Limbo of the Lost Wiki

Limbo of the Lost is a 2D point-and-click PC adventure game released in 2007, notorious for its controversy due to plagiarism.

If you are looking for a walkthrough, there is one available on this wiki.

Retail release[]

Limbo of the Lost received two separate retail releases - one from G2 Games online in Europe in September 2007, and another from Tri Synergy in North America in June 2008. Both releases were extremely limited, making this game in the European and American releases extremely difficult to come by, and quite expensive. There was also a Russian release in March 2008, called "Город потерянных душ".

Plot[]

Benjamin Briggs captain of Mary Celeste

Benjamin Briggs -- Captain of the Mary Celeste

Limbo of the Lost is a point-and-click Graphical adventure game. Players direct the controllable character around the game world by clicking with the computer mouse to interact with objects and characters in the game world.

Limbo follows Captain Benjamin Briggs, the real-life commander of the Mary Celeste. In 1872 the Mary Celeste was discovered drifting, its passengers vanished without a trace. To this day, the fate of Briggs and his crew remains a mystery. The game puts Briggs in Limbo where he has to aid Destiny in a war against Fate.

At the start of the game, none of this is conveyed to the player. The intro movie is actually on the Bonus DVD that comes with the game, and even that does not explain anything beyond showing Briggs' ship sinking to it's watery grave. At the start of the game, the player has The Seal of Sufferance in their inventory.

The actual plot of the game, as explained somewhat by its manual, is as follows:

There are two gods, Fate and Destiny. The two are having a divine wager, and the winner will decide what happens to humanity. Fate wants to rule over them with an iron fist, while Destiny wants them to be free to make their own choices.

Fate creates a thunderstorm that causes Briggs to be thrown overboard, and Destiny saves him by making him land on an abandoned island. On that island, Briggs finds the Temple of Sufferance, housing the Book of Sufferance. The Book is held shut by the Seal of Sufferance. Briggs removes the Seal, thus unleashing the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse. They cast Briggs down into Limbo, and thus set the wager in motion.

Now Briggs must make his way through Limbo and return to the Temple. If he manages to put the Seal back onto the Book, Destiny will win and the humanity will be saved. If he fails, Fate will prevail.

Note that most of the game is spent on just wandering through different locations with no sense of purpose, and the plot only really kicks in during the last chapter, where the Horsemen become the final boss (if you can call it that).

Ending[]

Limbo_of_the_Lost_-_Epic_ending

Limbo of the Lost - Epic ending

The ending to Limbo of the Lost has become infamous for being extremely bizarre. The ending itself depicts a... "very unique" experience.

Gameplay[]

The gameplay in LOTL involves quite a few instances of pixel-hunting for hidden items, as well as highly illogical puzzles, akin to Gabriel Knight 3 with its infamous cat hair puzzle. See the examples below, taken from the full playthrough at rpg.net.

Pixel hunting[]

LOTL commonly requires the player to interact with an object that is so dark on-screen that it cannot be seen. In order to progress, the player must move the cursor back and forth across the screen until they see text pop up that tells them that there is something they can interact with.

In the following example, the player must find an object in this scene.

380 bedroomofDEATH

It turns out to be a very thin piece of wood on the desk to the right.

384 pixelbitch4

Another example of pixel-hunting has the player trying to find something in the following image:

167 dankcave

It turns out to be a torn piece of cloth hiding to the left of the frame.

168 madness

Illogical Puzzles[]

Most of LOTL's puzzles require the player to combine items in their inventory to make new items. The logic of combining these items, however, is questionable. One such combination requires the player to place a worm in a flask of water to create tequila. Another, more complex sequence, is described below:

Step Image Notes
1 228 soul brothers The player must steal a vial with a glowing, green soul in it, called the "Soul of a Warrior". They must replace it with something that looks similar.
2 190 glass vial They find a matching vial, which is, incidentally, green in hue.
3 192 vial water They fill it with water.
4 267 omgwtf It should be noted that water glows like blue paint through the green glass.
5 113 Door number 1 In order to get the water to turn green, the player must mix it with saffron.
6 269 green at last After which it becomes green.

