Return to Mysterious Island

Return to Mysterious Island is a 2004 graphic adventure game developed by Kheops Studio and published by The Adventure Company. Based on Jules Verne's 1875 novel The Mysterious Island, the game casts the player as Mina, a shipwrecked woman forced to survive on an uncharted island.

Return to Mysterious Island
Developer(s)Kheops Studio
Publisher(s)The Adventure Company
Platform(s)Windows, Windows Mobile, Mac OS X, iPhone
ReleaseNovember 19, 2004
Genre(s)Adventure
Mode(s)Single player

Gameplay

Players explore the world by clicking on different areas to move and to interact with items. Players also have an inventory, in which they can collect and store items and construct new ones.

Plot

Return to Mysterious Island follows Mina, a strong young woman alone on a round-the-world sailing expedition. Caught in a tremendous storm, she becomes stranded on the shores of a wild and apparently uninhabited island. As she explores her new surroundings, she uncovers artifacts, living spaces and technologies left behind by the people who came before her to this uncharted island.

Creating a new life, Mina builds a home from the remains of the previous settlements and uses her survival skills against the wilds of the jungle. She soon becomes aware of a figure in the shadows who, seemingly aware of her troubles, offers her assistance. She eventually identifies this figure as the unsettled ghost of Captain Nemo, whose body is located in a cave on the island. Piecing together the hints and clues he provides, Mina must retrieve his body and give him a proper burial in order to free his tortured soul, and then travel to the Nautilus deep below the island shore to unlock a way to escape the island.

Development

Return to Mysterious Island was conceived by Kheops Studio because Mystery of the Nautilus had been a success for publisher DreamCatcher Interactive,[1] selling 117,000 units globally by 2004.[2]

Reception

According to the NPD Group, Return to Mysterious Island sold 21,700 copies at a list price $19.99 by June 2005.[5] It became Kheops Studio's biggest hit worldwide, which company head Benoît Hozjan attributed to word of mouth.[6] The game's later iPhone release sold 100,000 copies by November 2009.[7] Review aggregation website Metacritic reported critical reception of Return to Mysterious Island's original computer release as "generally positive", based on 19 reviews.[8]

The game 4 out of 5 from Modojo for its iPhone version; the reviewer said that the game have remarkable visuals and audio as well as manageable inventory system but have frustrating puzzles.[9] Geek.com who also liked previously states pros but also compared it to Myst.[10]

Return to Mysterious Island was nominated as SME's pick for the best adventure game of 2004, but lost the prize to Syberia II.[11] In 2011, Adventure Gamers named Return to Mysterious Island the 53rd-best adventure game ever released.[12]

Legacy

On November 25, 2008 Microïds, (Anuman Interactive's adventure games label) announced that a sequel was being made, Return to Mysterious Island II. Development by Kheops Studio began in April 2008, and the game was released on PC and Apple iPhone on August 14, 2009.[13]

Coladia, founded in 2005, teamed up with Kheops Studio to update and port Mysterious Island and other Kheops adventure games to macOS and iOS.[14] A port of the game to Apple's iPhone was released on the iTunes app store on June 15, 2009.

References
  1. Walter, Johann (November 14, 2006). "Kheops Studio - Benoît Hozjan INTERVIEW". Adventure Gamers. Archived from the original on July 16, 2016.
  2. "Product Info - Return to Mysterious Island". Mindscape. Archived from the original on December 10, 2004.
  3. Gehringer, Stephen F. (April 2005). "Return to Mysterious Island". Computer Gaming World (250): 88.
  4. Martin, Tiffany. "MacGyver Meets Castaway". Computer Games Magazine (173). Archived from the original on November 7, 2011.
  5. Saltzman, Marc (June 18, 2005). "Top PC games can end up in bargain bin". CNN. Archived from the original on July 2, 2005.
  6. Jong, Philip; Howse, Joseph (April 5, 2008). "Benoît Hozjan". Adventure Classic Gaming. Archived from the original on April 11, 2008.CS1 maint: uses authors parameter (link)
  7. Zibreg, Christian (November 13, 2009). "Review: Jules Verne's Secrets of the Mysterious Island for iPhone". Geek.com. Archived from the original on March 23, 2018.
  8. "Return to Mysterious Island (pc: 2004): Reviews". Metacritic. Archived from the original on July 24, 2007.
  9. Robert Workman. "Jules Verne's Return To Mysterious Island iPhone Review". Retrieved January 6, 2014.
  10. Christian Zibreg (July 1, 2009). "Review: Jules Verne's Return to Mysterious Island, the finest iPhone adventure to date". Retrieved January 6, 2014.
  11. https://web.archive.org/web/20050212090200/http://hry.sme.sk:80/clanok-1873399.html
  12. AG Staff (December 30, 2011). "Top 100 All-Time Adventure Games". Adventure Gamers. Archived from the original on June 4, 2012.
  13. "Return to Mysterious Island". Adventure Gamers. Retrieved June 18, 2014.
  14. www.coladia.com/company.php "Archived copy". Archived from the original on July 5, 2009. Retrieved 2009-08-15.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
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