The Space Bar

Moby ID: 2909
Windows Specs
Buy on Windows
$9.99 new on Steam

Description official descriptions

Armpit VI is a mining planet rich in ore known as Uptite, which can be refined into the very valuable Upshot. The planet is owned by a corporation named Amalgamated Vacuum, which runs its own Security Force. Alias Node is a member of AVSF, and also the only human on the planet. One night, he and his partner Maksh nearly witness the assassination of a fellow officer during an investigation of a break-in. The trace leads to the local bar, The Thirsty Tentacle. Unfortunately, the killer appears to be a shape-shifter capable of assuming the likeness of any of the multiple aliens in the bar. To make matters even worse, Maksh has been abducted. Alias Node has only a few hours to find the criminal before he escapes on a space shuttle.

The Space Bar is a humorous puzzle-solving adventure game. Navigation is done by moving between pre-rendered backgrounds, which can be viewed from different angles using full camera rotation. Many areas and objects can be zoomed on and interacted with in a fairly detailed fashion via context-sensitive menus. Conversations with the characters contain recurrent commands allowing the player to order them to perform actions, ask about various topics, as well as assume different attitudes. Following the tradition of older text-based adventures, each action advances the game's clock by an equivalent of a minute. Certain events will occur and characters would appear depending on the game's internal time. There is an overall time limit of several in-game hours.

Alias Node possesses a unique ability known as Empathy-Telepathy ("emp-tel"), which allows him to enter the worlds of several alien bar patrons and control them there. Each such segment plays as a self-sufficient adventure game on a smaller scale, with inventory-based, logic, and time-based puzzles. Controllable aliens include a shady character in conflict with the authorities, a teenage tree-like creature "rooted" by her mother, a robot specializing in alien sports, and others. Their gameplay may differ as well - for example, one of the aliens can use his tail for interaction; the insect-like bartender sees the world through his many eyes, etc. Most of the segments also involve unique application of local lore and rules, reading various documents for clues, and so on.

Once an emp-tel segment has been solved, crucial information is obtained, bringing the protagonist closer to the goal of his investigation. It is possible to tackle those sections in any order, but all of them must be eventually completed. In the bar itself, as well as in the alien worlds, the player has access to a map at all times. Alias Node's log contains general information about the aliens and the ongoing investigation and lists collected clues.

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Credits (Windows version)

147 People (124 developers, 23 thanks) · View all

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Interactive Screenplay
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[ full credits ]

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 78% (based on 14 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.2 out of 5 (based on 10 ratings with 1 reviews)

Intriguing, imaginative and one of a kind!

The Good
I really liked this game so I'm very surprised at its low ratings. It is so different from the usual point-and-click adventure games I'm used to but still retain all the crucial elements with a LOT of added innovations.

You play as Alias Node, a police officer. While going to the Thirsty Tentacles to make an investigation incognito, your partner Maksh, who has given you more than an arm and a leg in the past is captured by a Shape-Shifter and you must find him before time runs out. To do that, you will have talk to different suspects in the bar and use your special Empathy-Telepathy (emp-tel) ability to figure out the real identity of the Shape-Shifter.

This game is all done in a first-person perspective. This is very interesting because when Alias uses his emp-tel powers, he will dig into the suspect's memory and "become" them. That means you will see the world, the suspect's world, in their eyes. I thought that's one of the most fascinating feature of the game because of the different aliens you get to play get to be exposed to different views and have access to different abilities.

Some of the characters you get to interactive with/as is an alien who lives in a jar and needs a bigger, dumber alien to do things for him and a tree-like alien trying to "drop" her first fruit.

The graphics are great and the controls are very simple to use, even when they look different for each character you play as. .

Besides the side-missions your main focus is to solve the mystery and save your friend. Every now and then you will receive tips from Maksh and your captain and also threats from the Shape-Shifter. Remember, you are under a time limit so you better make your every move count!

The Bad
I've never been a big fan of time-limits and this game is full of them.

There's a time-limit overall for you to save Maksh and there are time-limits within each individual flashbacks. I think with a game that offers such rich characters, backgrounds and environments, the player should be allowed to explore everything as they please without worrying of making too many moves and ending the game too abruptly.

I guess one way to counter that is to make a LOT of saved games so you can keep going back and trying different things until you are ready to move on in the story.

The Bottom Line
This game is made by Steve Meretzky who is accredited to other classics like The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and Leather Goddesses of Phobos so you can expect similar the same kind of humour and quality.

Windows · by monkeyislandgirl (8627) · 2005

Trivia

Ron Cobb, the artist who designed the aliens in this game, also designed the aliens who drank at the Mos Eisley cantina in Star Wars.

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  • MobyGames ID: 2909
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Adam Baratz.

Macintosh added by Terok Nor.

Additional contributors: Jeanne.

Game added January 4, 2001. Last modified December 2, 2023.