The Quest For The Worst Adventure Game Puzzles Ever Made - Atlantis: The Lost Tales (Let's Talk About Myst Clones!)
by zombiepie
Preamble
When I last talked about an adventure game, it was for LucasArts' The Dig. I received moderate criticism during that blog that I was engaging in histrionics, and it was a fair point to make. Despite all of its faults, The Dig is in no way the "worst" at anything. It is a technical masterpiece that, at its worst, has a handful of above-average puzzles that can impede the player as they progress its story. Therefore, I decided to tackle something different with today's blog. You fuckers said I was "too soft" last time. As such, let's jump into everyone's "favorite" era of PC adventure games: the CD-ROM era! That's right, assholes; it's time for us to talk about "Myst-likes."
First, we should talk about Cryo Interactive. Cryo was a massive figure in the PC adventure game community as their output during their peak was bonkers. During the late 90s, they were outputting three to four fully-featured adventure games per year. However, they were a studio that rarely brought anything new to the table. At the studio's onset, they were making SCUMM-clones to try and capitalize on LucasArts' "Golden Age." Somehow, they ended up with the Dune IP and developed the well-received 1992 Dune adventure game. When the genre bottomed out, they were one of the few studios to survive as they quickly pivoted to make edutainment games much like Humongous Entertainment. Versailles 1685 mixed then-groundbreaking 3D graphics with historical fantasy storytelling. However, eventually, they found a niche of sorts making what many would derisively call "Myst Clones."
In comes the Atlantis franchise! Atlantis: The Lost Tales, the game we will be discussing today, is the first of five games in the Atlantis anthology. The gimmick with these games is that each tackles a different historical thematic, and none of them are explicitly connected. For example, the first game features a version of Atlantis based on Greek and Roman legends. The second game features fabled lost cities steeped in Chinese and Japanese mythology. Regardless, each game repeats the Myst franchise's gameplay and mechanical tropes. However, as with most Myst clones, none of the Atlantis games provide as much of Myst's storytelling and gameplay upside while still repeating many of its faults and shortcomings. Nonetheless, if there is one thing you have to give Cryo credit for, it has to be the production values of the Atlantis series. Unlike Cyan, Cryo entirely rendered its environments and characters in-game and fully 3D. While none of this graphical fidelity holds up by today's standards, there's something impressive about a game in 1997 with animated 3D polygonal characters and voice acting to boot. Also, for Saturn and PS1 owners, this game was a fixture at game shops and often sold at ridiculously low prices. In fact, a majority of the people with even a slight memory of the game are likely to be owners of the console ports rather than the original PC version. Now, let's jump into my puzzle rankings with all of that in mind!
Puzzle Rankings (In Chronological Order)
Finding Agatha - 3/10 - This starting puzzle all but determines if you will finish Atlantis or not. The trick is knowing where to go and getting used to how Atlantis controls. After a pilot plops you at the capital city of the kingdom of Atlantis, you endeavor to meet with the general of the queen's guard. You can brute force this scenario, but it is worth pointing out how large the starting hub city is and how little the game signposts you. In other words, it requires a lot of aimless wandering. If you enjoyed Riven, flaws and all, it's a fun start to the game wherein you can talk to NPCs and learn more about the machinations of the world. At this point, the game also reminds you of its brutal difficulty. If you interact with the guards for too long or enter the Queen's Palace before meeting Agatha, you will get a "Game Over" and start back at the pilot, which could represent the loss of hours of game time. By the way, this is one of those CD-ROM adventure games that uses checkpoints rather than manual saves.
Getting the Earring From the Fisherman - 4/10 - After interacting with Agatha and crossing paths with a handful of other named characters, your protagonist needs to pick up an earring from a local fishmonger. Again, nothing here is challenging, per se, but it is another friendly reminder of how fucked the game's checkpointing and difficulty can get. Two guards at an intersection will murder you if you even attempt to talk to them. More than any other in the game, this sequence plays like Myst. You rapidly move from one screen to another through mouse clicks. The difference in Atlantis is the game murders you if you enter a screen when the game does not want you to. That said, it is another puzzle you can fumble around with and still solve.
