The famous novel Return to Mysterious Island by the author Jules Verne was and still remains a classic today, but how will the book-inspired game stand up to the test of time? It's already been mentioned that Return to Mysterious Island does what it's meant to do very well, so on that basis it's timeless. But is the formula it's built upon nearly as timeless? Our opinion is that it's not.

One thing that Return to Mysterious Island has going for it is the different ways you can not only play but also beat the game. It starts out pretty much the same for everyone; you take on the role of the shipwrecked Mina, who becomes stranded on the shores of an uninhabited island, or at least one that appears at first glance to be uninhabited. Mina's ultimate goal is to find a way off of the island, but first you have to take care of human needs. That's right, Mina is hungry and you must spend the first few minutes of the game trying to find her some food to eat so you can move on and explore the island. Not only must you spend your time finding food but you also must figure out a way to cook what is only edible once heated up. It could be considered an annoying task to some, but to others a highly satisfying quest. After you feed Mina to an acceptable level she tells you she's ready to move on and so up the hill you go to explore more of the island. It is at this point in the game where you can choose to play straight through and beat the game as quickly as possible or spend your time trying to find every item on the island and creating as many things as you can. From reproducing Benjamin Franklin's kite experiment to making a bow and some arrows and doing who knows what with it, there are a great number of paths to follow.

The artwork in this game is beautiful and the artists did a fine job of conveying a tropical paradise. However, and this is the reason the artwork as both a pro and a con; it could have been much more. This game is Myst style all the way, from its pre-rendered backgrounds to the black-and-white drawings during the 'cut scenes.' But why just drawings to move the story along? Whatever happened to real-time movies, or at the very least, CGI movies to really convey the beauty of the game and to bring the excitement level up a notch? Apparently the game designers forgot that the technology is readily available and not all that difficult to pull off. There is one CGI movie at the very end of the game which was done beautifully, but our only complaint is that there should have been many more.

The world in Return to Mysterious Island consists of about 40 pre-drawn screens and not many more than that. The world, or rather the island, is divided into three "sections," all of which are not impressively large. The first section of the world consists of the Beach of Lincoln Island and the Granite House, the second section includes all the rest of the island (except for the volcanic area) and the final section of the world is onboard the Nautilus submarine. It took us around 4-5 hours to complete the game. That is, mind you, without spending too much time on item explorations and creation. The time spent on exploring the island and creating different items was quite enjoyable, which is part of the reason why the small game world is considered, at least to us, a con. If the developers, Kheops Studio, had spent some more time expanding the world, the game would have been a few hours longer, and would be a much more enjoyable experience. As it is, it seemed like just when you start getting the hang of things and really starting to get into the story, it abruptly ends.

Our final complaint is that the whole game engine was built upon a point-and-click format. We're in the year 2004, and with all of the technology available to developers they still pump out an occasional point-and-clicker. It was understandable back in the early to mid 90's; it was really the only way to get the graphics you wanted. But now that it's relatively cheap and easy to do something so much better, the point-and-click way of gaming really shouldn't be done anymore. Mina would have been so much more fun to control if she had not been limited to a first-person view with options of moving only to the next available screen. It's only so much fun to walk around an island with limited exploration options. For example, you can't even go up to the ocean on the beach, which turned out to be a big disappointment when you ran across some scuba gear in the granite house. But perhaps that was for the best: after all it wouldn't be very pretty for our hero to be eaten alive by a shark before we had the chance to finish the game.

Return to Mysterious Island was a fun experience while it lasted, but sadly, it didn't go on nearly as long as it could have. If only some more time was put into its development. With a larger game world and a more interactive game engine it could have been made into a classic, just like its inspiration, but sadly it falls short of expectations. Thus the average score has been given: A good play if you're a fan of the adventure/puzzle genre and not hugely critical but definitely not for everyone.