Ankh: Heart Of Osiris Review (PC)

A fresh and hillarious take on the point and click genre

Ankh ? heart of Osiris is the follow up to the 2005 point and click adventure game Ankh. It is set in ancient Egypt, and follows the adventures of a young man named Assil, who was assigned the task of protecting a mysterious Ankh, which supposedly has the power to bring Osiris (the god of the underworld) back into the mortal realm, where he could make all humans his slaves. Well in this game, Osiris’ minions have stolen the Ankh from Assil while he was intoxicated, and have returned it to their evil master. Only one thing stands in the way of Osiris carrying out his fiendish plot. His heart has been hidden, and he needs it to once more enter the land of the living. Assil’s quest is to find the heart of Osiris before the minions, and stop him from terrorising the earth once more.

The game showcases lush graphics for a game of this genre, and whilst the graphics are still cartoony, they seem very fitting for this game. The game play is practically identical to that of the early monkey island and broken sword games, whereby the player clicks on an item to investigate it or pick it up depending on the circumstance. These items accumulate in the inventory at the top of the screen and can be combined with other items using the second mouse button. This system is very easy to pick up, but manages to still keep the player interested throughout the game.

The story seems well played out, and is filled with great comedy moments.

One of the other plus points for this game is that it is much longer than some of the other point and click games I have played during my time on the YARS review board. The game actually felt to me that it would be worth the very reasonable £19.99 RRP (£14.99 on play.com). This game would probably have lasted me a week or two had I not submitted to some of the more complex puzzles and used a walkthrough. This brings me to my next point. Right from the outset, the player is presented with some complex puzzles, some of the solutions which make sense, others seem completely random. I like Daverage’s analogy of ?Find a piece of chewing gum, combine it with a rocket launcher then put it in lemonade at exactly 3 minutes past 2?, and although the puzzles are not quite this random, they will take you a while to complete (which is a good thing!).

The story seems well played out, and is filled with great comedy moments. This is largely helped by the fact that this era has not been truly explored in this type of game before. The character animation and voice acting are incredibly good, but during one or two points, there seemed to be chunks of dialogue missing, I am not sure whether this was down to me doing things in the wrong order, or simply a bug in the game, but it was noticeable. One of the quirks of the game was the authentication device. Rather than using a conventional CD key or serial number, the game had a codewheel included which came into game play within a certain puzzle. Without this codewheel, the player would be able to progress no further in the game.

Overall, this game adheres to the conventions set by other point and click adventure games, yet manages to stay completely unique and brilliantly funny. The story is well developed, and enhanced by the ability to play a variety of characters, yet the game can still seem a little rough around the edges in places. One thing I did feel let down by was the ending, which was not enigmatic, uplifting or even exciting! There are multiple dialogue choices which lead to one of three similarly underplayed endings. This left me with a slight feeling of anticlimax, after such a good game, I was expecting better! In conclusion, this game is a fresh new outlook on the point and click genre, and whilst it may be a little unpolished, it is filled with hilarious comedy moments you will want to see again. If you think there is even the slightest chance that this game will interest you, download the demo and give it a go!