The Gene Machine Review

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            The Gene Machine

Review by Jen

I have had a copy of The Gene Machine for quite a while now and only just got around to playing it because it was our FFC “Never Mind the Bollocks” Game of the Month in November 2001.

The Gene Machine is a little-known game by now-defunct European publisher Vic Tokai. You play as an English gentlemen named Piers Fanshaw (he really spells his last name with a lot more letters, something like Featheringstoneroseofsharonseabiscuitinthefourth, in the inimitable English way, but I’ll just leave it as Fanshaw for ease of typing), who is always accompanied by his trusty manservant Mossop (which is spelled M-o-s-s-o-p). It is 1880s London, and Fanshaw arrives home from America to find a talking cat on his doorstep. The cat tells a horrible tale of genetic mutations gone awry, of which he is but one result, and it becomes Fanshaw’s goal to stop these dastardly goings-on. His journey takes him to the moon and Atlantis and various other places in between.

Gameplay is third-person, point-and-click, no dying, mainly inventory puzzles. There is lots of conversation, which mostly involves silly jokes, but if you get bored with the talking aspects, you can skip big chunks of conversation and not miss anything important as far as gameplay or story development goes. You cannot get stuck, i.e., there are no dead ends, although in the first half of the game, you get umpteen million inventory items and about 10 locations.  More than once, I got stymied and had to cycle through every location and every inventory item until I hit on a combination that resulted in some progress. An exercise in tedium by anyone’s standards, but it only happened a couple of times and only because I was reluctant to consult a walkthrough—this is not a difficult game and I would have lost all self-respect had I done so—fortunately, the second part started off with all no-longer-needed inventory items shucked, and there are minimal, or more specifically sequential, locations and item buildup for the remainder of the game.

The characters are utterly charming, all very well-articulated and true to form over the course of the game. Fanshaw is a snob and treats Mossop shabbily. Mossop knows his place and never gives Fanshaw any lip, or at least if he does he’s properly contrite afterward. None of the auxiliary characters is in the least annoying—none of that “sidekick syndrome” that is one of my pet peeves.  In fact, I think the characters are the highlight of the game.  The drawings are not without charm, either. They appear to be done with pastels or colored pencils, and then the more cartoony characters and inventory items are sort of superimposed on these hand-drawn and -colored backgrounds. This makes for zero pixel-hunting because the items that can be interacted with stand out from the scenery.

I suffered a few technical problems while playing, and the other players on the Henhouse had similar problems too. One was the lack of save games—there is a game save feature but it malfunctioned.  However, there is an auto-save that allows you to take up where you leave off, so it is possible to quit and restart at some later time. Another problem was occasional breakdown in audio quality, but this could be solved by quitting and restarting. And a third problem was a hangup at one particular point in the game—this happened to all three of us. You can read the forum threads for a discussion of the workaround if you’re interested.

On the whole, The Gene Machine is a little jewel of a game. About 10 percent of it was tedious, but the rest was just plain old-fashioned adventure gaming fun. It’s silly and irreverent and does not take itself seriously, it’s good-looking, and it’s not too taxing on the old gray matter. It only misses the coveted FFC Gold Star by virtue of the technical problems and those two or three try-every-item-on-everything-everywhere parts.

One final note: No way nohow, despite numerous attempts, could I get any of my screenshot-taking methods to work on The Gene Machine, so the screenshots with this review are digital photos of my computer screen. The game screens really don’t have those horizontal lines that appear in some of these pictures, and they really are much crisper and more colorful in the flesh. I debated even including these at all, but they do give some idea of the style of the game so I opted to use them but with this here caveat. The End

The Verdict

The Lowdown

Developer: Divide by Zero Publisher: Vic Tokai Release Date: 1996

Available for: DOS Windows

Four Fat Chicks Links

Player Feedback

Screenshots (see note at end of review text)

Click to enlarge Click to enlargeClick to enlarge Click to enlargeClick to enlarge Click to enlargeClick to enlarge Click to enlarge

