Timescape: Journey to Pompeii Review
It took just a few hours for Pompeii to be destroyed. Unfortunately, that's also the approximate length of time it'll take veteran adventure gamers to finish Timescape.
When Mt. Vesuvius erupted in A.D. 79, it took just a few hours for the adjacent city of Pompeii to be destroyed. Unfortunately, that's also the approximate length of time it'll take veteran adventure gamers to finish Timescape: Journey to Pompeii, one of the latest historically inspired games from the dedicated adventure-game publisher Dreamcatcher Interactive.
Timescape was originally published in Europe by Cryo Interactive, whose many adventure games often lack an entirely coherent premise. Timescape is no exception. You play as Adrian Blake, presumably an archaeologist "on a mission for the crown" at the end of World War I. While exploring a cave, Adrian comes down with a fever and is approached by the goddess Ishtar, who offers to cure him in exchange for his love. Adrian refuses because he insists he loves only his fiancée Sophia, and so Ishtar decides to punish him for not believing in "love incarnate." Consequently, the night before Adrian's wedding back home, Sophia vanishes without a trace. Adrian returns to the cave region in search of Sophia, but it turns out his beloved is much farther away than he can imagine; she's been sent back in time to Pompeii and to the previous life she lived there. Ishtar sends Adrian back to the same time and gives him three days to locate Sophia and convince her to leave the city before the eruption occurs.
One of the first things you discover as Adrian is an amulet, which can be used at any point during play to access an extremely thorough encyclopedia. Here you'll find information on a myriad of topics about Pompeii, from its foundation and history to family life, religion, prominent citizens - even cooking, eroticism, and much more. None of the puzzles require you to dig through the encyclopedia for clues or answers, but the reading is interesting enough that you'll probably want to return to it even after you've completed the game.
Journey to Pompeii uses the same sort of first-person perspective and interface popularized by Myst and employed in countless other adventure games: You move between different preset points and can use the mouse to scan each of these scenes for clues and objects. The system works well for the most part, but it has its shortcomings--there are several points where you can overlook a necessary object because you forgot to look down at your feet or didn't move your mouse cursor over the exact hot spot. Exploration can be a little confusing at first because many streets have a similar appearance, which forces you to check the map constantly, not only to verify your location but also to ensure you're moving in the right direction.
- GameSpot Scorefair
Critic Scores
- GameZone 7.5 / 10
- Game Raiders 75 / 100
- GameSpy 84 / 100
- Quandary 3 / 5
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- DreamCatcher Interactive
- Arxel Tribe
- Adventure
- Release: Oct 4, 2000
- ESRB: Everyone
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