First Stealth Sequence With Guards - 5/10 - Ah, welcome to 90s era stealth missions! Before this sequence begins, you get an introduction to the game's dialogue system, which, like the rest of the game, rewards you with instant death if you pick even one incorrect choice out of a dozen. That sense of brutal difficulty applies to the stealth sequences. There are several missions in which you need to time your clicks to avoid getting detected by palace guards, and I feel the same way about each one: they suck. To give you an idea of how involved and unforgiving the stealth sequences can be, let me review the answer for your first one. After talking with Agatha, you need to return to the town square and quickly enter a door to the left. After entering the palace, you need to listen for the footsteps of a guard and, upon hearing the sound effect, have about ten to fifteen seconds to click through three screens to begin the next stealth mission, which repeats the same format. The only difference is that you turn right after the first guard and turn left on the second. If you make even one incorrect click, you start back in the room with Agatha. These missions are terrible but not hard. All you need to do is listen for difficult-to-hear audio cues and race to the next screen.
Planetarium Puzzle - 8.5/10 - This is the first puzzle in Atlantis that made me shout, "Fuck this shit!" I mean, seriously, just look at the above screen! What the fuck even is that?! After finishing the previous stealth sequence, you enter a room with a stone Chinese guardian lion. The game wants you to play around with a nearby planetarium to make the sun, moon, and city of Atlantis line up in a perfect string. The problem is that there's absolutely nothing in the game that tells you this is what you need to do. Worse, there's NOTHING in the environment that hints at the solution. You could spend HOURS perusing the entire room, looking for clues, and feeling like you are missing something. Likewise, fiddling around with the actual planetarium sucks shit. The complete lack of input makes it almost impossible to understand if you are getting closer or further away from the solution. Every guide I consulted recommended that you look at screenshots rather than figure it out yourself. Even that is not easy because the game's resolution makes it difficult to tell if your pixels match the proper solution.
Throwing the Flowerpot & Getting Out Of The Bar - 6.5/10 - Did you ever want to play a Myst-clone that thought it could also be an FPS? WELL, ATLANTIS HAS YOU COVERED! After exiting the planetarium, you need to enter a nearby inn, but an imposing man will murder you if you attempt to enter. Instead, you first need to ascend a neighboring building and throw a flowerpot to knock them out. Throwing the flowerpot is annoying, and the complete lack of a reticle stinks. Also, the guard throws a dagger and kills your character should you miss. Once you enter the inn, a former ally betrays you, and you need to beat a hasty retreat by first answering three multiple-choice questions correctly. After selecting the three correct choices, you need to fight your way out of the bar. Getting out of the bar is a timed action sequence you need to solve within 10-15 seconds; otherwise, you restart the ENTIRE puzzle. You have no idea that getting out of the bar involves going up a set of stairs to cut a rope so you can kick a specific target. Even a single incorrect input results in, you guessed it, death. Clicking the wrong person results in you crushing yourself with a chandelier, and going in any direction the game doesn't want you to go in causes the enemies to shank the shit out of you.
Getting Out Of The Garden - 6/10 - You hear a familiar voice coming from a garden as you exit the inn. The source reveals itself to be Agatha, and she tasks you with spying on the assumed origin of an evil plot. This mission requires you to pick up a ladder and use the scaffolding on the garden wall to enter the imperial palace. The weird thing here is that you leave the ladder behind when you find a window on one of the palace's walls. Picking up the ladder is simple, but the concept of an item being temporary is new and not apparent to the player. Likewise, the window you use the ladder on is hard to find. Once you enter the palace, you find yourself in its sewers, and the game needs you to find a crowbar to break a specific pixel on a wall. Picking up the crowbar is next to impossible because you have no idea you need to find a crowbar in the first place, let alone use it on a dark spot on a random wall texture. The dark spot texture on the wall is poorly communicated and looks like a random environmental texture. It's a first-person platforming sequence combined with a pixel-hunt. This game is Hell incarnate.