System Requirements

MS-DOS 5.0 or greater (6.0 recommended) 486/66 MHz (Pentium 60 MHz recommended) VESA compliant SVGA required 2X CD-ROM drive (4X recommended) 8 MB RAM (12 MB recommended) 15 MB free hard disk space All major sound cards supported Mouse/keyboard/joystick Windows 95 compatible

Where to Find It

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

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17 Responses to First Impressions: Heavy Rain

  • Toger

    I hate QTEs, but Heavy Rain is sitting in my Amazon cart waiting for me to push the button. I don’t even own a PS3, but I plan on buying the game anyway. I do have a good friend who’ll let me play at his house. Of course, I’ll have to drive 100 miles, one way, through the snow to get to his house. His chat-happy birds will cheerfully chirp thereby completely disrupting any atmosphere, but I can play.

  • David

    What!?  Heavy Rain is full of QTEs?  I totally did not see that coming.

    The whole dad experience thing sounds intriguing.  I’m already getting odd looks from my girlfriend for exclaiming over cute kids on the bus or at the mall, something like what you described might send my biological clock over the edge.

  • Lewis B

    My sentiments exactly David!

    Mat has been playing the Heavy Rain demo for a while now, and although he admits he is intrigued by the story, he does constantly complain about the control method.

    R2 + Analogue stick to run? *scoff*

  • Gregg B

    @Lew: DEMO?! PS3 DEMO?! *runs off to PS3*

    That sounds like the Batman: Arkham Asylum controls – Crazy Bonkers Design. The sort of design that puts pull handles on push doors.

    @Steerpike: “I despise children. They are disgusting and annoying. They knock things over. They interfere with everything. They’re not useful until they’re at least 13, when you can get them to mow the lawn and stuff. But you can pay a service to do that for just a few hundred bucks a year and the service won’t vomit on you, shit in its diapers, grow up to resent you, or otherwise suck. Don’t flame me and don’t post comments to the contrary: kids are repulsive. Why anyone would want them is beyond my feeble imaginings.”

    HAHAhahaha- I er, – hahahaha – you’re as outspoken as me about demon spawn children.

  • Lewis B

    Yeah its been on the internet for weeks and weeks Greggi.  I think you have to do a couple of online puzzles etc to get the appropriate code or something.

    Search on Kotaku, they first ran with it IIRC.

  • Mat

    The puzzle code was for early access before it hit the PSN Store. It’s been available to all since last week.

    Regarding the demo, it took me around 3 or 4 attempts at it to appreciate it. First time around I couldn’t have been more dissapointed by it, but after the 3rd or 4th I decided I wanted to stick with it. I don’t think the demo is a particularly great example of what the game supposedly does best either – choice. I also HATE the control scheme and some of the voice acting is so wooden. Creating an immersive, realistic game is fine but having characters stumbling into tables and fridges because of the ham fisted controls, and listening to French voice actors impersonate Americans does remove that realism a little!

    Still, I rushed out to buy it this morning and will rush home from work to play it in about an hour!

  • xtal

    @ Toger: I don’t own a PS3 either, and it’s not like Heavy Rain seems to be “that” game which makes you run out and buy one– like Bioshock made me run out and get a 360– and it’s also not like this game looks groundbreaking in any way, because it really doesn’t. It’s just got me curious…and people tend to do crazy things the week after they get their yearly bonus. Soooooo yeah, who knows; maybe I’ll own a PS3 soon, but like hell I would admit that it was for Heavy Rain. Psh. I’d tell people it was because I wanted to watch BSG on blu-ray; though anyone who knows me would see right through that lie since I am an avid non-format-upgrader: I’ll switch my BSG collection from DVD to blu-ray the day I upgrade my copy of Jurassic Park from VHS to DVD. (Hint: never)

  • Toger

    @xtal: I’m in no hurry to upgrade my meagre DVD collection to blu-ray either, but I have to say the movies I’ve watched on my friend’s PS3 are absolutely stunning. Blade Runner was simply breath-taking in blu-ray and it made me want a PS3. I don’t think Heavy Rain will be a system seller for me, but I’m betting the game from the Ico team will.

