Buy Phantasmagoria

FMV games are an obsolete game genre from the 1990s. They existed to try and bridge the gap between the 16 bit sidescrollers people were used to, and the high detail polygons of the future. They also helped popularize CD drives. Although while FMV games were impressive at the time, they did not age well and are generally derided online due to the lackluster acting and simplistic gameplay.

Enter Phantasmagoria. Phantasmagoria is a very bizarre FMV game (although tame compared to something like Harvester). It was created by Roberta Williams with her company Sierra On-Line. It takes a huge amount of influences from classic Stephen King stories like the Shining although does its own unique spin on things.

In Phantasmagoria, you play as Adrienne Delaney. A writer who moves into a strange house owned by a man with a dark past. The story starts out very slow and relatively dull. With time spent exploring her relationship with her husband and her relatively quirky personality. However the game gets progressively more and more surreal and bizarre as the storyline goes on. It's generally paced similarly to a Stephen King story and keeps your attention really well. It helps that the game was not afraid of controversy and doesn't shy away from scenes involving ♥♥♥♥ and dismemberment.

At the time Phantasmagoria was a relatively simple game to play. Almost the entirety of the game is played using the mouse. This was done to appeal to people who don't normally play video games. But actually really helped the game age better compared to other adventure games at the time. The game also runs in Dosbox so it should run relatively well, barring a few tweaks here and there.

It's a classic 90's game from yesteryear that was not afraid to offend and push the envelope. And it comes highly recommended.

A point and click adventure game, FMV, corny plot and dialogue and some of the worst acting you'll ever see in a video game. What's not to like.

They sure as hell don't make games like this anymore.

i love this game so much i played it all the time too when i was alot younger and im 31 now and still love it alot, such beautiful graphics and etc and its so much fun to play and never gets old its the best old sierra classic game ever made, roberta williams did an amazin job.

Play this game on cold meds

THE BESSTTT. I loved this when i was younger

First of all, make sure you save as often as possible. Half way through the second chapter my cursor decided to only go half way up on the screen, which ultimately made me have to restart the chapter. But thnakfully you can click through the movie sequences.
As for the game itself, this is one that I wanted so badly when I was 15. (Back when it was new) After finally talking my parents into buying it, I was saddened to find that my computer wasn't strong enough! So here I am, 20 years later, finally playing this game. That's what love about Steam though, between this and the internet archive, I can finally go play all those games I couldn't play back in the day.
This game is pretty easy in my opinion, but that's not a horrible thing either. The plot is a bit on the campy side, as well as the action. This game had me laughing more than anything else. The ease of playing this point and click adventure made me give it more attention than a lot of point and click adventures do these days. (I love that they made a come back though). I highly recommend clicking your way through this one.
I'm also looking forward to playing the sequel. That was a game I managed to get working on my system when it was new, but only part way through the first CD. So, certainly loving the dosbox format and not having to go through the trouble of putting in multiple CDs. I don't remember if this first game has multiple though, It's not too easy to recall all the details from 20 years ago. I do find it funny that having a game on multiple CDs was a selling point back then. Between the CD shuffling and messing with the memory sectors of the computer to make a game work was an everyday practice in the 90's.
I'm off to bed, but if I can edit this review, I'll come back with further thoughts. The cursor problem I mentioned at the beginning had literally just happened prior to my writing this review. I don't want anyone turned off of this game because of a little glitch. So, save save save!

If you live in 1995 and FMV mixed with bad CGI impresses you, then by all means buy this game. If you’re still interested, just watch a playthrough on Youtube. Sadly this game is not "so bad it's good", it's just kind of meh. It’s impossible without a guidebook as you’ll be wandering aimlessly for hours. But then again, that’s how games were back then.

its was a great game back then,
but now you prove that your still
at same stage and level of programming
you cant even make a propper mouse function.
not worth a penny, they should give it away...

still a great game after 20 years..

If you have a deep-seated love for cheesy FMV in games, you owe it to yourself to play one of the first and best. Wander around your comically oversized home, talk to upwards of 6 people, visit a wall fish, and inject some of that pure, unfiltered 90s Full Motion Video straight into your veins.

Only issue with this version as far as I can tell is that it doesn't have Steam Overlay, and alt+tabbing out of the game causes it to get stuck in windowed mode.