Rat Catcher Board Game - 2/10 - When you open the trapdoor, you discover a man known as "the Rat Catcher" who sells wares and rumors in the depths of the palace sewers. However, before he shares one of his secrets, you must beat him in a board game. The game you play is mind-numbingly dull and straightforward. It is a hide-and-go-seek game but played using a board game. Some starting positions felt fucked, but it's not like there's no input. All it takes is a lot of trial and error to get the desired outcome.
Library Guard Puzzle - 7/10 - After beating Rat Catcher at his game, he shares that indeed the queen's consort is up to no good and then flips a switch to drop your protagonist down to the palace library. You need to navigate two levels at the library like an escape room. While here, you can only make two incorrect inputs before getting a game over, and as a result, this puzzle requires an insane amount of trial and error. You can use the process of elimination, but there are so many steps and red herrings that this can be a massive time sink. When you enter the room with the red carpet, the solution is left, forward, forward, right, forward, forward, right, forward, left, and forward. That is a ten-input sequence that you need to nail perfectly as this is ALSO a timed mission!
Underwater Cave Puzzle - 6/10 - Congratulations! By completing the library puzzle, you are now entering Atlantis' second act! Things start with you exploring the second significant environment in the game, Carbonek. Here, your pilot from earlier reveals himself to be an ally to the queen's cause and agrees to take your character to a forest near the queen's prison. You can find her chambers in a hidden underground cave near the city of Carbonek. However, just getting to the underwater cave is insane. This is the first time the game asks you to swim, so you may never realize you need to float across a body of water to find an underwater cave. Next, the cave entrance looks like a random background texture and does NOT look like the entryway to a one-off story-required level. There's no in-game compass, making the forest's size even harder to figure out. Finally, the game presents a sundial puzzle before you can meet the queen. The puzzle itself is surprisingly fun and easy. The tiles on the snake have a rainbow gradient that assists you in figuring out the correct order of the pieces, and there's a handy reset button in the middle. All in all, getting to the actual puzzle is harder.
Saving The Princess - 10/10 - This is a long sequence wherein you need to break the queen out of prison and take her to an escape ship. Getting through the dungeon is complex, and because the prison is a circular loop, it is easy to lose your sense of place. Allowing you to distract guards is nice, but you can still instantly die if your reaction speed is off by even a second. Also, the checkpointing is awful. There is one checkpoint at the start of the prison and one right before you take the queen to the airship. Once you get the queen, you need to ferry her back to your flying craft. The escape routes cannot be deviated from even slightly; otherwise, you risk a swift death and being booted to a checkpoint back at the cave. There are so many steps involved with this escape sequence that it is impossible to remember them unless you take notes. Likewise, the final part of the last escape route requires you to get to a dead-end to trigger a cutscene which is the opposite of what the game wants you to do during the first escape sequence. Oh, and did I mention this is also a timed mission?
For those still unconvinced why this warrants a ten out of ten, let me review what the answer entails for the player. There is precisely one correct series of inputs during this sequence that does not result in an instant "game over." For the first part, the correct mouse and keyboard inputs to the airship are left, left, escape, right, forward, left, forward, forward, right, forward, forward, mouse click, forward, forward, left, forward, and right. That's a sixteen-input series that you need to figure out through brute force, as the game does not provide any hints if you are going in the correct direction. Likewise, you die after inputting two wrong coordinates and start from the beginning. But here's the kicker; that's just the first part of the escape puzzle. The second part requires you to leave the airship and form a distraction, and you need to input left, forward, forward, forward, forward, right, forward, forward, left, and forward. That's a ten-input sequence, and if you fail the second part, you start at the beginning of the ENTIRE puzzle! That, my friends, is pure Hell.
Chicken Gear Puzzle - 2/10 - It's a gadget and gizmo puzzle! There are no superfluous gears, making the solution an easy elimination process. You have likely seen a similar puzzle like this one before. I don't mind gear puzzles if I have exactly the number of gears necessary, and that's the case here.
