This is the first science fiction game to spring from the mind of Scott Adams. He continues to explore different genres while at the same time continuing to experiment with the medium. We have witnessed this first hand playing his previous games and now with this one he continues to do something completely different. You’ll find yourself struggling with alien technology and also dealing with a completely disconnected map as you teleport from location to location.
This game was hard and I struggled with this game more so than any of the others to come before it. I probably spent at least two total hours before I finally had an “aha experience” with the alien machinery. I struggled with the phaser, I struggled mightily with the glasses and I struggled on the ice planet. It took me twice as long to complete this game than any of the other previous Scott Adam games.
However I loved it.
It was odd, fascinating, frustrating and exhilarating all rolled into one. You are back to collecting treasures and depositing them at your ship at the end but the disconnected map, alien landscapes and alien machinery more than make up for reintroducing a treasure hunt to us. There is certainly a plot here. You’ve landed on an alien world and your ship is not capable of leaving. You’re stranded and it’s up to you to explore your alien environment to see if there is a way for you to escape.
I’m not going to give you a walk through. I want you to play it and experience it one day as I have. I can’t tell you the number of times I pushed and pulled on that damn rod (umm, I’m referring to the one in the game attached to the alien machine). I was almost ready to pull my hair out rather than the rod out. Once I thought I had it all down and began to cycle and teleport myself to different locations; I struggled once again and realized I didn’t know how to reset the thing or go backwards. This brought on another 30 to 45 minutes of experimentation before I finally figured it out.
There are a number of puzzles that you’ll need to work through and they are just difficult enough that a beginner or intermediate player is going to struggle here. If you have successfully played through all of Adam’s previously published works then you’ll find that player growth is running parallel to Scott Adam’s growth as a designer and artist. If you have no experience with interactive fiction to this point you may not want to choose this game to “cut your teeth” on as I feel that beginning players will struggle.
I have to berate myself publicly where the phaser in the story is concerned. I knew what I had to do and where I needed to go but I nothing I tried seemed to be working. I should have examined my phaser and it would have saved me a good twenty minutes of heartache. A newbie mistake.
The glasses puzzle however was diabolical. I honestly only solved it on my own because I remembered reading or having a conversation with someone about the puzzle years ago (admittedly I’ve been around the block a few times – I like to consider myself experienced rather than old however) and yet I still struggled with the verbage in the game and experimentation with the glasses. I found that dealing with the methane snow storm was a tricky puzzle as well.
If you’re a game historian or you are interested in how games have progressed over time this game offers a first in that the map that you have to create is completely disconnected. The only way to access key locations is to teleport to them AND there is a pattern and specific means to reach each necessary area. All of this will have to be mapped and puzzled out and this was a first in interactive fiction history. The design, idea, execution of design and implementation are all original and a first. It took some getting used to and was difficult to master which is why I said a beginning player might struggle.
Adding to the difficulty of the puzzles and game design was the restriction that you are on limited oxygen with your space suit. Once you obtain everything that you need, treasures included, you have to make your way back to your ship, leave the planet and reconnect with your mother ship. Once you do that you’ll find yourself victorious. I encourage you to try this game out; it is engaging but be warned it may cause you to take up drinking. If you find yourself struggling at some point in the game and would like a gentle nudge (not an outright answer) all you need do is ask.
Well done for completing Strange Odyssey! It’s a really tough game, and one that requires a lot of endurance on the part of the player – you need to have a lot of patience to suffer through the many instant deaths that you will experience as you explore. I shudder to think what it was like for players back in the 1980s who were having to reload saved positions from tape!
Strange Odyssey was one of six games that Adams released in 1979 and, in my view, his least enjoyable. The treasure hunt aspect of the game feels tacked on and unnecessary when you’ve got the perfectly sufficient plot arc of having to repair your ship and escape back to the mother spacecraft.
Thank you William and thank you for your post. Your assessment of Strange Odyssey just gave me the idea of ranking all of Scott Adam’s games in order of personal preference of enjoyment. I understand that it IS subjective but it might also spark a fun community sharing of notes.
Great idea! I’m sure that there will be various opinions on which of his games are the best (and which haven’t stood the test of time).