''Lost Eden'' is an

adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an interactive story, driven by exploration and/or puzzle-solving. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based m ...

developed by Cryo and published by

Virgin Interactive Avalon Interactive Group, Ltd., formerly known as Virgin Interactive Entertainment, was a British video game distributor based within Europe that formerly traded as the video game publishing and distributing division of British conglomerate the V ...

in March 1995 for

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

Macintosh Mac is a brand of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 1984. The name is short for Macintosh (its official name until 1999), a reference to the McIntosh (apple), McIntosh apple. The current product lineup inclu ...

3DO 3DO is a video gaming hardware format developed by The 3DO Company and conceived by Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins. The specifications were originally designed by Dave Needle and RJ Mical of New Technology Group, and were licensed by third ...

, and

CD-i The Compact Disc-Interactive (CD-I, later CD-i) is a digital optical disc data storage format as well as a hardware platform, co-developed and marketed by Dutch company Philips and Japanese company Sony. It was created as an extension of CDDA ...

. It is set in a world where humans and dinosaurs coexist.

Plot

Adam, prince of Mo, has grown up in an isolated world of humans. His mother and sister were killed less than a day's march from the Citadel of Mo by the forces of the Tyrann, led by Moorkus Rex. The king of Mo has lost all hope for the world since this tragedy. Adam's great-grandfather is remembered as the Architect, who built gigantic fortresses across the land. The secret of their construction died with him. His grandfather is known as the Enslaver. He tore down all the citadels except the one at Mo. He drove the humans and dinosaurs apart, creating mutual distrust and, in places, sheer hatred. Moorkus Rex, a strange, armor-plated reptile, leads the ''

Tyrannosaurus ''Tyrannosaurus'' () is a genus of large theropod dinosaur. The type species ''Tyrannosaurus rex'' ( meaning 'king' in Latin), often shortened to ''T. rex'' or colloquially t-rex, is one of the best represented theropods. It lived througho ...

'' armies, known as the Tyrann. One of the only remaining places of safety from the Tyrann is the Citadel of Mo.

Reception

Computer versions

Next Generation Next Generation or Next-Generation may refer to: Publications and literature * ''Next Generation'' (magazine), video game magazine that was made by the now defunct Imagine Media publishing company * Next Generation poets (2004), list of young ...

'' reviewed the PC version of the game, rating it three stars out of five, and stated that "Although it won't provide much of a challenge for experienced players, ''Lost Eden'' is a great title for anyone who loves a good story." ''

'' reviewed the PC version of the game, rating it four stars out of five, and stated that "All in all, it's a solid adventure game with some very nice trimmings."

3DO version

The 3DO version received mostly positive reviews. Critics were unanimously pleased with the advanced

pre-rendered Pre-rendering is the process in which video footage is not rendered in real-time by the hardware that is outputting or playing back the video. Instead, the video is a recording of footage that was previously rendered on different equipment (typ ...

graphics, full voice acting, sharp

full motion video Full-motion video (FMV) is a video game narration technique that relies upon pre-recorded video files (rather than Sprite (computer graphics), sprites, vector graphics, vectors, or 3D models) to display action in the game. While many games featur ...

cutscenes, and most especially the unique and imaginative world these visuals and audio gave life to. However, the other elements of the game divided critics. The four reviewers of ''

Electronic Gaming Monthly ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' (''EGM'') is a monthly American video game magazine. It offers video game news, coverage of industry events, interviews with gaming figures, editorial content and product reviews. History The magazine was fou ...

'' and Scary Larry of ''

GamePro ''GamePro'' was an American multiplatform video game magazine media company that published online and print content covering the video game industry, video game hardware and video game software. The magazine featured content on various video ...

'' were highly pleased with the simple, easy-to-learn interface, but a reviewer for ''

'' found that it loses appeal over time due to the obtrusively large cursor. While ''EGM''s reviewers deemed the story compelling, ''Next Generation'' remarked that despite the unique milieu the plot falls into obvious cliches, and Scary Larry found the dialogues were overlong and often did nothing to enhance the story. And while Mark LeFebvre of ''EGM'' called Picq's soundtrack "truly impossible to deal with", most reviewers enjoyed it, variously calling it "relaxing", "strange and rather ethereal", and "a great earthy composition". Scary Larry gave the game a tentative recommendation, saying that the long dialogues somewhat tarnished the enjoyable puzzling, while ''Next Generation'' was more enthusiastic, concluding, "Overall, ''Lost Eden'' is well-constructed and different enough ... to warrant more than a look."

References

External links

* * {{Authority control 1995 video games 3DO games Adventure games Cancelled Sega CD games CD-i games Classic Mac OS games Cryo Interactive games DOS games Fantasy video games Single-player video games Video games about dinosaurs Video games developed in France Video games scored by Stéphane Picq Virgin Interactive games Steve Jackson (British game designer) games