Press Release: 1997-01-10: SegaSoft Obsidian on Shelves Now: Breaking Rules and Breaking Ground

This is an unaltered copy of a press release, for use as a primary source on Sega Retro. Please do not edit the contents below. Language: English Original source: SegaSoft (archived)

5 CD Graphic Adventure Expects to Set New Standard for Genre

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. (January 10, 1997) - SegaSoft, a multi-platformed publisher of interactive entertainment titles, today announced the shipment of their highly anticipated 3-D graphic adventure CD-ROM game, Obsidian, for the PC. The Macintosh version will follow in March '97. Both versions will retail for $49.99.

Obsidian, a five CD game is a dreamlike, first-person graphic adventure which propels gamers through a wild and strangely intriguing techno-organic world. Obsidian has received considerable acclaim within the gaming community. In a December preview of Obsidian, GamePen Online told readers "Obsidian is the first [game] to do everything that Myst did, only much better. Perhaps when Myst II: Riven is finally released, people will call it an Obsidian like game." While Newsweek's Cyberscope tells readers [ In Obsidian] "disembodied robots with televisions forheads, giant mechanical spiders and three inch tall guitar-wielding mariachis are all vividly brought to life against gorgeously designed backdrops."

"Obsidian is one of SegaSoft's key titles which will establish our market presence for the new year," said Gary Griffiths, president, SegaSoft. "Obsidian is designed for hard-core gamers that want an experience that will challenge and engage their minds and take them to another reality for hours at a time."

Game Storyline
In Obsidian, you take on the role of Lilah, an environmental scientist who, together with her partner, Max, has created the Ceres Project. This is a weather control satellite that uses nanotechnology -- robots smaller than a human cell -- to find and repair the worst parts of earth's seriously damaged atmosphere.

Your partner disappears. Searching for him, you are drawn inside"Obsidian," a giant black monolith that contains a series of stunning dream worlds. Inside these dream worlds nothing is as you'd expect. The laws of physics and reality do not apply. You can defy gravity, you can bring a machine to life. You can even teach that machine to dream.

Players must negotiate four, reality-altering realms vividly rendered in 3D in order to unravel the mystery surrounding this strange new world and find Max. These dream environments take you from one world to the next in mesmerizing transitions that are as unexpected as they are impossible. In one moment, you can go from a deserted beach with gravity-defying mountains, to a flaming desert where lightning makes music, to an abandoned factory where a mechanical spider comes to life, to a distant nebula where machines are gods.

Each environment offers many fresh new puzzles carefully integrated into the storyline: you travel inside of dreams and encounter conundrums that require you to use not just your rational mind, but also your intuition. The environments within Obsidian are puzzles themselves-how do you negotiate a room where you can walk on all six sides or get waves in the ocean to flow in synch?

In addition, all of the unusual music within Obsidian has been created by Thomas Dolby to create a completely immerse experience through each of the five dreamlike realms. Next Gen Online has called the sounds in Obsidian "gorgeous."

Obsidian was developed by Rocket Science Games.

System Requirements:
Windows version requires a Pentium 90 processor or higher with 16 MB of RAM, Windows 95 operating system, a 4x CD-ROM drive, a 16 bit video card, 2 MB VRAM is strongly recommended, a 16 bit audio card, and AWE32 strongly recommended. The Macintosh version requires a Power Mac 7100 or higher with System 7.0, 16 MB of RAM, and a 4x CD-ROM drive.

About SegaSoft
SegaSoft was founded in 1995 and develops interactive software and content for delivery on all platforms, including PCs, gaming consoles, and the Internet. A joint venture of CSK Corporation and Sega of America, Inc., the U.S. subsidiary of the $4 billion Sega Enterprises Ltd., a global leader in interactive digital entertainment media, SegaSoft is headquartered in Redwood City, Calif., where it employs 170 people. For more information on SegaSoft, please visit http://www.segasoft.com.

About Rocket Science
Rocket Science Games, Inc. develops next-generation gaming and interactive entertainment software for PC's, the Internet and videogames consoles. For more information on Rocket Science, please visit http://www.rocketsci.com.