The intended logic is that water is blue and saffron is yellow, blue + yellow = green, thus, saffron + water = green. There are many issues with this:

  • The blue color of water is only apparent in very high quantities and would NOT appear blue in a container as small as a bottle.
  • The bottle is green, so clear water in a green bottle would look green to begin with.
  • Mixing saffron in water results in yellow water.
  • Most people are unaware of what saffron is, let alone its color.

Walkthroughs[]

  • A full walkthrough is available on this wiki.
  • Gameboomers has a walkthrough written entirely in verse.
  • A text-only Let's Play by The Dark Id (with pictures) can be found on the Let's Play Archive.
  • A speedrun that doubles as a walkthrough can be found on YouTube.

Reviews[]

Limbo of the Lost received only a limited release from both G2 Games and Tri Synergy. Few gaming sites would have ever reviewed it had the plagiarism controversy never occurred, and it would have likely disappeared without notice. As it is, there was only one major review for the game before the controversy began, thus there is arguably little in the way of unbiased reviews out there.

Professional[]

Just Adventure reviewed the game first, before any plagiarism was uncovered. Their review is reasonably kind, though somewhat confused as the reviewer writes, "...this became the most complicated review I’ve ever written". He goes on to talk about how the graphics and gameplay are a "mixed bag" and that "All of the chapters feel as though they have been created by different people. This results to some chapters being absolutely excellent, especially 3 and 5, while others are of an inferior level, especially chapter 2". The reviewer goes on to talk about problems such as "extreme pixel-hunting" but ultimately decides that LOTL is "...a good adventure game, fun to play, with a few frustrations here and there, but certainly well worth your time."

Reviews for Limbo of the Lost following the controversy are universally negative. The reviewers primarily cite gameplay defects and not plagiarism for their low scores. A review from Boomtown and a review by U.K. games journalist Richard Cobbett mention defects such as:

  • Interminably long, unskippable dialogue sequences with no player interaction
  • Difficult-to-find items (pixel-hunting)
  • Illogical puzzles
  • Awful voice-acting
  • Poorly-mixed sound (making characters hard to hear)
  • Extremely slow walk speed
  • Uninteresting story
  • Humor that falls flat

GameBoomers Scandal[]

Gameboomers was to publish a review, but before they could do so, things got ugly (taken from a Quarter to Three thread):

"Apparently, the developer has been pretending to be a player of the game on various adventure forums telling everyone how incredible the game is. Then he sent a review copy to one of them, and the reviewer helped out someone who was stuck in it. Then the developer pretending to be a player started ripping into the reviewer for letting hints out, and then posted as himself, the developer, supporting himself pretending to be a player.

Then... they figured out the "player" and the "developer" were the same person by seeing that their IPs were the same... so the developer said that it was a beta tester and posted as a player without his knowledge.

At another forum, the developer tried to do the same thing, got called out, and then the "beta tester" said that he was actually the developer's daughter.

Confused? This is so awesome.

Links to the forum postings if anyone wants to have a laugh:
http://www.gameboomers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=233736&fpart=5
http://justadventure.com/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1196172821/0 (No longer available, even through Wayback Machine)

The players:
FABLE = The developer pretending to be a player, a beta tester, or his own daughter
MSSTUDIOS = The developer responding to himself pretending to be a player, a beta tester or his own daughter."

Community[]

Readers curious for a more in-depth review of the game can view a complete walkthrough of the game at rpg.net.

It is also worth noting that in October, 2007, a customer review of LOTL appeared on amazon.co.uk stating:

5.0 out of 5 stars Cool game, and I have only played the demo!, 10 Oct 2007
By: Simon "sorcerer" (New York) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
Graphics: Wow really good, excellent atmosphere, the main character knocking on the screen to get your attention is brilliant!!