Snake Egg Puzzle - 2/10 - Another surprisingly fun, albeit, totally unoriginal puzzle. You need to place eggs on a maze and connect them with the heads of snakes without crossing any of the lines. I only had to reset once, but not being able to remove the eggs unless you leave the puzzle screen is frustrating. However, I am almost sure there is more than one solution, making it far more "acceptable" than other puzzles in this game.
Locating the Magical Bow and Arrow - 10/10 - This mission defines the needle in a haystack puzzle trope to a T. While fussing about with an old lady, she gives you a riddle, and the solution is to find a bow and arrow propped up against a tree on a hill. You need to use the bow and arrow to slay a legendary white boar whose blood will allow the old lady to look into the future. This sequence, at first, does not seem too complicated as it is another one of the game's tedious and annoying fetch quests. HOWEVER, without a guide, it could take hours because the old lady's riddle is not at all helpful. Likewise, the bow and arrow virtually blend into the environment, making them easy to pass by on accident. Finally, the lack of a minimap and compass is entirely unacceptable.
What makes this a ten is everything after the fact. First, you need to "purify" the bow because it is apparently "cursed." However, you can only lift this curse by dropping it on one specific part of a river, and you need to be facing in the correct direction. If you approach the river facing South and not North, you can't drop the bow into the river. The game is that specific about its programming in that regard. Then, after purifying the bow, you need to kill a white boar that only exists in random forest screens near Carbonek, but the game never tells you which ones those are. To make matters worse, you have one shot per screen to kill the boar, and it will not respawn until after you leave the screen you last saw it. Furthermore, you need to aim your bow and arrow without a reticle, which is just the worst! The game expects a level of pixel perfection with your actions but does not give you any of the tools to make that possible. I had to repeat this puzzle twice because I thought I had collected the boar's blood, but the game did not detect it because my mouse click was off by a few pixels.
Rat Catcher Pachinko - 5/10 - The weirdest part of this puzzle is knowing where the game wants you to go. Understanding you need to go to the Rat Catcher after initiating the next part of the story is in and of itself a massive leap of logic. Likewise, making your way back requires you to do the door puzzle to unlock the Rat Catcher all over again. Nevertheless, the pachislot puzzle the Rat Catcher plays with you isn't the hardest in the world. I ended up solving it after a few tries.
Throne Room Action Sequence - 6/10 - After you chat with the Rat Catcher, you learn you need to enter the palace's throne room. First, let's review the many steps of illogic you need to make to solve this "puzzle." After exiting the sewers, the first step is to turn to your left, pick up a vase, and throw it at a guard. None of your previous items, which includes a knife, can be used to get out of any part of this combat sequence. The guard grabs the vase and acts surprised like he's in a comedy movie. Next, you deal with the second enemy by clicking between his legs so you can slide through his legs instead of attacking him. It's an utterly anachronistic action that makes zero sense. Finally, you grab a spear to lock a door. The cherry on top is that you already have a crowbar, but the game will only allow you to use a flimsier nearby spear. Oh, did I mention if you start this action scene too early, you miss out on your ONLY HINT for the next puzzle?! YEAH! YOU CAN FUCK YOURSELF OVER IN THIS GAME!
Throne Room Puzzle - 9/10 - As mentioned earlier, the only hint you get about the throne room puzzle is through a mini-puzzle briefly accessible after your second meeting with the rat catcher. HOWEVER, this is in a one-time environment you can't go back to once you have started the throne room action sequence. The minute you meet the guards, you have lost your chance to get your only hint on how to solve the following puzzle. For reference, the queen's throne is decked with colored orbs and mosaic symbols, and it needs you to match the correct colors with the appropriate shapes. The very missable reference guide on deciphering the forms into colors is found in a nook right before starting the previous action scene. If that weren't bad enough, once you solve the puzzle, you have to flick a switch on the throne that is easy to miss. Finally, this is a timed puzzle!
Statue Puzzle - 2/10 - It's a Tangram puzzle! I have nothing against tangrams, but putting them in your adventure game always seemed like the laziest shit imaginable. None of the tangrams are challenging, and they only have a single solution. The controls are the most challenging part as the puzzle pieces do not snap into place. You can find yourself knowing where to put your final pieces only not to be able to because the remaining space on the table is insufficient to fit the rest of the pieces together.
