Lost Horizon

Overview

Lost Horizon is a point and click adventure game developed by German studio Animation Arts featuring hand-drawn backgrounds with 3D character models and a fast-paced story.  The story is heavily influenced by the Indiana Jones movies and pulp serials, and the game provides interactive action sequences to provide a sense of excitement, even though there is no way to die.

Story

Set in 1936 Hong Kong, disgraced former British soldier Fenton Paddock is your typical pulp hero - a rugged but charming smuggler who is in trouble with the local triads.  Paddock is recruited by the British governor of Hong Kong, Lord Weston, to find his son and friend of Paddock's who has gone missing as part of an cartography expedition to the uncharted Himalayas.  Paddock is accompanied by the requisite love interest Kim, who is unwittingly dragged into the entire affair by Paddock.  Soon enough the Nazis get involved, who are looking for the fabled city of Shambhala and the world conquering power it is said to have, and Paddock must travel the world to stop them.

Gameplay

A traditional point and click adventure game, Lost Horizon features high resolution, hand-drawn backgrounds and 3D character models.  The puzzles are straight forward and the inventory never gets too full, allowing easy experimentation if stuck.  Anytime in the game you can press the spacebar to see all hot spots highlighted, negating any pixel hunting in the high resolution backgrounds.
 
The game also features several sequences where you control two characters who must work together but are in different areas. You can switch between them at any time and can exchange inventory items.

To provide the sense of danger that pulp serials often had, there are several "action" sequences.  They are not timed nor can you die in them - you solve puzzles during action set-pieces such as a car chase. 

System Requirements

Minimum: 

• OS: Windows XP / Vista / Windows 7
• Processor: Intel Pentium 4 @ 2.0GHz / AMD Athlon XP 2000+
• Memory: 512MB of RAM
• Hard Disk Space: 4GB
• Graphics Card: 64MB nVidia GeForce FX 5600 / ATI Radeon 9600
• Sound Card: DirectX compatible
• DirectX: 9.0c

Recommended: 

• Processor: Intel Pentium 4 @ 3.0GHz / AMD Athlon 64 3200+
• Memory: 1GB of RAM
• Graphics Card: 128MB nVidia GeForce 6600 / ATI Radeon x1300