Sound: Music is really good and better than most games, keeps a theme throughout

Movement/Interface: The game flows very well and feels very easy and natural to manipulate, great use of the interface - OUIJA BOARD. Hope this is used again on other games from Majestic.

Puzzles: Mostly Inventory based, but still very good, all keep to the macarbre feel of the game.

NPC'S: The characters in the game are a joy to watch and listen to, with near on perfect lip synching and great closeup views when they talk I could not wait to meet another creature or character.

Overall: Great game that deserves to do well, destined to become a classic of the genre! deffinately on my TO BUY list!All I hope is that there is more to come, a sequel maybe? come on MAJESTIC!!!

This review is believed to have been posted by Steve Bovis himself. The elements that the reviewer refers to as being high points of the game are generally things that other reviewers specifically complained about. These include the Ouija Board (which has a slow animation every time you open it to interact with anything), the inventory puzzles (extremely illogical), character knocking on the screen (pointed out by Richard Cobbett's review as being extremely irritating), character close-up (the player spends half the game looking straight up the nose of the character they're talking to), and lip syncing (near non-existent). In addition, this review was posted before the game came out and it references a "demo" that was never released to the public. Finally, various other customer reviews have popped up since then, the reviewers appear to have never written any other reviews on Amazon, so it is likely that these accounts were created expressly to post this review.

Sequel[]

Limbo_of_the_Lost_-_Ending_part_2

Limbo of the Lost - Ending part 2

A sequel was planned for LOTL. As per the second part of the ending cinematic to LOTL, the title was to be Limbo of the Lost II: Flight to Freedom.

The sequel, originally titled "Limbo 2: Temptations of Tarot" has been "on the drawing board" since 1995, according to an interview with Steve Bovis from The One.

In a post on the Wintermute engine forums, Steve Bovis advertised for a background artist for the sequel - implying that the next game was to have legit art for the backgrounds. Why he didn't do this for the first game is anyone's guess.

The plot of the sequel would center around Flight 19 - a group of bombers that disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle. In The One Amiga magazine, Steve Bovis describes the plot as follows:

"Because Limbo is based from the 5th December 1873, Limbo 2 takes you to the same date only in 1960... er, well, I can't remember the exact year now, but it's when Flight 19 disappeared into the Bermuda Triangle. You take the part of the rescue craft's pilot that also went missing. We're hoping that maybe you'll meet... Elvis? Er, no, Briggs from the first game, and he'll act as a guiding spirit."

Finding a copy[]

Unfortunately, since both G2 Games and Tri-Synergy have pulled all retail copies from store shelves, it is extremely difficult to find Limbo of the Lost for sale. At the time of the controversy, G2 Games still had LOTL available for download on its website for £29.99. Trying to create a user account and download it, however, didn't appear to work. It is still possible to find authentic G2 copies on eBay occasionally, but final auction prices can exceed $200.

The US Tri Synergy version, scheduled for release around June 2008, which comes boxed with the more detailed cover art work, is extremely difficult to find and is more valuable than the G2 version, which was released September 2007 in the UK. Estimated value is hard to speculate due to the lack of data from any previous sales based on the rarity of the US Tri Synergy version. There are also conflicting reports on whether the US version ever made it on to US store shelves.

It is possible to find illegal copies of LOTL and its Bonus DVD readily available via Bittorrent. While downloading it in this fashion is technically illegal, it is unlikely, for obvious reasons, that the publisher or developer will attempt to protect their product.

A playable image of the disc is available for free at Archive.org.

Demo[]

A demo of this game appeared to be available to purchasers of Carte Blanche, another recently released Tri-Synergy game, which mentions on its cover that its purchasers are eligible for a USB pen drive with a demo of Limbo of the Lost in it.

External links[]