Sliding Block Puzzle - 3/10 - It's a 3x3 sliding block puzzle. I solved it just by fucking around for a few minutes. Enough said. This puzzle is not a 1 or 2 because of the item you need to collect to get to it. Likewise, reaching the puzzle itself is a convoluted process. After talking to the fisherman, there's another sliding block puzzle to unlock the secret passage by the palace. There is a third sliding block puzzle, but it is the most nefarious. It is found down a long corridor in a monotonous hallway to the side of a dead-end. However, because of the nature of the game, you can quickly get to this dead end, miss the puzzle, and think there is nothing of note.
Getting Anna - 4/10 - First, you must find a corrupt priestess in an unmarked building. After getting Anna, she runs away to the inn, where you start a dialogue sequence wherein you have a limited amount of time to say the correct responses or risk getting killed. There's a second dialogue sequence where you need to convince a Lennie Small-type character to do your dirty work. It's another example of games from the 90s poorly representing the mentally disabled community. However, the puzzle itself is fun, considering you use dialogue choices to get an outcome rather than items or action prompts.
Get Out of Igloo Puzzle - 5/10 - Things start with you needing to use your knife on a piece of rope and using that rope on a block of wood. This sequence is old-school adventure game design through and through. If you were to try and solve this without a guide, you would need to use all of your inventory items on parts of the background and foreground until you found the solution. Basically, it's an escape room puzzle. For the second part, locating the correct igloos with the puzzle pieces is a trial and error scenario. You have three attempts to find the two igloos that allow you to progress the story, and you need to see them in the correct order. After exiting your third igloo, you die. Regardless, it's still one of the game's more "doable" scenarios. The only problem is finding the puzzle pieces in the igloo with the fire. The puzzle pieces are frustrating because they snap into place with a lot of wiggle room, and it is hard to know if there is enough space for your unused parts and where you can place your pieces to make room.
Puzzle In the Ice Cavern - 3/10 - This sequence involves you saving Anna and then tricking the natives into thinking you are their deity. Before you ask, yes, the game's representation of igloo-dwelling natives is HIGHLY PROBLEMATIC! The first part of this set piece requires you to examine a series of mosaics. You need to activate these stained glass relics in a specific order so that a mask will appear on a nearby statue. After failing a few times, the mosaic puzzle is easy to figure out using intuition. Nonetheless, there's one part to its design that pissed me off to no end. This mission is timed, but you are subjected to an intricate animation whenever you examine a mosaic. Those animations eat up your time, and should you make around two mistakes, you can end up in an unwinnable scenario.
The Polar Bear Puzzle - 8/10 - This is fucked. Here we have ANOTHER sequence of events that underscore how granular Atlantis can get about your approach towards hostile enemies. In this case, what you need to do is approach a pile of rocks that act like turnstiles and then loom over a bear using the left side of the cairn. Walking towards the bear by looping around the right side or any other direction will instantly kill you. After enraging the bear, you need to retreat to the rocks and loop around the right side of the cairn. Yet again, any other input or direction will result in you instantly dying. Then, and only then, can you enter the cave to get to your flyer and transition to the next level.
Crab Puzzle - ???/10 - What the fuck even was this? So, after encountering this game's idea of a Maorian society, a village chief decides to pit two of the characters to "The Crabs of Destiny." A shrewd pilot attempts to backstab you, and the two of you need to race different colored crabs to determine which of you is trustworthy. I played this puzzle three times and was victorious every time. I read mixed reports if this was a puzzle with a set outcome or not. Regardless, it was fucking stupid.
Statue Puzzle - 3/10 - After proving your worth to the Maori tribe, they take you to a far-off island where you can confer with their gods. At the entrance to a cave, you see a variety of statues that coincide with a religious pantheon and different icons representing food. You have to swap the statues and food icons from top to bottom or vice versa to match the figures with the correct food icons. It's a logic puzzle and this game's version of the Fox-Chicken-Grain Puzzle. In other words, it's a "basic bitch" puzzle.
