and disappointing, not up to Myst caliber

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: January 05, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I loved Myst, had a lot of fun with Riven, and thought Exile's rollercoaster was the best game payoff ever. Sadly, Uru was nothing but a huge disappointment. Oh, there's a new avatar you can control in 3D and make run and jump, plenty of eye candy, and generally pretty good camera work (although a bit quirky in spots, when I could look through my avatar's body to her ankles disappearing in her shoes).

Uru lacks a good story. The puzzles are almost non-existent, and what few there are don't really make much sense, and they're not well integrated into what little story there is. One whole age consists of mostly of just wandering around, trying to figure out which eye candy you can actually interact with. And you have to run and jump. This is cool, at first. It becomes a bit frustrating as jumps you think should work don't, then disconcerting in some of the more vertigo-inducing sequences, then downright gratuitous when you're forced to do the same annoying sequences at least twice. (And that's only if you actually make the jump each time.)

I only finished the game because I was hoping for at least a decent payoff at the end. It's not there, unless a Peter Gabriel song does it for you.

And yes, the other reviewers are correct: you MUST have a system that meets all the technical requirements. My brand-new Pentium 4, 2.8 GHz, 512MB Dell, couldn't run Uru until I gave it a new video card. Deciphering video card terminology, along with the capabilities and slot requirements of different brands and models, is not for the faint of heart.

If you enjoy gratuitous frustration, this game's for you. If, like me, you were looking for a good game that you can't pull yourself away from, expect to be severely disappointed.

Check Your Video Card Before Buying

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 9 / 12
Date: February 04, 2004
Author: Amazon User

The specs that appear on Amazon require: "Video Card: 32 MB NVIDIA GeForce 1, 2, 3, 4, or FX; ATI Radeon 7000-9800 or better." I don't know what they mean by "or better" if you don't have one of those specified video cards the game will not run. It took us one week of chasing down their support team to get that simple answer.

And, if you think unraveling Myst, Exile, and Riven are tough, wait until you need to get hold of UbiSoft Tech Support. They put you through days of trying to find them, contact them, send them files (which they never receive...or claim to not receive) and in the end when you don't give up and go away quietly, they tell you what they knew all along. "You must have one of the specified video cards. So go buy one and leave us alone." It's almost like playing one of their games except that their website and the techs that man it entirely lack the charm and interesting nature of the previous game worlds. Entirely.

Some people will say you should run out and buy the right video card without complaint. That's okay. A geek's solution is always that everyone else is a dummy for not sharing his narrow priorities. The truth is that UbiSoft should have designed a product to meet the requirements of the market and not require the market to meet their product's requirements. They know they blew it and they are trying to weather the storm. Well, they might and they might not. I can only tell you one thing for certain. They lost one family of steady and previously devoted customers by this strategy. And you know what? That's all right too because I don't really think they had anything more to show us.

If you don't take my experience to heart. I can still help you. Check Ebay. There will be at least one copy for sale and probably a whole lot more...

Huge disappointment

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 12
Date: January 06, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I have to disagree with the people who are saying "Oh folks just don't like it because they don't have the system requirements." My computer ran the game just fine and it still stunk. The so called "puzzles" were tedious and frustrating, with little to no reward for putting you through the hell of solving them. The 3rd person user interface was disastrous, unnecessary, and poorly rendered. The landscapes were repetitive (note the repeating cloud patterns in one scene) and looked like something out of a Dr. Seuss book, not a high end video game. The soundtrack was dreary when it wasn't irritating.

I'm so very sad that this game is of such poor quality both in technical matters and concept. I loved Myst, Riven, and Exile. Too bad I'll never get the same experience from this wonderful game world unless I go back to play the old three again. By the time I got to my third age in Uru, I was bored and annoyed at being treated so rudely by Ubisoft/Cyan. I packed it up without a twinge of remorse--well, except for the regret I felt for purchasing it and wasting my last holiday weekend playing it.

The writers of this game should be taken out and shot for degrading the wonderful Myst mystique.

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