Official space helmet on, Captain Video! I, Edward Norton, Ranger Third Class in the Captain Video Space Ranger Academy, do solemnly pledge to obey my mommy and daddy, to be kind to dumb animals and old ladies in and out of space, not to tease my little brothers and sisters, to brush my teeth twice a day and to drink milk after every meal. – Art Carney as Ed Norton on The Honeymoooners

Let’s get right to the crux of the matter, just as Captain Video (and maybe even the Honeymooners) is now a forgotten relic of the past, hardly anyone in North America has ever heard of Perry Rhodan, even though he has been a fixture of German culture since 1961, almost five decades.  So, publisher Viva-Media is taking somewhat of a chance subtitling The Immortals of Terra as, ‘A Perry Rhodan Adventure.’

Now I was a sci-fi aficionado even before Freddie Mercury turned Flash Gordon (Flash - a-ah - saviour of the universe) into a cheesy icon.  But unfortunately, it seems in North America that remnants of Perry Rhodan can only be found in dusty, old sci-fi paperbacks from the 60’s and 70’s and this only due to the Herculean efforts of the legendary Forrest J. Ackerman and his German-speaking (late) wife Wendayne, who translated Perry’s adventures into English.

So, while I possess a cursory knowledge of the Perryverse – fandom’s name for all things Perry - there are no fond childhood memories of constructing Aurora Perry Rhodan model kits or collecting Topps trading cards.

Which, more-or-less, makes someone like myself the perfect candidate to review The Immortals of Terra with an unjaundiced eye as neither a fanboy nor a newbie.

In an era when so many adventure games are under-ambitious and underachieving, The Immortals of Terra goes the opposite route and is too often overambitious.  In the interest of fairness, it is difficult to adapt any work to a new medium and even more-so when your main character is toting forty years of developmental luggage.  Your game must be accessible to neophytes while simultaneously also finding appeal with the hardcore fan-base who expect to find all of their favorite Perryverse trappings wrapped-up in a shiny new story.

Now, the reason that Perry Rhodan has survived – and flourished – for so long, is that – unlike such now forgotten heroes as Captain Video and Flash Gordon – the authors of the Rhodan stories have always adapted to the times by presenting contemporary issues in the Perryverse

For this reason, Robert Feldhoff – a veteran author of the Perry Rhodan series - was hired to write the game and it proved to be a wise choice as he, for the most part, does a splendid job of remaining faithful to the Rhodan mythos while still making the game welcome to newcomers. 

The Immortals of Terra is about Perry’s search for the reasons behind an attack on his home planet and the subsequent kidnapping of his baby mama – Mondra Diamond – who had been researching the Illochim, a mythical ancient race.  It is an entirely new entry to the Perry Rhodan saga, yet features all of the elements expected by the fanbase.

So who is Perry Rhodan?  Stuck forever at age thirty-nine, he’s an immortal, three-thousand-years-old Jack Benny.  As Regent of the League of Free Terrans - an interstellar league of nations that includes the representatives of Earth and a multitude of Terran colonies – he is the most powerful man in the universe (unlike George Bush who only thinks he is the most powerful man in the universe).  Fit & trim, not only is Perry a good-looking three-thousand years old, but he also seems to be sporting quite the package down there, if you know what I mean (and before you send me an angry email, how many complaints have you sent to reviewers drooling over Lara Croft’s cleavage?).

The game is a third-person, point-and-click with mostly inventory-based puzzles.  Other than a game-stopping, out-of-place puzzle based on a game called Ylohim that involves the  endless manipulation of colored tiles, the puzzles are fair with a solution always within reach, though you may have to do some digging!

Inventory items scroll across the bottom of the screen with the usual left-click to use an item and right-click to obtain more info.  Perry also sports a nifty multifunction wristband – ala Dick Tracy - that stores a much-accessed notebook.  Inventory items can also be dragged onto the notebook to obtain more detailed information on individual items.

While the above is very helpful, you also tend to become overly reliant on the wristband as one of the faults in the game design is that scrolling your cursor over an active item on the screen never provides identification of that item – only ‘use’ or ‘speak’ icons appear.  Once you add an item to your inventory, the item is then identified.  This is problematic for a few reasons.  If you click on an item on the screen when the ‘use’ icon is active and nothing happens, how are you supposed to know what to do if you don’t even know what the item is?  Objects need to be identified when the cursor scrolls over them.  I don’t want to learn that something is an anti-molecular whatchamacalllit after I’ve picked it up, I want to know beforehand because then I feel like I’m playing as Perry Rhodan instead of watching Perry Rhodan.

There is also a nice scan feature – which I’m sure the more hardcore adventure gamers will endlessly bitch about – that is activated by pressing ‘s’ on the keyboard.  A scanner bar then scrolls from the top to bottom of the screen and identifies all of the hotspots in the area.  If you don’t like it, don’t use it, but it is a welcome feature if you are stuck on a puzzle or a newbie to the genre.

