Beneath a Steel Sky (1994)

I still remember the first impression I and a few friends had in front of the opening scenes of this game. [b]Beneath a Steel Sky[/b] features what I have no hesitation in calling some of the best 2D graphics ever made at the time, and they still impress today for the level of detail in the backgrounds, the fine quality of the pixel art characters, and the even finer animations. VGA at its best. Having comic book legend Dave Gibbons on the team paid off, including a nice introductory comic, which this CD version smartly turns into a motion comic that opens the game. With some fiddling, it is also possible to play the floppy intro with its iconic music, which I still hum from time to time even nowadays. Under such a sumptuous “vest”, the adventure is rock solid, save for a few instances of pixel hunting. It is not the longest or most difficult in the genre, but it has quite a few good puzzles to offer, and they are mostly pretty logical—or rather, logical within the world it is set in, as you will need to enter cyberspace several times. They are integrated into brilliant world-building and writing; of note are the dialogues of Joey, one of the best (and sassiest) robotic partners ever seen in a game. My only notable issue is with the tone, which is not always consistent. It is supposed to be a fairly bleak dystopian cyberpunk setting, but it often gets quite light-hearted, even if some of the dark humour is appreciated. Apparently there was some conflict during development about what direction to give the writing, and that clearly reflects in the final product. To be fair, though, it also gives [b]BASS[/b] its own unique flavour. While some audio tracks set the appropriate mood (like the very first one you hear when you start controlling Foster), others are too “happy”; it is better to keep the music volume down. No doubt an adventure classic, which put Revolution on the map (and unlike LucasArts, they are still around), and it has also been free since 2003. There is literally no excuse for not playing it.

Muy buen juego. Vale la pena jugarlo, a mi me costó porque tengo cerebro de maní.

[h1]Una joya cyberpunk de Culto[/h1] Esta segunda aventura gráfica de los creadores de Broken Sword es una experiencia fantástica que me ha gustado muchísimo a pesar de habérseme quedado algo corta. Destaca por su trama cyberpunk llena de humor y personajes memorables, con el gran añadido de que sus puzles son bastante lógicos y no cuesta encontrar las soluciones si te fijas bien en los escenarios. Lo mejor de todo es que es completamente gratuito tanto en Steam como en GoG, por lo que no hay excusa para no tenerlo. Recomiendo jugarlo a través de ScummVM utilizando Munt para emular el Roland MT-32, ya que la mejora en la calidad de la música es espectacular y eleva por completo la atmósfera del juego. Un clásico histórico que todo el mundo debería probar.

Superb, still playable in 2026.

Point and click essential

Bought this in the mid-90s and, with no walkthrough, spent many hours clicking on every bit of screen. This time, I'm hoping to make it further. For gamers of today, I'd recommend it for the story, setting, and visuals, but you need to keep in mind that the solutions to puzzles back then didn't always make obvious sense.

Ive been lookiing for this game for ages. Huge memories playing this back in the day. Love seeing it come onto steam. Fun game!

For some reason, when i was playing this game, it showed up as Leisure Suit Larry on Discord. I think it's neat.