Ring Review

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Ring

Review by Jen

Even though I am not much of a fan of classical music in general and opera in particular, the idea of an adventure game based on an opera was intriguing to me. I thought there would be a strong plot and great music, but I was only half right.

The game is set a long time into the future and uses the main characters from Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelungen, who are Alberich, Loge, Siegmund, and Brunhilde, all of whom are controlled by Wotan, god of gods. You play as Ish, a human who is sent by “Mother” to complete a quest as each of the four characters and return to tell her what you’ve learned. Each quest ends with you learning some great moral lesson. I have never listened to the Ring opera, although much of the music in the game is very familiar, and I started this game pretty unfamiliar with the story—I found myself not understanding what was going on most of the time.  I suspect that if you are an opera fan and already know the story, you could follow along quite easily, but the writers did not do such a good job translating it into lay terms for the common adventure game player, i.e., me. It’s not necessarily because there wasn’t a story or it wasn’t good (it does make for a classic opera, after all), but I just didn’t get it from the game. Also, I didn’t think the transfer of the plot from the time of the ancient gods to a sci-fi scenario deep in the future was a very good idea.

The graphics are spotty. Some are very beautiful and well-executed, but in some cases, comic book-style drawings (unmoving) were just superimposed on the backgrounds, creating what was to me a total clash of styles. Also, the characters all looked like they were made of rubber. Picture a latex Halloween mask, like a Richard Nixon whole-head one, and then picture a finger poking the bridge of the nose. The middle of the face collapses and the upper lip rises. This is how the characters’ faces looked when they spoke.  There is not really a whole lot of movement in the game, either—a large part of the game (at least half) consists of speech over still backgrounds. There were a couple of instances that were just lovely, though—I really liked Wotan’s gown o’starry night, and I also liked the way flames were executed in a couple of spots. Overall, though, there was nothing special here. If I were a man, I might think otherwise because no pixels were spared on the women’s bosoms.

You have the option of playing the four characters in sequence or switching from one to another in the middle of the game. I played them all in sequence; their stories are sequential, and I have a feeling if you were not thoroughly familiar with the story already from listening to the opera, you would be totally lost, even more than I already was, by playing them all simultaneously.  I generally like the ability to play as multiple characters, but it just flopped in this case. The puzzles are either very simple or totally incomprehensible. There was a slider puzzle (how unoriginal), and I just hate slider puzzles. There was also a puzzle where I had to play back a Wagner piece that was playing in the background, and oh, man, I am totally clueless when it comes to this kind of puzzles—I get it sounding right to me, but it is still wrong. At least there were no mazes. There were also a lot of puzzles in the LucasArts style that involve picking up inventory in one place and using it in another. I had to resort to hints numerous times in this game on the more unfathomable puzzles, and even after I learned what to do, I still didn’t understand why in a couple of instances. The puzzles all lack originality or are too obscure, and as a result there were not very many fun ones.

The music is outstanding—that’s probably why it’s classic.  It is all taken from the actual Ring opera, and yes, it includes the Ride of the Valkyries when you play as Brunhilde.  The voice acting, like the graphics, is really spotty. Some of the actors are outstanding; others obviously are just reading a script; and some even occasionally mispronounce words. There is a mix of accents between English and American. Methinks this game was originally created in German and the English and French were added as an afterthought to broaden the market for the game.  Sound effects are neither intrusive nor inappropriate. The game is about the music and the music is great, but the quality of the sound overall, outside of the music, is just very inconsistent.

I fancy myself a pretty intelligent person, but this game left me befuddled and bewildered. Toward the end, I was just anxious to be done—it became extremely tiresome. I would recommend this game only to the Wagner aficionado and maybe not even that—I believe games based on books or music or whatever should always stand alone so that someone unfamiliar with the basis can still enjoy them, and Ring does not achieve that. The End

The Verdict

The Lowdown

Developer: Arxel Tribe Publisher: Cryo Release Date: November 1998

Available for: Windows

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Screenshots

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System Requirements

Pentium 133 16 MB RAM 8X CD-ROM drive DirectX 5 compatible SVGA graphics card Mouse Sound card and speakers or headphones highly recommended

      Copyright © Electric Eye Productions.  All rights reserved.  No reproduction in whole or in part without express written permission.

