Lost: Via Domus Review

I am a huge fan of the television show "LOST." I don't think I've missed an episode since I got into the series (which was right before season 2 started). The main reason I purchased the game was due to my enjoyment of the show. The game does NOT fit into the cannon of the show, so you will not learn anything new about the show by playing the game.

LOST: Via Domus stars a background character in the Lost universe. You start the game as a passenger who is about to be assaulted by a menacing looking man on the plane. Just before this can begin the plane tears apart and you have crashed on a mysterious deserted island. When you awaken, you figure out you have amnesia, and you must begin your quest to find out who you are, but there are many forces acting on this island and not all of them are benevolent.

The game is broken up into seven episodes all with their own flashback, signature to LOST. With each flashback your character learns a little more about his past and why he was on the plane. The game spans the first two seasons but has a few locales from the third season.

Via Domus, I would classify as an action platform game. Almost all of the game takes place in the third person. There are only two spots where firing a bullet is required, however a third possibility is in the final episode which offers a slightly different ending sequence. There are only a few action sequences that are quite short but offer a lot of fun.

For LOST fans the voice acting is bit off due different actors being used for the majority of the roles however the voice acting to a non viewer would be slightly above average. There were a few spots where the emotion being shown in the game (ie. Jack being angry) wasn't carried over into the voice acting but it only happens a few times.

The walks through the jungle become tiresome due to the difficult nature of navigating. You are always given a direction to go whether it be scattered plane debris or by directions written on trees. If you are slightly off 1-2 degrees you can miss the next piece due to a tree being in the way and then have to back track to the nearest marker or start that entire jungle sequence over.

The creators of the game, Ubisoft, did a great job recreating the set of LOST. The beach, hatch, the Staff, Sonic fence, the Flame, etc., where all beautifully done. A lot of time and energy went into researching the various items that were recreated.

Pros:

• Great environmental design
• Sticks to places and people the fans would know.

Cons:

• Voices where not as they sounded in the show and poor dialog user interface.
• Getting lost (no pun intended) on jungle treks
• No replay value

Overall this is a slightly better than average game. The game does not have any game breaking issues but has several things that could be improved upon. I give this game a 7.0/10. I'd recommend fans of the show if they wanted to play it to find it used as it would be a few dollars cheaper or rent it.