A Timeless Adventure with a 2002 Heart
It’s a strange, almost disorienting experience to eventually play the first game in a series long after you have played one of the latter games in the franchise. But that is what is happening here with Syberia – Remastered.
The late Belgian comic book artist and game developer, Benoit Sokal, was a true visionary, coming up with the Syberia franchise, which was first released back in 2002. Now, we have this new remaster, promising updated visuals, modernised controls, and tweaked puzzles.
The publisher, Microids, also remastered Sokal’s first game, Amerzone, and we liked that very much, which set a high bar for this release. So, it was with great hope that I approached this latest remaster of an old classic, expecting it to reach the same heights. It is, however, a very different prospect than Amerzone. And even though there are lots of new, welcome improvements, it still fundamentally feels like a product of 2002.
Story and Narrative
For those who don’t know, Syberia is a third-person, point-and-click adventure game that follows the fortunes of Kate Walker. Having only known her from the height of her later adventures, it’s good to finally follow her story from the very beginning.
In this first adventure, she is a young American lawyer working for a prestigious New York firm, the epitome of a high-flyer whose life is dictated by contracts and deadlines. She is tasked with a seemingly simple job: go to a sleepy, forgotten French village in the Alps following the death of the owner of an automaton factory. Her job is to finalise the purchase of the factory for her company, as there is no living heir.
But, of course, things are not that simple. It turns out that the owner had a long-lost, eccentric brother called Hans. He was a brilliant inventor who doesn’t live there anymore. Thus, it’s up to Kate to go on an epic adventure across Europe, following his cold trail to get him to sign the papers.
The story of Syberia – Remastered is an old-fashioned one. It is not full of high-octane action but is instead a deliberate, dramatic mystery with a very different, melancholic vibe. You chat to lots of different, often peculiar, characters and find clues about the elusive Hans and the journey you find yourself on. I liked the writing and can certainly see why this game has proven to be a cult classic over the many years since its original release. It’s a solid, well-told story and has a great, steady flow to its narrative.
Point, Click, and Pacing
Remember, this is a point-and-click adventure at its soul, so you will be doing a lot of walking around and a significant amount of backtracking to different locations as you uncover new clues and items. I think the movement of Kate has been revamped for this remaster, with more fluid, modern-style movement and fewer restrictive fixed camera angles than the original. But even with these improvements, it does still feel like a game from a while ago.
The pacing is extremely methodical, and sometimes Kate herself can feel a bit awkward and clunky in her environments. It was never enough to annoy me during my game time with her, but it did occasionally pull me out of the experience.
The UI has had a bit of a revamp as well, making it much easier to use for a modern-day audience. I did find it easy to navigate and use throughout the adventure. You will be looking for everything to interact with or to read, and the game does help you with a more intuitive, modern way of highlighting what’s in each area.
But you should still be looking out for everything, keeping notes of what you have seen. This is because, like all point-and-click adventures of that era, the puzzles have their own unique, internal logic. This means that some answers or item combinations will seem a bit obscure at times, where a solution makes perfect sense to the designer but isn’t immediately obvious to a player.
Obscure Logic and Visual Flourish
The puzzles themselves are, generally, a good mix, ranging from fairly simple, logical ones to the “I need to quickly look this up online because I have no idea” variety. But, for the most part, they are very enjoyable and fun to solve. There were a few moments in Syberia – Remastered where I did think to myself, “If I didn’t know this game was made in 2002, would I just think it was poorly designed or simply old-fashioned?” I think the design philosophy of the early 2000s still shines through brightly in this game. That’s not always a bad thing, as it’s a window into a different time in game development, but modern-day gamers accustomed to clear signposting and faster pacing might find the deliberate slowness of it all a bit of a slog.
In terms of visuals, I enjoyed looking back at some screenshots of the original 2002 game and seeing that the upgrades here are really significant. We are not just talking about a simple resolution boost; this remaster features much better textures, vastly improved modern lighting, and enhanced character designs. It looks brilliant at times, and I think it honours the original artistic vision but with a modern flourish. Some of the cutscenes, however, look a bit old-fashioned, and I suspect they haven’t had as much of the same restorative treatment as the in-game assets.
Audio-wise, it’s all the same voice cast from 2002, and they do a good job. The performances still hold up, in my opinion, with a classic, earnest quality. The music is the same as well, and there are some great, atmospheric tracks to accompany your puzzle-solving.
An Enjoyable Trip Back to the Past
I enjoyed the recent remaster of Amerzone a little more than this Syberia one. The first-person perspective of that game was easier to impress with a new, fancy engine, as it’s a more direct and immersive viewpoint. The fixed-camera, point-and-click format of Syberia is inherently more detached. But I enjoyed the unhurried pace of the story, the cleverness of the puzzles, and just exploring this unique world with its upgraded visuals.
Syberia – Remastered is not a perfect game, and there are many moments when it really does feel like it’s 2002 again, but you’ll mostly be glad to experience this iconic story from the very beginning.
Important Links
A Point-and-Click Masterpiece is Reborn in Syberia – Remastered – https://www.thexboxhub.com/a-point-and-click-masterpiece-is-reborn-in-syberia-remastered/
Benoît Sokal’s Masterpiece Reborn as Syberia Remastered & All-New Syberia VR Announced for Late 2025 – https://www.thexboxhub.com/benoit-sokals-masterpiece-reborn-as-syberia-remastered-all-new-syberia-vr-announced-for-late-2025/
Buy Syberia – Remastered on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/store/syberia-remastered/9P7NXKCS6XBR/0010
