OnLive: Oddworld – Abe’s Oddysee Review

Life ain’t so great for Abe. He and his fellow Mudokons are slaves to the Man, working in the meat processing plant known as Rupture Farms. As if this weren’t bad enough, he recently discovered the terrible fate that lies in store for his species – it seems that after years of decimating the local populations of wildlife, his captors have decided upon the next type of meat they will use in their culinary creations. Yeah, that’s right – Abe and the rest of the Mudokons are about to be liberated from their life of slavery and instead become ingredients in some type of tasty treat! The time has come to break free from the shackles of oppression, save a few Mudokons along the way, and discover the destiny that lies ahead.

Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee was originally released in 1997, on PC and PlayStation. It would best be described as a puzzle platformer, along the lines of Prince of Persia and Flashback. Run, jump, grab platforms, and avoid the various things that can bring instant death – these are the main actions you’ll be doing as you guide Abe along his journey. However, you are soon introduced to a couple of interesting mechanics that set the game apart from similar ones that came before. For a start, you can communicate with other Mudokons you come across, using simple phrases such as “Hello”, “Follow me”, and “Wait here”, as well as with…. er….. bodily functions (yes, it seems that farting is amusing even to alien life forms). This is how you’ll guide them past obstacles and to freedom.

The second interesting gameplay twist is Abe’s ability to possess the bodies of enemies, taking control of them and utilizing whatever weapons they hold. It’s an interesting idea and is put to use throughout the game, giving you one more aspect to consider when deciding how to traverse the difficult and dangerous environments. When in his own body, Abe has no attack moves, so you’ll spend a good deal of time simply running, jumping, and sneaking to escape the foes that wish to harm you. In fact, this is where most of the puzzle element lies – figuring out how to get past seemingly-impassible screens full of badguys.

Unfortunately, while Abe’s Oddysee is fun, overall, there are a few aspects that aren’t so great. For one, time has not been too kind to the graphics in this game: They’re low res and blurry, and the highly compressed video during cutscenes is full of artifacts. However, this shouldn’t detract you from playing, as you’d be hard pressed to find any title from this era that still looks good. Just don’t plan on using this game to showcase the Onlive service on your HDTV, or even on your PC for that matter – I can’t imagine anyone being too impressed. Another element that deserves criticism is the poorly designed checkpoint system: After completing a particularly difficult challenge you have no way of knowing whether your progress has been saved. This will be especially frustrating for those who attempt to save every Mudokon, as many are hidden in tricky side-sections. These side-sections rarely have checkpoints following them, so expect to repeat them while figuring out how to progress along the main path.

The Onlive port of Abe’s Oddysee is decent, but not the best I’ve seen. The graphics, while low res, have not suffered any in the conversion, and the controls feel responsive. However, there seems to be something mysteriously absent, and that’s controller support. While many grew up playing platformers on PC, I originally enjoyed this title on PlayStation, and was quite disappointed to find that it’s keyboard only. This won’t be a problem for some, but those looking to emulate their late-90s console days may be put off a little. There’s also no touch control yet, but I think it’ll work well when they decide to add it.

So overall, Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee is worth playing if you’re in the mood for a fun, slightly twisted adventure, and can look past the dated graphics. The trial and error gameplay may not appeal to all, and the checkpoint system can lead to frustration, but the interesting premise and unique art style help make up for these shortcomings.

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Oscar Langford