The Syberia series is quite an enigma in the gaming sphere.

Its longevity has always sort of fascinated me. Where many classic franchises have stayed dormant for years, Syberia has kept churning out sequels and found ways to reinvent itself.

For me, I’ve been there since Benoit Sokal’s original classic, a beautiful point and click adventure that has a powerful message to share, much like The Longest Journey it launched alongside.

But for many, Syberia is a game that would have passed them by, something of a byproduct of its time. So thankfully, Microids have decided to remaster it, reintroducing the series to an all new audience. And the results are …. good.

The world of Syberia is more free and open than before, with its main character Kate Walker able to explore more of the environment than before, as well as play using updated user interface and with reimagined puzzles.

At times, you really see the beauty of this world like never before. Up close, Kate’s facial expressions are clear and her animations crisp. The backdrops are really sharp with individual brickwork, moving fog, flowing and reflective water, and elegant camera angles to really bring out the best of every scene.

There’s really deep shadow effects and flowing leaves that are wonderfully captured in the moment to moment gameplay, but Syberia – Remastered does come a little undone during cutscenes which are lower resolution by comparison. Where the base game itself is beautiful and remastered, the cutscenes are more grainy and blurred, a recreation of their original.

As such, the game itself feels like a halfway home between a remake and a remaster and it suffers a little bit for that. It would have been better if the game had gone in one clear direction over another.

Still, it’s a really beautiful game and the soul of Sokal’s original vision remains mostly in tact, through the dialogue, the script, and the world of automatons that Kate meets.

As the story goes, Kate comes from a Lawyer firm in America and heads to Valadilene in order to complete a sale of a Toy Factory from Anna Voralberg. However, following her surprise, unexpected death, it throws up a series of questions as to inheritance and whether the transaction can even be concluded.

Through lots of different types of literature like diaries, faxes, newspaper clippings and wills, you’ll gain insights into the world and piece together the wider mystery. Kate will also pick up various items like gears, dolls, ink pots and levers so she can solve certain puzzles and progress through the adventure.

The game has a story and adventure mode with increasingly more difficult puzzles that require a mix of logic and discovery in order to progress. The remastered version features a larger journal that couples as updated UI, with button presses assigned to individual components like making phone calls. Kate has her partner, mom, best friend and firm on speed dial but will also gather more numbers throughout her adventure.

Syberia Remastered’s beautifully realised detail really does enhance the game for the better using Unity and relying on modern technology, but you can tell the game is based on older source code with lines of dialogue interupting each other abruptly, sluggishness in movement and the aforementioned grainy cutscenes.

Still, Microids must be commended for making this game feel like a natural home on console and converting it in a way that a whole new crop of players can come to know and love the game. As for whether this is going to be for those who know and love the original is a little more debatable. The classic point and click adventure is beautiful and stylish in its own vintage right, even 20 years on.

This new version might actually end up feeling a bit diminished in comparison, at least at times. Still, it’s a beautiful attempt at restoring Kate’s world and does a decent job of keeping in tune with the original vision, even with its flaws and all.

Verdict

Syberia – Remastered is a novel attempt at bringing back the classic point and click original twenty years on, but gets lost between attempting to be a remake and a remaster and as such loses some of the charm for those who knew, grew up with and loved the original. For an all new audience, this is the best way to experience the classic original story, but classic fans may be frustrated by some of the decisions and the odd natured feeling of experiencing the world this way, despite its beauty. 

Pros

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Syberia – Remastered is out now on PC, Xbox, and PS

Played on PC and PS5

Code Kindly Provided by Microids for review purposes