Review: LOST: Via Domus

There are several games I’ve suffered through for the sake of cheevers: TMNT and King Kong come immediately to mind. I thought that LOST: Via Domus would be equally unfun; but in the end, I think there was enough good in this game that I didn’t have a bad experience.

First and foremost, don’t even consider playing this game unless you are familiar with the LOST canon. This is really a game that only a fan could love, it has that many unexplained references to the show. It plays like an adventure game, broken into six “episodes” that all follow the same general setup. You play as a guy who isn’t in the show, and who has amnesia. Each episode has a “flashback” moment where you learn a little about your past, which you then use to your advantage in that episode. That’s about it.

There’s lots of random-item-collecting, and two pretty fun chase scenes, and I used my gun a total of four times. The black smoke monster is all over the place, and most of the characters aren’t voiced by their actual actors, which is no fun. It was an easy 1000 achievement points, with about four hours of actual gameplay. At the beginning of the game I was talking to everyone and exploring every nook and cranny; but by the third episode I was already over it, and I would only go and talk to the people who I knew would advance the plot.

The main character is a morally-inept piece of garbage. I felt some satisfaction whenever he died (usually thanks to the somewhat unresponsive controls). The ending is the only real thought-provoking part of the whole thing, and it’s pretty sweet.