The Space Mystery
| The Space Mystery | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer(s) | Mondo |
| Publisher(s) | The LEGO Group |
| Platform(s) | Web browser |
| Release | 5 December 1996[1] |
| Genre(s) | Adventure game |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Exploriens – The Space Mystery was an online point-and-click adventure game based on the LEGO Exploriens product line. Players were tasked with solving a mystery aboards an Explorien spaceship. While the gameplay was single-player, players could chat with each other and work together to solve puzzles in the game.
The Space Mystery was developed by Danish web developer Mondo and released in December 1996. It was the second game released on LEGO.com, and was also the first LEGO game released in multiple languages and the first time users could communicate with each other on the LEGO site. The game remained online through the first half of 1997, during which over a million users played it. It was a finalist in two different advertising awards.
As a LEGO Surfer Club account was required to play The Space Mystery, it was not archived on the Wayback Machine and is currently lost media.
Gameplay
The Space Mystery was a point-and-click adventure game played from a first-person perspective. The player navigated through pre-rendered environments using arrows on the sides of the game window.[2] In the game's backstory, the Explorien Space Lab at the planet Mondo II has lost contact with its SatCraft 001 spaceships. The player takes the role of a Junior Explorien tasked with going into space and solving the mystery onboard one of the spaceships.[3] New players were asked to keep what happened in the game a secret, and were told that there was no use for Exploriens who were not willing to fully accept the mission if they did not check the checkbox agreeing to this.[4] The player needed to collect items that could be used to solve puzzles; for instance, one puzzle needed the player to find "orthochromatic spectacles" to read a scrambled message in an image projected by an "ILTAR projection machine".[5] Players could communicate with each other through an in-game chat function, available in four languages, and were encouraged to do so to help each other overcome problems and solve the game's mystery.[6][2]
Development and release
The Space Mystery was developed by Mondo A/S,[2] a Danish web development company that also designed the original LEGO.com website.[7] Mondo produced the game's computer-generated imagery in their graphic production facilities and programmed it in their "$HTML" system, creating what they claimed was "some of the web's first true game interaction." Player progress was tracked and saved using "Mondo Modules".[2] The game's appearance, navigation, and focus on player interaction were based on thematic role-playing.[2] It was designed for players of all ages, though it was considered to be potentially difficult for younger players.[6]
The Space Mystery was first made available on LEGO.com on 5 December 1996.[1] Mondo employees Soren Beck[8] and "Laust" advertised it on rec.toys.lego a few hours after its release.[9] The LEGO Group officially announced it in a press release on 12 December.[6] The announcement referred to it as an "advertainment" game, as it had been made to advertise the Exploriens LEGO sets that had released earlier in 1996.[6][2]
The game and its chat servers were available in Danish, English, German, and Spanish; the previous LEGO web game, Treasure Hunt in the Pirate Sea, had only been available in English.[6] Players were required to create a LEGO Surfer Club account to play the game, if they did not have one already.[3] During its time online, over one million participants played the game.[2] On 3 May 1997, The Space Mystery was apparently removed from the Play page of LEGO.com.[10] At some point between then and June, a notice was added to the game's index page stating that it had been temporarily disabled.[11] According to Mondo, the game was online for six months.[2]
The Space Mystery was an Interactive finalist in the 1997 Cresta Internatinal Advertising Awards[12] and a Print finalist in the 1997 Epica Awards.[13][14]
Additional images
Screenshots
Additional screenshots of the game from the Wayback Machine and from Mondo's website. These are the only known images of the game remaining at this time.
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Landing page with language selection
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A SatCraft 001
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Exploring a room
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Awards
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Cresta 1997 finalist award
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Epica 1997 finalist award
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Soren Beck (1996-12-05). "NEW GAME ON WWW.LEGO.COM". Newsgroup: rec.toys.lego. Usenet: [email protected]. Archived from the original on 2024-06-21.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 "LEGO Explorien Space Mystery Game". MONDO. 27 February 1998. Archived from the original on 1998-07-01.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Mondo (1996). "LEGO Exploriens - The Space Mystery (English LEGO Surferclub signup)". LEGO World Wide Web Site. The LEGO Group. Archived from the original on 1997-01-10.
- ↑ Eileen Keeney (1996-12-13). "Re: Exploriens Game". Newsgroup: rec.toys.lego. Usenet: [email protected]. Archived from the original on 2024-06-24.
- ↑ Camiel Rouweler (1996-12-09). "Orthochromatic glasses in LEGO web game". Newsgroup: rec.toys.lego. Usenet: ????. Archived from the original on 2024-06-25.
{{cite newsgroup}}: Check|message-id=value (help) - ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 Nipper, Mads (December 12, 1996). "Space-travel game on the Internet". LEGO World Wide Web Press Info. The LEGO Group. Archived from the original on 1997-01-10.
- ↑ "MODNO A/S - Internetløsninger". 18 April 1996. Archived from the original on 1996-11-11.
- ↑ "Experience – Soren Beck Jensen". LinkedIn.
Mondo A/S – Nov 1994-Jun 1998, 3 yrs 8 mos – First employee in the company. Started as HTML slave and was involved in many projects. Helped develop MondoSearch and give birth to Mondosoft.
- ↑ Jeff Findley (1996-12-10). "Re: NEW GAME ON WWW.LEGO.COM". Newsgroup: rec.toys.lego. Usenet: [email protected]. Archived from the original on 2024-06-22.
- ↑ "LEGO Internet Games". LEGO World Wide Web Site. The LEGO Group. May 3, 1997. Archived from the original on 1997-06-15.
- ↑ "LEGO: Exploriens - The Space Mystery". LEGO World Wide Web Site. The LEGO Group. Archived from the original on 1997-06-15.
This game has been temporarily disabled.
- ↑ Ross, Nancy (1997). "Cresta International Advertising Awards 1997". MONDO. Archived from the original on 1998-07-01.
- ↑ Weill, Alain (1997). "Epica Finaliste 1997". MONDO. Archived from the original on 1998-07-01.
- ↑ "Finalists by Country - 1997". Epica. Archived from the original on 1998-12-03.
Denmark – Print Finalists – Mondo (Copenhagen) – Lego Explorien, Online – Internet Game, www.game.mondo.dk
