Syberia 3

Syberia 3 is an adventure game in the vain of King’s Quest or more recently, Thimbleweed, but without the humor and a ton more puzzles to solve. The game recently came to the Nintendo Switch and I received a review code for it. Is Syberia 3 a good game or should you skip this adventure?

Before you start Syberia 3, make sure you watch ‘the previously on Syberia’ video. Syberia 3 does not introduce Kate Walker and throws you right into her adventure. So the previously video is a must.

After that, you will a find story that is sometimes interesting and other times bogged down by its puzzles. The dialogue choices do make the story a bit more interesting than it would otherwise be, though the dialogue overall isn’t that great. If you do end up liking the story, then you’ll want to check out the Additional content provided with this game (its accessible via the start up menu).

Syberia 3 doesn’t have a horrible story but it could have been better. That pretty much sums up the rest of the game too.

Syberia 3 is an adventure game thats harkens back to older games in the genre. It is filled with puzzles that do not hold your hand or give you much direction. Even on easy mode (voyage mode), this is hard game. I found myself looking at a youtube walkthrough of the game more often than not to get through a puzzle. This game can be very frustrating.

And its not just because the puzzles are hard. Syberia 3, again and again, makes you think you are about to leave an area and then goes “Oh wait, one more puzzle.” and you solve that and then “But wait!” The game makes everything endlessly complex, making you do puzzles/tasks for even small things like putting a stamp on a passport or opening a dock gate.

Yes, some of the puzzles in this game are inventive and neat, while others are just ‘this is not needed. can we move on now?’

The control scheme for this game is pretty bad too. There are no touch screen controls, which seems like a no-brainer for an adventure game. Touch controls for this game would have improved the puzzles a lot. As is, you have to use the analog stick and buttons for the puzzles and for some things that was ok and for others it was horrible. The game’s graphics and sound don’t fair much better.

Syberia 3 looks like a game from the PS2 or early PS3 era. Basically it looks like an older adventure game. To its credit, the environments in this game are very detailed, but they just don’t like Nintendo Switch detailed graphics. The faces in this game are pretty strange. The eyes on several characters are bug-eyed. Syberia 3’s graphics are not the worst I’ve seen on the Switch, but they could’ve been a lot better.

Syberia 3 also has framerate issues, which are especially noticeable when Kate Walker is running around. Running is the best way to get around, cause the walking in this game is too slow. So you’ll have to put up with the framerate stuttering and also weird camera angles that’ll confuse you as to which one you should be going. This game absolutely needed a map for the bigger areas.

Then there’s game’s voice acting, which I found to be very stilted and forced. The subtitles in this game are not good either. I had both the voice acting and subtitles on and a lot of the time, the subtitles didn’t even say the same thing as the voice acting! The music in the game is ok, though nothing special. Overall, Syberia 3 is a mess.

There are some neat puzzles and an occasional interesting plot twist in Syberia 3, but the game could have been better! The gameplay is frustrating, the graphics are outdated, and most of the experiance feels like a chore thanks to the endless puzzles, even for very minor things.

If you absolutely love Adventure games, then you might want to check this game out. There are some neat things hidden in it. Then again, you might want to avoid it. I love adventure games, but there were times during Syberia 3 that I wanted to throw my Nintendo Switch. There are better adventure games on the Nintendo Switch and you might think of tracking them down instead.

Syberia 3 gets a 5.0 out of 10

A digital code was provided for this review. Syberia 3 is currently available on the Nintendo Switch eshop.