  • xtal

    A game from the Ico team, you say? Hmmm. I’ve been making rounds on Kijiji and Craigslist looking for a copy of Ico (eBay prices are so shudder-inducing) for a few days now. I really need to play that game after my experience with the indescribable Shadow of the Colossus.

    It’s good to know they haven’t died some Interplay-esque death in the meantime.

  • Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

    Nope, they’re a small team that works within Sony. Fumito Ueda is the lead and he’s got like ten or so people who’ve worked with him on all his games. Sony pretty much lets them do what they want.

    The Last Guardian is the game that’s coming up from them. It looks more like Ico and less like Shadow of the Colossus to me, which is to say it appears to be focused on platform elements. If I didn’t already have a PS3, it’d be the game that sells it.

  • Gregg B

    @Toger: Ooh, Blade Runner on Blu-ray, gorgeous in all its gorgeosity. In 5.1 it sounds incredible too.

    I bought my PS3 for Team Ico’s unnamed-at-the-time game, Heavy Rain (back when it was just a teaser), LittleBig Planet (yes, yes, I know), Dead Space and Motor Storm: Pacific Rift which sort of pushed me off the fence.

  • Toger

    Gregg, oh yes. The surround sound was spectacular. Did I mention my friend’s HDTV is 72″ (obscene, isn’t it)? It’s like being at a high-class theatre: better food, pauses for bathroom breaks and no one talking through the movie.

    Is Trine up on PSN, yet? If so, that might be my tipping point: Last Guardian, Heavy Rain and Trine.

  • Gregg B

    *spits tea out, despite not drinking any*

    O_O

    72″?! I’m speechless. I can only imagine how awesome that is. Size does matter.

    Not so sure about Trine… hang on. I think it is.

  • Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

    I think it is too, Toger. I’ll check.

    To be honest, though, I doubt you’d be disappointed with the purchase even if Trine’s not there yet. I’ve been way happier with my PS3 than with my 360. Demon’s Souls, Valkyria Chronicles, Uncharted, Folklore, even little games like Flower – I’ve had more concentrated fun with the PS3 than with Microsoft’s console, which tends to gather dust for months between game releases.

    72″???? I thought size didn’t matter!

  • Toger

    Size doesn’t matter. 😀

    In my friend’s defense, it was a great deal: opened box, itty-bitty scratch on the case, not a dead pixel to be seen and it was less $$ than the 60″ he originally wanted.

    Thanks for checking guys. I’ve played a tiny bit of Uncharted, but I’m horrible at the combat. Flower intrigues me. As does Demon’s Souls, but I know that game will crush my soul.

  • Gregg B

    There were certain moments in Flower where it just totally succeeded in conveying a feeling that I can’t say I’ve had in many other games, usually when rushing across a field through the grass or through a canyon or just skimming a pond, but it was never anything to do with collecting bloody petals or fulfilling some rudimentary puzzle. I think my problem with it was that it felt like it was trying to be this deeply emotional piece but in the end there seemed to be too many concessions to being a game rather than just running with the emotive side of the experience. One thing I am sure about though, is the trophies. Don’t get me started on the fucking trophies…

    One of my favourite little games on the PS3 is Everyday Shooter. It’s got a brilliant soundtrack that suits its raw visual style and I love how each level requires a certain tactic or strategy to survive it. It’s a very satisfying game in small bursts.

  • Hanover

    Unfortunately Cage mucked up the ending yet again.  The problem is that the mechanic of the game forced them to have to cheat in order to prevent spoiling the mystery of the game.

    There is also a red herring that makes no sense and is obviously put there to misdirect the player.

    90% of the game is awesome, the last 10% while not as bad as the indigo prophecy, is still sloppy.

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