Seaman

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CNET editors' rating: 3.0 stars Good
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Product summary

Visual issues aside, though, Seaman is a good game, provided you don't burn yourself out on it.

Specifications: Genre: Games - simulation; Context: Realistic See full specs

Gamespot editors' review

Reviewed by: Frank Provo
Reviewed on: 08/08/2000
Updated on:05/17/2006
Released on: 08/09/2000

What do baseball, politics, reproduction, dating, movies, music, television, gangster rap, and pharaohs have in common? Not a darn thing, except for all being integral parts of Sega's virtual pet simulation, Seaman. "That's Sea-man, skin puppet." Combining the rigors of pet care with the novelty of voice recognition, Seaman is sure to be a game that elicits the gamut of controversy, praise, and contempt.

The game starts innocently enough: Pop in the microphone, load the disc, and listen to Leonard Nimoy's deadpan introduction. From there, you're presented with three things: an aquarium, a shell, and an egg. You use the D-pad to improve the temperature and air quality, and then you wait. Eventually, eight tiny monocular creatures will spew forth from the egg, only to be devoured by the squidlike creature that lives in the shell. Soon, however, the squid is ripped to shreds from the inside and, in a life-giving act of revenge, your gill-men are born. Sound twisted? It gets better.

For the next few hours, the humanoid-faced gill-men will continue to grow, exhibiting speech patterns akin to human "baby talk." Once they start uttering familiar syllables, you're supposed to use the A button to activate the microphone and talk to them, which gets you into the meat of the game: conversation. Nothing much will come of it initially, usually just requests for food or environmental needs, but later on, as the gill-men weed out their numbers and gain intelligence, they'll take an interest in you. First, they'll ask about your birthday, then how your family is doing, and - as the weeks progress - the state of politics in a two-party, republic-style system of government. Between each visit, Spock, er... Mr. Nimoy will summarize the prior visit's highlights and even give you hints on how to better care for your Seamen.

While the speech recognition is far from perfect, it's constantly impressive to witness just how much "Poddy" (as I came to know the last remaining Seaman) could understand. If I greeted him with "'Sup?" he'd respond with "Word." Amusingly, "PlayStation" yields "Mmm, that name sounds familiar." The speech recognition isn't without its flaws, however, in that some words aren't recognized as easily as others, forcing you to sit through many repeats of Seaman soliloquy before you get another crack at pronouncing "Rastafarian." After five attempts at getting Poddy to understand "Vermont," this reviewer nearly jumped out the window.

See more CNET content tagged:: conversation,; Sega Corp.,; speech recognition,; America,; microphone

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