Cyberia is an action-adventure game originally released for DOS in 1994, and later ported
to the 3DO in 1996.
Despite being rather dated, even upon release, Cyberia blends pre-rendered graphics, full
motion-video, and light puzzle elements together to create a rather interesting science fiction
game.
Right away, the game does a nice job laying out a narrative.
Set in 2027, the world has collapsed and there are just two main powers remaining.
The Free World Alliance represents the West, while the Cartel represents the East.
It is cliche for sure, but as the game is 20 years old, I’ll give it a pass.
The West learns the East has a new weapon of mass destruction, dubbed Cyberia and the
leader of the Free World decides to Pardon cyber-hacker Zac to go get the weapon.
And thus, the adventure begins.
Nearly every element of the Cyberia is present in the first section of the game.
After being escorted to a secret island, you actually get to walk around.
This basically plays out like a slideshow, with the different directional buttons triggering
a video of the character walking, rather than real interaction.
Following the voice instructions provided, we reach the first quick time event.
Pressing the wrong button ends in death, only there is nothing on the screen alerting you
to the correct button.
There is some trial and error involved, but thankfully there is a fairly generous save
system preventing you from having to ever repeat too much of the game when you fail.
After getting the hang of navigation and the quick time events, another gameplay element
is presented.
Scattered throughout the game are shooting areas where you control a crosshair and have
to take down enemies.
It works well enough but it plays as basic as it looks.
Once we defend the base from the attack, it is time to navigate to the third floor by
taking the elevator.
After pressing the misspelled elevator button, we arrive at the hangar.
Here, the game’s first puzzle is presented.
Before starting the game, you have the choice to change the difficulty on the shooting sections,
as well as the difficulty of the puzzles.
The medium puzzle difficulty is actually quite hard, and I honestly have no idea how this
puzzle is supposed to work.
Basically, you get to use your MRI scanner to reveal the inner workings of a bomb, and
then flip switches to disarm it.
Disarming the bomb will allow you to take the jet and finally make your way to Siberia,
the region, to intercept Cyberia, the weapon.
Before getting to Siberia, you have to complete a gauntlet of shooting stages.
These play out like most other FMV shooters of the era.
You control a crosshair while full motion video plays in the background.
It is not the worst thing ever, with some semblance of missions and specific targets
needing to be destroyed.
These can be challenging at first, but if you repeat a stage a few times you should
be able to memorize where enemies are and avoid having your shield depleted before the
mission ends.
There are even breaks in the action, showing your craft maneuvering through the environment
which I find to be a nice diversion.
With your full set of skills now learned it’s time to infiltrate the enemy base and figure
out what the Cyberia weapon is all about.
Despite being entirely pre-rendered, the enemy base is laid out logically and it is fairly
easy to make forward progress without getting lost or going in circles.
The enemy base also presents one final gameplay element, shoot-outs.
These are cover-based affairs, where you have to duck behind objects, and only look out
and shoot when it's safe.
These are rather forward thinking, and the concept is commonplace in modern gaming.
As you progress, sneaking past security guards, solving puzzles, watching voicemails, engaging
in shootouts, and participating in the occasional cross-hair action stage, the story slowly
reveals itself.
With each voicemail it becomes clearer whatever was being developed has slowly gotten out
of hand.
As we make our way through higher security areas and listen to the medical staff voicemails,
we learn experiments with viral weapons have gone horribly wrong, with the virus taking
over hosts and presenting a real problem for humans.
The storytelling is good, but not great, and the Russian accents in all the characters
is pretty poor.
Still, everything is coherent and it is easy to follow along without things getting needlessly
complex.
On paper, Cyberia is a decent little adventure from a bygone era of gaming.
The FMV looks dated for sure but the dialog isn’t half bad and the b-grade voice acting
has a certain charm.
I like how the developers mixed in third person wandering, quick-time events, action sequences,
and scripted flight segments into one cohesive experience.
Some of the puzzles are quite clever.
On the wall of one of the barracks is a picture of Einstein for example, which is then the
password needed for the very next terminal.
In another area, you have to open the air vents in a medical room, and then back-track
your way through a ventilation shaft to then reach in and grab the now accessible key card.
Unfortunately, Cyberia is plagued with one major flaw.
It just isn’t very fun to play.
Watching your character walk isn’t as fun as controlling your character.
Moving a cross hair around the screen isn’t as fun as actually flying.
And some of the puzzles are beyond me.
Cheap deaths are abound if you don’t play the game in the exact order you are supposed
to.
The timing can be far too difficult as well.
It took me a dozen times to shut this elevator door before the enemy dropped his grenade
before I finally got it right.
The shoot-outs are also somewhat clumsy, with ducking for cover being far to slow compared
to your enemies blasts.
There are just far too many frustrating sequences like this, and it really drags the experience
down.
I really do appreciate the ambition behind this project, but like many early CD-rom titles,
Cyberia hasn’t really aged well.
It isn’t bad, but is definitely below average.
Two, out of five.