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14 Responses to Fear Factor

  • Fear Factor | Tap-Repeatedly.com | Reality Topics Blog

    […] nobody@flickr.com (graftedno1) wrote a very interesting post today.   Here’s a quick excerpt:My greatest fear is to be trapped alone in a confined space with a blind human, in total darkness. They have a heightened sense of smell and hearing, and. […]

  • Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

    Lewis, you made me think of the scariest moments I’ve experienced in gaming, and we’re very similar people.

    Bioshock had two moments – the dentist and the flooded room filled with mannequins.

    Thief had Return to the Cathedral, which was terrifying to me. Thief 3 had Shalebridge Cradle, which is so scary it ought to be fined.

    System Shock 2 kept me on the edge of my seat, but it was more lonely panic than true fear.

    Korsakovia was so scary that I uninstalled it.

    And STALKER. Oh, god, the haunted labs in STALKER. The latter two games don’t have scares like that. Few games do.

    It’s especially rare for a game to have more than mere “moments” – for a game to be scary from beginning to end, that’s a triumph.

    Wonderful article. As if Gregg’s review wasn’t enough to convince me that Penumbra is not something I have the courage to play!

  • DPenn

    I’m with you Lewis … I’m a bit of a puss. I just have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of dread as entertainment.

    Still, I’m drawn to dark stories when they have something interesting to say, whether it’s a game like Thief or a film like, say, Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible. So I’ll push through, sometimes peering through my fingers.

    The trouble with games, though, is that if you look through your fingers, you’re probably just going to have to play through the scenario again. :~)

  • Mike "Scout" Gust

    I wanted to play this game. I downloaded the demo but the controls were just too wonky for me to get my head around. I liked the atmospheric vibe a lot. I think I’m a bit desensitized from an overdose of horror movies in my youth so I don’t so much get the dread thing from these games as a nice creepy vibration. If only the controls were better…

  • Lewis B

    @ Mike, what’s wrong with the controls bud? As someone who despises poor control schemes, Penumbra’s is just like any other FPS, except to examine things you right click on them.  To use things you left click.  I’m not sure that can be considered difficult 🙂

  • Gregg B

    @Steerpike: Yeah my greatest shit-scared moments were with those games too. A few spoilers below people, so beware.

    Bioshock – Haha, I remember the dentist. I didn’t really find the game that scary overall but the bit where you go into the wine cellar and notice a mannequin facing the wall and after upgrading your weapon it’s stood directly behind you motionless and quiet just for a moment before attacking you. I shat a brick. I also missed that bit originally until Lew told me about it.

    System Shock 2 – same as you really, more unremitting tension all the way through rather than specific terrifying moments. Oh actually, theres a bit where you call a lift and it breaks then you realise a service droid is coming to fix it… I do remember having sleep issues after my first encounter with the cyborg ninjas though.

    Thief: The Dark Project – The Sword and Return to the Cathedral and Down in the Bonehoard and well, loads of them. The Sword made me break out into goosebumps though because there was a bit where you could hear this creepy giggling which seemed like it was following me about then it suddenly changed to this horrible throaty noise. What made matters worse was that the EAX (bless you Creative) made my foot steps sound like somebody else was there with me. That level was incredible, a bit too incredible as it seems I missed great chunks of it because I was so eager to leave.

    Thief II: The Metal Age – Trail of Blood where you end up in that opening with those damn tree beasts. God the first time I saw one of those hurtling towards me I actually died shortly afterward. Do you remember that Mechanist child walking around on one of the levels? That was a little creepy.

    Then there’s Penumbra: Overture – quite a few bits but I’m not mentioning them here.

    Oh and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. – The brain scorcher lab just because it was so damn quiet. My imagination seriously got the better of me there. Those stuffed animals and heads I’d seen in various buildings led me to believe that those creatures were lurking somewhere in the Zone, specifically that lab.

    @Mike: My control setup was perfect after some tweaking (as well as the simple weapon swing fix). If you ever fancy giving it another go, give me a shout and I’ll let you know my setup.

  • Lewis B

    I’m not sure why guys, but one of my starting paragraphs had gone missing, even though I copied it straight from the original source, and It was fine earlier. 

