国王：北方传奇 Konung: Legend of the North p.268

这些（指混搭游戏玩法）全都源自年轻的游戏设计师们的蠢点子。有些人之前从没做过游戏就会想当然地认为：‘我们既然要做游戏，为什么不什么都做呢？’正是因为我们之前重来没有做过，所以根本没考虑到我们策划内容的规模，制作过程也是异常痛苦。

Those [mixed gameplay genres] were a young game designer's stupidities. Someone who had never made a game before and who thought: ‘Might as well do everything, why wouldn't we do everything?’ That's because we had never done it ourselves so we didn't realise the scale of what we were writing, because we just didn't have the experience. So it was an extremely ambitious game, which was incredibly painful to create
– in totally, totally unreasonable proportions.

David Cage,
《恶灵都市》导演

David Cage,
Omikron's director

这种独特的灵魂转移机制甚至被用来避免“游戏结束”。因为你可以使用其他角色继续游戏，所以死亡并不意味着游戏的结束。事实上，有些角色只能在游戏某些事件中死亡后才能获得。

既然说到了事件，就不得不提玩家在探索城中酒吧时可能会遇到虚拟的 David Bowie 这件事，他会在精心编排的表演中演唱《Survive》和《Something in the Air》等曲目。

与绝妙的音乐一同表现得淋漓尽致的是 David Cage 对电影拍摄方面的热爱，因此游戏的过场动画和人物对话中跨时代地使用了动态摄像机视角，使一切看起来非常“电影化”。

遗憾的是，制作规模如此之大的游戏同时也存在着巨大的缺陷。《恶灵都市》这么多的玩法模式就没有一种是完善的，战斗和射击部分迅速失去新鲜感后变得枯燥无味，而冒险解密的部分又过于简单，至于灵魂转移机制更经不起延展推敲。

This unique soul mechanic is even used to avoid Game Overs. Dying does not mean losing the game, as you can often possess other characters to continue. In fact, there are certain characters that can only be obtained by dying in certain events.

Speaking of events, players exploring the city's many pubs might come across a virtual David Bowie performing in choreographed concerts, singing songs such as Survive and Something in the Air.

Together with great music, David Cage's passion for cinematography is already on full display, as the game's dynamic camera angles used during cutscenes and dialogues feel very “cinematic”, ahead of its time.

Unfortunately, behind such a massive project lie equally large flaws. Omikron has several gameplay modes, but none of them is well-developed. The fighting and shooting sections quickly grow repetitive, while the adventure parts are too simplistic and fail to explore the game's soul-transfer mechanic.

据传《恶灵都市》续作从 2002 年就开始制作，但除了是设定在前作的“100 次轮回”后，其他细节一概不知。

A sequel to Omikron has supposedly been under production since 2002, but few details are know apart from the fact it would be set “100 cycles” after the first game.

尽管很大程度上得益于出色的配音，游戏的演出和文本都非常精彩，但操作和界面却要落后于当时的水准，鼠标仅在第一人称射击模式下能派上用场，大多数情况下只能“坦克式移动”^[2] 以及仅可通过键盘管理背包库存的笨拙操作。

正如 Quantic Dream 工作室作品的一贯特点，《恶灵都市》的故事开头很棒，可到结尾却匪夷所思地变得一团糟，这点更是让玩家对其倍感失望。

因此，《恶灵都市》的市场反响并不强烈。评测者们比起游戏成品更喜欢它的理念。David Cage 对人们（特别是刚接触游戏的人）难以适应这种杂糅的玩法感到十分沮丧，这也是他后来的作品变得简单易上手的关键原因。

总而言之，《恶灵都市》这类由一个满腔热血的制作人将自己钟爱的一切注入其中，从而突破常规的游戏，更与《创世纪 1（Ultima I）》颇为相似。虽然最终成品不够有深度或者浑然一体，却仍不失是一段值得拥有的独特体验。

While the presentation still holds, in part due to the excellent voice acting, the controls and interface are horribly dated. Mouse control is limited to the FPS sections, leaving you with “tank-controls” and a clunky keyboard-driven inventory for most of the game.

In usual Quantic Dream fashion, the story starts out interesting, but eventually becomes an unintelligible mess, adding to the disappointment later in the game.

As such, Omikron's reception was lukewarm, with critics enjoying its concept but not its execution. David Cage was also frustrated by how people had difficulty adapting to the multiple gameplay modes, especially those new to gaming – a critical fact in his subsequent decision to create accessible games.

Overall, Omikron is somewhat akin to Ultima I a passionate developer throwing everything he loves into a game, pushing the boundaries of the medium. While the end result many not be deep or cohesive, it's still a unique experience worth having.

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² 译者注：坦克式移动，tank-controls，常见于早期 3D 游戏中的操作方式。通常以控制游戏人物左右旋转实现在行进中调整方向的目的，例如《生化危机 1（Resident Evil）》。因其运动原理与旧式坦克类似，故因此得名。