Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy- A visual masterpiece, and a great game

Author's Rating:

Pros: Beautiful, engaging world. Great Characters and plot. Perfectly challenging.

Cons: Not enough places to save, individual objectives take a long time to complete.

The Bottom Line: 
Buy it- it is a great purchase, an amazing world.

Author's Review
I honestly didn't know a thing about this game before purchasing it. I wanted a new title for my collection, it was on sale, so I bought it. Usually I do a lot of reviewing before buying a game, but I think not knowing anything about Sphinx appealed to me for once. I've never regretted the purchase...

The version of this game that I purchased is for the Nintendo Gamecube platform. However, at this time epinions.com is not offering the Gamecube title as an addition, but I know for sure that there are no differences between the two games. Sometimes in my reviews I make references to Nintendo games. I will try not to do that in this case, but if I slip, I do apologize.

A Visual Masterpiece

The folks at Eurocom definitely had their work cut out for them when they started producing this game. After working on other games like a James Bond title for EA, Eurocom never really had a chance to make a game of their own... until now! Since this was Eurocom's first adventure in creating a game of their own, they wanted to make a big impact. To do this, they spent plenty of time with character and world development, and it paid off!

Sphinx is a gorgeous game... You will want to spend time in this world, whether seriously working on one of the objectives or not. It is easy to get lost just spending ten or fifteen minutes wandering around looking at the landscape and buildings and inhabitants. All are amazingly crafted, beautifully designed, and wonderfully colored. In addition, the characters have been well crafted. All movement is fluid and natural- no jerky or odd angles to contend with. And there are no polygonal face-shapes to deal with, and no boxy characters. All beings are smooth and solid, a good combination of reality and fantasy. As an added plus, the camera angles work well, and the player can make an easy time of traversing a world and focusing on exactly what they want to be looking at.

Sphinx... and the Mummy

The player controls two characters, but not at the same time. You start out the game a Sphinx, a demigod (half lion, hence the name). He and a "friend" Horrus (half falcon) are sent in search of the sword of Osirus by their master and teacher, Imhotep. After a nasty turn of events, Horrus ends up coming face-to-face with fate, while Sphinx is left with the glory. (Don't worry, though, Horrus will return)

You continue playing with Sphinx for a while, then switch over to Tut, who will eventually become the Mummy. Each character has a different purpose. With Sphinx you are usually traversing different lands, searching through temples, battling enemies, and trying to gain allies. Once Tut is doomed into becoming the Mummy, you stay in one place, and work as the Mummy to complete your objectives.

Sphinx travels through the real world, alive and well, doing good deeds, until after a major objective is acomplished, you gain or find a canopic vase, which contains part of the Mummy's soul. Cutscene, to the Mummy. Then, for a period of time you control the Mummy. The Mummy is essentially dead, so he cannot be killed, which makes it useful for the dangerous place he is in. The Mummy can be set on fire, smashed to paper-thin, electrocuted, and be turned into a bat or to smoke. All forms will be needed in one way or another to solve puzzles and unlock keys to the mystery. Once the Mummy finds an item that could be extremely useful to Sphinx, you go back to playing with Sphinx until another canopic vase is found. Phew.

The Plot

Basically, evil deeds are starting to happen all across Sphinx's world, and as a fairly powerful, smart, and headstrong demigod, why not share the wealth? The evil Set, your master enemy in this game, wants to take over Egypt, and must first take care of Tut, which he does by mummifying him and scattering the canopic vases in which his soul can be found. So, obviously, the Mummy wants his life back. The two will team up to overthrow Set and his evil plans of domination.

Weapons

Although the only thing the Mummy can do (apart from not having to worry about health and getting set on fire and all that great stuff) is jump up and down, but Sphinx is more fortunate. You start of the game with virtually nothing, just some basic rope-climbing and jumping skills. As you progress, though, you are blessed with the sword of Osirus, the shield of Osirus, and blowdarts of many assortments, inluding an unlimited set of regular darts, and some less-numbered poisonous and underwater varieties, just to name a few. Sphinx can also learn a double-jump, which is really useful, ride around on zip lines, travel by boat, and use portal, which warp you from one place to another. Needless to say all of this has to be gained, either by completing a temple or pleasing the gods, both of which will take a little effort.

Pros

Visually engaging world, spectacular music, movement, characters and plot. This game will literally keep you entertained for hours on end. And, if you're a history buff, although the characters and items in the game aren't necessarily used in a historically correct context, they all exist as part of Egyptian mythology, so grab a library book and use your knowledge from the game to learn! Yeah! Or not...

Cons

The game only has two major faults that I see. First of all, it is extremely difficult to save your progress. Unlike some games where you can hit the start or pause button, save and be done with it, in this game you must get to a specific point, a saving statue or something, to protect your progress. Unfortunately, sometimes your objective may take an hour or more complete in full, with no saving spaces inbetween. So you really need a good chunk of time on your hands before you start playing, because if you don't have time to finish what you've started then you'll lose all the progress that you may have had.

The only other fault is small, and involves health. Enemies usually don't harm you too much, and life is generally easily found, but you really don't have a lot of health. You start off the game with three Gold Ankh pieces, which are divided into four mini-sections. After you first major task is complete you gain a forth Ankh. Then for a long (really, really long) while you can't gain any more. By completing minigames or small tasks within cities you can grab some Ankh pieces (four to one Ankh container), but unfortunately, these have to be redeemed at a certain place (Bedouin Outpost) to actually be turned into an Ankh container and used. It takes a lot of work to actually get to Bedouin Outpost to trade in your pieces, but I found that I really could have used all that life energy before then.

All in All

It is a gorgeous game well worth the time, effort, and money. I have enjoyed it immensley, and would reccomend it to anyone.