Apple - Games - Articles - The Omega Stone

By Brad Cook

Many heroes have risked their lives wandering deep into unknown territory to find and bring home ancient relics. Indiana Jones. Lara Croft. And now you, the star of Dreamcatcher Interactive’s Riddle of the Sphinx II: The Omega Stone.

At the end of the first Riddle of the Sphinx game, you and noted archeologist Sir Gil Blythe Geoffreys uncovered the Ark of the Covenant. When you touched its interior, however, you were catapulted several feet through the air and knocked unconscious.

When the story of The Omega Stone opens, Geoffreys informs you that you’ve been out cold for a few days. During that time, he has found and deciphered an ancient scroll that prophesies an impending cataclysmic event. Symbols found on the scroll suggest that it has links to other mysterious sites around the world, including Stonehenge, Easter Island, Devil’s Triangle, and even Atlantis.

The scroll also refers to something called The Omega Stone, which has six discs connected to it. Geoffreys tasks you with finding those discs and solving The Omega Stone’s riddle before it’s too late. He’s certain that you’ll find the clues you need in the places mentioned on the scroll.

Tools of the Trade

Geoffreys also leaves you the services of Humphrey Allen, who can take you where you need to go, whether you’re headed there by helicopter, boat, or RV. Both Allen and Geoffreys are played by actors who were filmed and placed inside computer-generated environments.

The Omega Stone features a Myst-like interface in which you click where you want to go, with the ability to scan 360 degrees around you at each point in your journey. You simply click on objects to examine and take them, and in certain places you can interact with your environment to perform tasks ranging from blowing a hole in the ground to opening a door. When you correctly solve a riddle, in-game animations show you the result, and a gong sound lets you know when you’ve successfully recovered a disc.

Like any adventurer, you have a variety of tools at your disposal. A camera allows you to take pictures of items that you can’t take while memory sticks come loaded with crucial data. A crowbar, grappling hook, shovel and other implements help you access hard-to-reach areas and uncover buried treasures.

Four Discs of Adventure

All the environments in the game were modeled after the real ones down to the texture of the stones and such environmental effects as rain and sun. Many of the locations also contain scholarly archeological texts that reveal not only interesting facts but also vital clues. As in the Myst games, the environment doesn’t provide concrete directions for you to go in. You simply look for indications what you should do next; a scroll might hold the key to figuring out in which order you should press the cobra-shaped pedals found in a chamber inside the Sphinx, for example.

Perhaps we’ve revealed too much, but with four CDs full of mysterious places for you to explore, we can assure you that The Omega Stone has plenty of surprises in store.

Stonehenge. This ancient observatory provides a key to the puzzle.

The Sphinx. Deep inside the mysterious Sphinx you will find a room which contains the first disc.

System Requirements:

Mac OS X version 10.2.6
600MHz PowerPC G3 processor or higher
128MB of RAM (256MB or higher recommended)
12x CD-ROM
Nvidia GeForce 2/ATI Radeon 7500 or better graphics card
1GB of hard drive space
Java Update 1.4.2 or higher

If you liked this game, check out:

Mysterious Places

To help you prepare for your journey, we’ve assembled information about the locations in the game.

Easter Island: Named by Dutch Admiral Roggeveen, who discovered it on Easter Sunday in 1722, Easter Island is home to dozens of statues called Moai and carved by the local Rapa Nui, who supposedly arrived there sometime around 400 AD. Isolated from the rest of the world until Roggeveen stumbled across them, the Rapa Nui carefully carved the enormous statues — the largest weighs over 80 tons — in a quarry and moved them by unknown means to various spots around the island. The heads you see in many photos are actually the tops of the statues; their bodies have been buried by centuries of erosion.
Many of the Moai statues have eye sockets, which archeologists believe were filled with special stones during ceremonies. In 1864, a missionary discovered 100 wooden tablets covered with strange hieroglyphics; some of them are so odd that they remain untranslated. In 1914, a woman named Catherine Rutledge came to the island and interviewed many of the remaining tribal elders, who told her that they knew little about the statues but could relate much about the Birdman ceremonies, which replaced statue carving after their ancestors depleted most of the island’s natural resources.
Remnants of the Birdman ceremonies can be found in bas relief carvings of birdmen on the island’s rocks. The ceremonies consisted of competitions in which contestants would swim through shark-infested waters to one of three islets just offshore and return with an intact bird egg. The one who could do so first would become leader of the island for a year. During her investigation of the elders’ tales, Rutledge discovered secret underground caves.

Chichen Itza: The Mayans, who were apparently masters of mathematics and had an understanding of astronomy, built many pyramids similar to the ones found in Egypt. The one at Chichen Itza is called El Castillo. It has many intriguing features, such as 365 steps that lead to the top and a serpent-like shadow that slithers down them as the sun sets during each vernal equinox. If you stand at the top and talk normally, those on the ground can still hear you.
The Mayan calendar abruptly ends in their year 2012, which equates to 1200 AD on the Western calendar. Their culture originated around 2600 BC and was violent, with many sacrifices to their gods. You’ll find many skulls lying around Chichen Itza; they’re not just there for decoration.
Devil’s Triangle: This body of water is also known as the Bermuda Triangle, where many ships and planes have mysteriously vanished. It contains an underwater road that must have been built by an ancient civilization before the area was submerged by the ever-shifting continents. While you need to visit specific coordinates on the map to find what you’re looking for, try diving into random areas to explore a bit. You’ll find all kinds of interesting things.
Atlantis: The Greek philosopher Plato alluded to this submerged continent in one of his writings. While you don’t visit it during your adventure, it does have ties to several other locations. For example, some believe Atlantis was located in the Devil’s Triangle. And Atlantean architecture is believed to have similarities to both the Egyptian and Mayan pyramids, which suggests that Atlanteans left their doomed continent and populated other areas of the world.

Stonehenge: Few who have studied this mysterious circle of stones seem to agree on its purpose. Theories abound that Stonehenge was built for holding pagan ceremonies. That it was built as a kind of calendar. That it was meant as an observatory for watching the stars. It’s very possible that it was used for all those things, and more, during the centuries since its erection; evidence abounds that parts of it were modified or rebuilt over the years, which implies that different people used it for different things. In the 20th century, it was used by the Ancient Order of Druids for their ceremonies; some claim that druids originally built Stonehenge, but it predates them.
Giza: You start the game in Giza, a suburb of Cairo where the Sphinx is located. It contains a labyrinth of tunnels that contain a few key artifacts, including the first disc. Here’s a hint for finding it: The altar in the chamber uncovered by Geoffreys (which he tells you to explore at the beginning of the game) contains a scroll with an image of the altar and a series of glyphs. Note which glyphs correspond with which cobra head pedals and click them in the proper order to unlock the disc.