AGON (Ancient Games of Nations): The Mysterious Codex

Having just finished Agon with my girlfriend, we bought this game due to the reviews and I must say we were a little disappointed with it. The graphics are good, but it tends to be a very tedious game of going back and forth a lot to do things. I also agree with the reviewer about being able to move faster when having to go back and forth. You can't......Overall, take it leave it with this game, but I will probably get episode 4 when it comes out........

I purchased "AGON: The Mysterious Codex", new, in early November of 2008. The game is entirely inoperable.I followed the limited instructions on the support site, with no success. I have written to the two support addresses provided, but I received no reply from the first address, and my message to the second address bounced back as undeliverable. I have found many reports in discussion forums by others who have had the exact same experience as I. Details are below.Every time I get to the sleeping guard and try to approach the key box, the game quits-shuts down altogether, returning me to my desktop.The first time this happened, I opened the game again, and I had lost all of my progress. (Although this juncture is very early on, in the first episode of the game, I had still lost a considerable amount of progress- that is, time spent reaching that point in the game.)I started the game from the beginning, but when I reached the exact same point in the game, the exact same thing happened.So I started the game from the beginning, again, but this time, saved my position precisely when I reached the sleeping guard. However, when I tried to approach the key box-the same thing happened.I have tried several times, but every time I approach the key box, the game quits. I am completely stonewalled.I went to <[...]> and downloaded the recommended patch for "Agon: The Mysterious Codex (PC)", which downloads to my desktop as AGON-UB-Patch.zip, but I cannot unstuff it, although I have tried using several different professional applications to open it. In every case, I receive an error message reporting that the file cannot be extracted.I sent a message to <[email protected]>, the first address provided in the jewel case insert of the game I purchased, yet, two weeks later, I have received no response.I then sent a message to <[email protected]>, the second address provided in the jewel case insert of the game I purchased, but the message bounced back to me as undeliverable.I have spent hours of my own time online, searching for guidance, answers, options, support, or fixes, to no avail. I have, however, discovered many entries in discussion forums by others who have purchased "AGON: The Mysterious Codex" and are experiencing exactly the same dilemma as I.**These customers report being unable to solicit a response from any of the product support resources to which they have been directed.**In several forum entries other customers describe their inability to unzip the patch file <AGON-UB-Patch.zip>, so I know that this experience is not particular to my case.This is an absolutely inexcusable lack of support for a product that is new, and quite costly. Not to mention that the product itself is completely inoperable.My specs:I have a *Dual* *2GHz* processor with a massive amount of memory (1.5 GB).My hard drive has almost no data on it (I keep almost everything on external drives). Everything about my hardware and software is in perfect condition.I have no problems with any other software. I often use Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign all at the same time, together with other applications running, and yet, never before, in all my time on this computer, has my computer crashed like this.

If you have even an inkling of interest in playing this game, let me point out from the start that the designers most likely had this as purely an iPad/touch screen game in mind, because it took me a good ten minutes to figure out that I had to HOLD DOWN THE MOUSE BUTTON to move my line of sight. This isn't noted anywhere in the interface notes--though it does point out what the symbols (which YOU CAN'T SEE if you don't know how to MOVE) are--and the budget packaging gives no manual, presumably because it's all so ***obvious*** that it needs no mention. BOO.The rest of the game is bland at best, and the first "episode" made me nauseated from the game's quirk of centering then moving to the next section with a fade transition, which was aggravated with how apparently the main character can't just walk in a straight line down a hall; he slips slightly to the left or right as he goes. There are more than a few places where the game is needlessly long/tedious--for instance, traversing the thick jungle of the third "episode" after navigating it even once (I ended up having to do it five times!)--and the decryption puzzles were made miserably difficult because Hunt could not hold up the reference material to the object he was trying to translate, so after the first such "puzzle" I just consulted a walkthrough so I could get through it already.To get back to the subject, apparently there are twelve or so games Hunt is looking for, but by the third episode he's only found two. Are they at least fun games? Eh... not really. Both are "capturing" games, and they have the same problem as chess, when it gets down to each player having only a few pieces left, it ends up being a stalemate of moving pieces back and forth between safe zones until one player takes a chance. At least once you win, you get to play them "offline" without having to play the main game.On the whole, I guess it's worth the budget price, but definitely disappointing that, unless you know what "A Collection of 3 Complete Adventures" means, there's no indication that this is only a partial narrative. Since I had recently watched a cancelled TV show with a similar "epic" narrative that never concluded, I would have preferred going in to know that the disc content ends on a cliffhanger. At least I didn't spend a lot, but definitely no fond memories... except I guess the beach of Madagascar was pretty.

Just played Episode 1 - really liked it. Not too dialog heavy, good story, historical environment, graphics and soundtrack fine. I was really enjoying it, when suddenly - "to be continued". It only took about two hours, and really about 80% of that time was taken up by navigating to here or there -- running (walking slowly, that is) up and down the stairs. Hey, It's not like the passenger elevator wasn't invented by 1903.I hope to get a chance at some of the other episodes.

I had a good time with this game, though some of the back and forth trekking was tedious. I'm looking forward to the next in the series.

HiI have all 3 episodes and a nice game it is .the problem is it's a continuing story and the episodes were supposed to come out every 6 months.........the game can't be finished without all the episodes and episode 4 is two years overdue folks...they won't respond to inquiries about the next episode so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize the game is dead...Buy at only if you like not being able to complete the story....

too much brain power is required this is one of the awesome game i have ever player mostly recommended best logic game ever