Syberia is a classic Euro-adventure game from an era of gaming where the beast that was adventure gaming was mostly asleep in the US, leaving most of the interesting games to come out of Europe. From The Longest Journey to Broken Sword, there is a pedigree of fantastic European adventure games coming out of the late 90s and early 2000s. Syberia certainly belongs in that stable, and our Syberia Remastered review will let you know if this particular re-release is worth all your time and fuss.
What Is Syberia Remastered?
If you’re not already familiar, Syberia is a point-and-click adventure game created by famed Belgian artist Benoît Sokal. It tells the story of a lawyer who is dispatched to a tiny town to oversee the sale of a famous clockwork company. Upon her arrival, she discovers that the original owner has died, and while the town is in mourning, she must go on an adventure to try and discover who owns the company now and if she can get the sale to go through. While it might not sound like the stuff of a fantastical adventure, the town’s penchant for clockwork contraptions and the whimsical atmosphere help to set it apart.
The original game used pre-rendered backgrounds, a la Resident Evil, and mostly tasked you with your standard point and click gameplay of clicking around to interact with objects and people, as well as finding items to use to solve puzzles. A lot of the puzzles are related to the various clockwork devices that were dotted throughout the world, and the pre-rendered visuals gave everything an eerie but mystical vibe. For Syberia Remastered, the visuals have been replaced with “proper” in-game rendered graphics, and now you have a free-moving camera and main character. The puzzles are largely unchanged, however, much to the game’s benefit.
A Magical Adventure, Clunk or No Clunk
It’s a weird truth that a game like Syberia Remastered substantially improves the smoothness and graphical fidelity of the original game while also managing to reduce the charm and personality by an equal amount. The pre-rendered visuals of the original were a clunky workaround necessitated by technical limitations, but they also added a lot to the otherworldly atmosphere that attracted many people to the game. This new version is smooth and infinitely playable in the exact same way as many other modern adventure games, which means it stands out much less. Luckily, Sokal’s design is still fantastic, so the visuals are still a strong point.
The puzzles are still great too, which is perhaps unsurprising since they’re largely unchanged from the original. There’s also an optional “objective” system, which is useful for leading you in the right direction as the lack of pre-chosen camera angles can make certain puzzles harder to find. You also tend to be shown specific puzzle and item locations as you’re having conversations or entering rooms, via the medium of random “cinematic” shots of the stuff that you’re supposed to go and do stuff on, near, or with. These cinematics are great from a purely gameplay perspective but also contribute moderately to the game’s ‘play-by-numbers’ feel in this remastered form.
Controller Enabled
On the plus side, Syberia Remastered features some pretty great controller support. If you’ve ever tried to play a classic point-and-click adventure game with a regular controller, you know how much of a pain it can be. Even in the age of the Steam Deck and Steam controller, having to mess around with mapping and touch-screens is, at best, a massive inconvenience when it comes to a classic point-and-click interface. It’s great that a controller-compatible option is available for these games, even if something feels a little lost in translation.
The more direct form of control also makes exploration a lot more enjoyable, and it’s not like the game’s environments have lost much of their wonder. It’s still a fantastic world to explore, featuring many elements like our own but more than enough unique ones too, even when compared with other contemporary fantasy settings. The clockwork machines are beautiful, and there’s so much joy to be found in re-discovering the various contraptions that make up the game’s various puzzles and rooms.
Graphics and Sound
While it has lost out on overall charm, it’s impossible to call Syberia Remastered ugly…most of the time. The game is still incredibly beautiful, thanks in no small part to the world and character design. Obviously, I’ve already talked about how excellent the intricate clockwork contraptions are, but rendered in a full 3D engine with modern lighting, they do have a glint to them that certainly wasn’t present in the earlier version of the game. That said, you also have to deal with cutscenes from 2002 that have been re-rendered in HD, which is, at best, incredibly jarring.
The music is similarly well-done, though it’s mostly the same music as the original game, albeit with a clearer quality to the sound. While it’s not necessarily a soundtrack that you’ll spend hours outside of the game listening to, it certainly fills the atmospheric void while you’re exploring the world of brass and cogs. Without it or the original composer, Inon Zur, the game would be nowhere near as immersive and nowhere near as whimsical.
The Final Word
Syberia Remastered is an excellent way to experience one of the best classic point and click titles of the early 2000s, especially if you’re planning on using a controller. While it loses some charm thanks to the glitz and glamour of a modern graphical remake, the original world design and puzzles more than make up for the loss, and whether you’re a fan of the original or just planning on playing it for the first time, there are much worse ways to experience this story.
Developer: Microids
Publisher: Microids
Platforms: PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, GeForce Now
Release Date: 6th November 2025
Gaming Respawn’s copy of Syberia Remastered was provided by the publisher.