Underground Cave With the Green Stones, Pyramid, And Time Lord Lady - 3/10 - I swear to God that once you reach the tropical island, the game feels like it runs out of ideas. After helping the statues with their food situation, you enter a cave and watch some bizarre cutscenes prophesizing the end of Atlantis. Then, you encounter a black pyramid with a blue orb on top. You discover you need to click the blue sphere and dash from one side to the next while pressing buttons and widgets to allow the globe to reach the bottom of the pyramid. If you are off by even one nanosecond, the ball returns to its perch on top of the pyramid. It's a dexterity puzzle and one as simple as it seems on paper.
Creon's Ship & Rescuing Anna - 2/10 - Anna has been kidnapped, AGAIN! Before you can rescue her, you need to return to the fisherman's cabin and talk to her dad. After resting, you return to your flying vessel. You board Creon's airship and need to ignore its request to stay put. If you obey and remain still long enough for the talker to finish their warning, the airship blows you up. You enter the airship and discover Anna wearing the Princess Leia bikini costume. You release her from her shackles, but instead of immediately returning to your airship, which results in immediate death, you need to move to the right and trigger a required cutscene. Why the cutscene doesn't trigger after rescuing Anna by default is anyone's guess.
Dolphin & Whale Puzzle - 4/10 - It's the end of the world as we know it, and YET AGAIN, the game wants you to have a random chat with the Rat Catcher. Knowing to go to the Rat Catcher one more time is stupid. His hint is awful in that it is incredibly vague and all it does is ask you to think of the last time you saw a whale and dolphin. The whale is a skeleton on a level you haven't explored for hours. Also, applying the eye from the whale to the dolphin statue requires you to navigate a large enough span that it is easy to get lost.
The Minotaur's Maze - 9/10 - The game's final puzzle does not ease back Atlantis' brutal difficulty. Creon, the game's driving antagonist, has discovered the power of druidic magic and transforms himself into a minotaur. Obviously, that means you must challenge him inside the depths of a labyrinth. However, instead of purposefully seeking him out, you need to locate the middle of the maze and destroy the source of his power. First, you need to follow a rigorous series of steps or risk dying instantly. One mistake, even misclicking in one wrong direction, results in death. There are also unmarked traps that can kill you. AGAIN, it is a trial and error puzzle with about fifteen steps. That's what makes this so utterly unacceptable. It is an extended sequence in a maze where every screen and level looks the same, and if you make one mistake, you have to start from the beginning. Oh, and it's also a timed mission. You have about a minute before Creon simply catches up to you and murders you. I cannot conceive of anyone solving this without the help of a guide.
Should You Play Atlantis: The Lost Tales? [Answer: FUCK NO!]
Even as a Myst apologist, I have a hard time coming back to this era of adventure game design. On the one hand, I credit this era for getting me into the hobby and moving games from being fun little timewasters to a distinct part of my life. Had it not been for games like Myst, Syberia, or The Longest Journey, I would not have developed an early appreciation for the storytelling possibilities of games as an art form. Nonetheless, some of these games are no goddamn fun to play. I forgot to mention this during the introduction, but I played every game in the Atlantis franchise as a youngster. Hence, you can see the time and attention I put into the wiki pages for the first handful of Atlantis games. I liked these games as a kid, but I recognize they are incredibly flawed today.
So, no, you should not play this game. Even if you are attempting to re-explore an oft-forgotten era of PC games, you are best off avoiding Atlantis outright. There are better games from this era that provide more fun and interesting experiences in this particular style of adventure game. If you wish to play the game to completion, you need to play the game with a guide. Many puzzles and sequences in the game cannot be solved through intuition or brute force and can only be solved if you were the developer or programmer behind the game. Not only that but there are times when the game throws all pretense of logic out of the window. Hopefully, through my exhaustive annotations, everyone reading this can appreciate that playing this game "with honor" is an impossible task. This game plays dirty, and so should you. But hey, at least the music is good!