One feature that I never understood was that if you pass your cursor over an exit or entrance to a room or another area, if you have already visited that area then a small picture of the inside of that room appears on the screen.  Look, if I’ve already been in the room, then I know what it looks like, it’s not as though we’re playing Thief and there is someone hiding in the shadows waiting to attack.

Perry’s voice is spot-on with just that right tone of Bruce Campbell heroic smugness.   In fact, all of the voice-acting is above average helped in no small part by the engaging dialogue which can often be quite interesting.  Ditto for the sound effects and music.  But it is the graphics which are the ultimate selling-point.  Detailed 3D with cinematic action sequences, there is always something new and fresh to goggle at whether it is one of the numerous colorful alien cultures that stroll about purposefully or an underground city reminiscent of Blade Runner where spaceships zoom past as you follow elevated walkways.  This is one of those rare games where screenshots alone cannot do justice to the graphics and animation.

There is also a lot of background activity that invites a deeper investigation of the rich Perryverse:  a bar that serves a potent oxygen concoction, the interesting menu in the cafeteria and that strange race known as the Blues; and I’m barely scratching the surface.  There is a depth to this game that is sorely lacking in today’s cookie cutter adventures and it begs further exploration.

There are though, a few things that are bothersome.  The dry humor that Perry is supposedly known for does not always come across.  For example, if you attempt to solve a puzzle by repeatedly clicking on random objects without any success, Perry might say, “And while we’re trying things out, why don’t I drill a hole in my knee and pour milk into it?”  While I understand the point being made here, the statement produced more of a WTF moment than the intended guffaw.  Maybe it just suffered in the translation from German for it is obvious that the developers are intimately familiar with adventure games and create a magic moment with their inclusion of a crow bar amongst all the high technology late in the adventure.

There is also a lack of information provided within the game proper for the main characters and other inhabitants of the Milky Way.  This could have been corrected a variety of ways either through an informative voice-over or scrolling text at the beginning of the game ala Star Wars or through some added information in Perry’s computer database that can be accessed by the player.  I did notice a few other gamers complaining about this on various adventure forums and some made the point that all of this information can be found in the instruction manual that comes with the game.

Well, that may be, but when I go to the movies, I shouldn’t need to read a book beforehand to understand the movie, when I read a book, I shouldn’t need to watch a movie beforehand to understand the book, so I fail to understand why some gamers think it is acceptable that the instruction manual should be mandatory reading to understand a game rather than an enhancement.

One area where the developers and writer do a splendid job of delving into Perry’s history is the Hall of Fame which provides interesting background into some of his more memorable escapades.  More of this would have been most welcome.  Adventure gamers love to read, we’re not looking to kill everything in sight – bring on the monosyllabic words!

The most egregious oversight though is the key point around which the story revolves.  As the game begins, Perry’s baby mama  - Mondra – is kidnapped.  It’s almost impossible though to care about her fate as not only have we never met her, but we know nothing about her; there is zero emotional involvement invested.  For all we know, she might be the biggest bitch in the galaxy.  It was only through some research on my own part and by *shudder* reading the instruction manual that I learned of the depth of Perry’s relationship with Mondra.  This is one area where too much was taken for granted by the developers and an opening cinematic showing some interaction between Perry and Mondra would have gone a long way.

Finally, and maybe I’m just overlooking something obvious, but there are a few times that Perry must don a disguise so that he will not be recognized.  Yet, all he ever does is change his clothes and present a data card with a fake identity.  But his facial features look exactly the same!  Are you telling me that absolutely no one in the entire galaxy recognizes the immortal Perry Rhodan!  I wanted to believe that maybe this was like a Clark Kent/Superman type of conundrum, but there are some high-ranking characters encountered who immediately recognize the ‘disguised’ Perry even as everyone else remains oblivious.  A head-scratcher to be sure.

Overall, The Immortals of Terra: A Perry Rhodan Adventure is highly recommended even with its numerous minor faults.  A sequel would be most welcome as would a historical perspective of Perry Rhodan that could be included as an extra on the game dvd.  The game is bug-free and technically impressive.  As adventure games go, it is almost a sci-fi opus and it is intriguing to think that only a miniscule portion of the Perryverse has been plumbed.  There awaits untold worlds to explore and stories to be told.

For more information on Perry Rhodan, make sure to read our informative article The World of Perry Rhodan which was graciously supplied by Viva Media.

System Requirements:

• Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista
• NVidia 6600+ or ATI9600XT+
• Intel Pentium® IV1.5GHZ (or compatible AMD ATHLON XP™)
• 512MB RAM
• DirectX 9.0
• compatible soundcard
• 4GB free hard disc space
• DVD-ROM