    Incase you missed it due to some technical issue you might want to re-read just after “Well no she wouldn’t in truth, but in Penumbra: Overture you don’t want to move anyway.” at the very start for those who’ve already read the article. Apologies 🙂

  • Mike "Scout" Gust

    Lewis, it was the weapon swing. It had this terrible, unresponsive feel to it, like trying to hit through molasses. I couldn’t stand using it. I tried the .ini fix as mentioned in the review but it didn’t seem to help. Of course this was the demo…but that shouldn’t have made any difference. I might try the second game instead as I guess they did away with the weapons thing.

    I’m see your first paragraph just fine. It’s the dialogue, right?

  • jdeuel

    I like the argument that weapons can remove fear, but even loaded to the teeth with ammo in AVP’99 the Marine missions were frightful because the enemy was anywhere at any time.

    As for Penumbra Overture, if the controls are anything like the original Penumbra they need to hack in some Wii-Remote 3d controls. I did not like using my mouse for 3d movements.

  • Gregg B

    @Mike: I’ve read that many people avoided conflict altogether in Overture which incidentally is something forced upon you in Black Plague. As somebody who has been renovating a house over the last 6 months with no DIY experience I can safely say that swinging a hammer is significantly easier in real life than it is in Overture without the fix. The fix balanced that for me.

    I’d highly recommend completing the first Penumbra because it’s one big build up to Black Plague which spoils the ending to Overture in the intro. And it’s a great ending too. Just so you know!

  • Lewis B

    @ Steerpike, those moments you mention are all my worst too!!  Do you remember the Robot labs in SS2? Absolutely terrifying, waiting for robots to burst out on you! 🙁 oh and have you ever player Condemned?

    @ Mike, The use of weapons in Penumbra is different to say HL2, where the player is physically holding the weapon, as in Penumbra it floats slightly infront of you.  However, if you change the control method to normal weapon swing, it’s no different!  Speak to Greggi and he’ll tell you what to do 🙂

    @ jdeuel, AVP the original and its sequal were scary however what type of fear do you think it is? I don’t think it’s anything more than sheer tension.  Having a Smart Gun makes you feel incredibly powerful.  I can honestly say in Penumbra the fear is sheer unrivalled terror, where you actually have to force yourself to play on.  It genuinly is that scary! 🙂

  • Jason Dobry

    It’s so true, an arsenal of weapons and ammo rapidly deflates any sense of horror or uneasiness in any game for reasons you already mentioned. Sakey, I thought Bioshock was more “lonely panic,” while I was pretty much always terrified in System Shock 2. I really, really, REALLY did not want to enter The Many’s nursery, and my weapons were so unreliable and ammo so scarce that I never felt safe.

    Silent Hill was terrifying for the same reasons. Ammo was rare and I frequently had to rely on my pipe for self-defense.  Even when I had ammo, the game mechanics prevented my character from being anything other than marginal with any firearm.

    Fear had one moment for me: I was climbing up a ladder, and as I reached the upper platform, my guy briefly looked down as he climbed off. As my perspective looked up again, that Ring-esque little girl was RIGHT THERE, reaching for me. I screamed and she was gone.

    What else…the original Aliens vs. Predator sent me into a locker room and I could only hear the facehuggers scurrying about somewhere within. I had to go in there. I advanced about three steps before the damn thing screamed and filled up my screen with its repulsive underside as it implanted me with its spawn. My roommate made fun of me for weeks for screaming like a girl child.

    Korsakovia–meh.  I was too annoyed and frustrated by the box rearrangement/jumping puzzles to be scared. I uninstalled it after an hour of play, I think. Maybe the scary parts were later, but I doubt it.

    As for Penumbra, I did play through about half of it before other games distracted me. I remember unease and creepiness, but no sweaty fear. I think I’m to blame here, or, more precisely, my daughter, who was still an infant at the time and generally allowed me only to play during the day for 45 minutes at a time. I was denied total immersion and the fear effect suffered. Maybe I should give it another go after I finish Call of Pripyat since she sleeps through the night now. With any luck, Penumbra will keep me from doing the same.

  • Gregg B

    I played the demo of F.E.A.R. but that ladder scare is the only bit I remember. Christ, that made me jump. I’m not too good with cat scares.

    Also I felt exactly the same about Korsakovia. It was creepy at first but then it began to irritate me far too much and it just soured the experience. I stopped playing as a result. Not to mention, when I realised I could bash those smoke-things with my crowbar they didn’t bother me nearly as much.

  • Online Up

    Great article. I look forward to reading more in the future.

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