ER (2005)

"Suffers from something beyond the developers' control"

Introduction

When I first heard about an ER computer game, I was quite excited. I really love the television series (though I have to admit that the more recent seasons are disappointing), and I was curious to see how they would manage to bring it to the PC. Because of bad reviews on the Internet (and screenshots that are not very glamorous), I refrained from buying it until recently. Overall, it's not a bad game (at least not as bad as the gamespot review makes it look like). In the end, while it does suffer from some gameplay problems, I do not think that the developers are to blame for the average quality of the game.

Gameplay 6

From the moment you see a screenshot of ER, the first thing that probably came to your mind is : The Sims. Because yes, the game looks a lot like the sims. You basically control a doctor; an intern of Cook County's General Hospital's ER. The game is divided into episodes (with titles similar to the ones in the TV series), and each episode consists of a 48 hours shift (which is about an hour of play time).

The general layout of the ER is said to be exactly the same as in the TV series. It is in fact very easy to see the similarities between game and show. Moving around can be unsettling at the start. Fortunately, the game provides you with a map on your screen, and you can click on the different rooms to make your character move to that spot.

When starting a new game, you must first create your doctor. You may choose from a rather limited selection of heads, but you can also choose skin, hair, eyes and scrubs colours. You can then assign some personality points, each aspect governing specific skills.

Your doctor has three basic needs, akin to those of The Sims. Energy is determined both by hunger and sleep. You can eat at the cafeteria (strangely enough, there is no one at the cash machine and you doctor will still go there and "pay") and rest in the doctors' lounge. Hygiene can be raised by washing your hands or taking a shower. Finally, composure can be improved by socialising or taking a shower. Keeping your needs up will help your skills.

And we come to skills. There are six of them. General Surgery, Neurosurgery, Cardiology, Toxicology, Paediatrics and Oncology. These skills are governed by the personality you chose when you created your doctor. Skills are raised through practice and by using “experience stars” which you earn by treating patients.

Occasionally, special events will happen. These events will require you to treat specific patients (which usually have more complicated problems) in a specific amount of time. These events also aid the comical relief of the game.

So far so good. Now we will see the downsides.

First, there's the interaction between your doctor and the various non-player characters. They have obviously tried to do something like in The Sims, but by pushing it to another level. As such, when talking with someone, you can choose which topics to talk about, like saying if you like travelling or not, or if you like Doctor X or Y. It is too superficial. Advanced interactions that are present in other games are missing. But then, ER is about treating patients, right? Wrong. What made the show famous is the interactions between the doctors, nurses, technicians and patients. This is not developed well enough in this game.

The fact remains, however, that you have to “treat” patients in an ER. In the game, treating a patient is basically to click on him or her, cross your fingers, and hope that you can heal him/her. If the case gets more serious, give it a right click and pass it to Dr Carter who seems to be able to handle everything.

This is basically the heart of the problem : the game does not really represent the TV show. While the developers could have done something about the social side, it would have been very hard, nearly impossible, to create a game that makes you heal people while still being accessible to everyone.

Video 6

The graphics look a lot like those from The Sims 1. The problem is that The Sims 2 has been out for more than a year. If you cannot do the math, lets just say that the graphics are kind of outdated. However, lets not forget that ER does not enter in the “full game” category, meaning that it's cheaper, simpler, and shorter than “real” retail games. Considering this, the bad graphics can be excused.

However, there are things that could have been easily improved. For example, patients who have not been diagnosed have an ugly grey border around them. I cannot believe that we still see such tings in 2005's games. Why not make it a small coloured circle around the patient's feet? Or a simple coloured dot over the patient's head? The different skins and models of the characters could also have been improved.

Audio 9

I must say that I quite like the audio part of the game. Music is generally nice and appropriate to the situation, and sound effects are well used (it is especially nice to hear the alarm clock when you wake up). Voice acting is obviously the strong part of the sounds, since some of the show's actors have been drafted for the job. And they do it well.

Story N/A

It would be very hard to rate the story, simply because there's no real story. You heal people, and work your way through those special events. That's not enough to have the game qualify in the story department though.

Replay Value 7

By itself, the game does not have a really good replay value. It will always be the same episodes. I did give a 7 though because it is a really nice time killer (if you have time to kill, that is). What I am saying is that you might not feel the urge to play the game, but if you do fire it up, you'll probably end up playing a bit; there's just something in being a doctor and walking around the ER.

Conclusion

Overall, I guess I would normally give the game a score of 6. I instead give it a 7 because this is a special case : the designers took more than they can chew. The ER TV show is about 2 things : social aspect between the personnel of the hospital and doctors, technicians and nurses treating patients. A social game has been successfully developed in The Sims series. ER does not bring anything new, and does not really improve the genre. The other aspect? I say it is impossible to simulate a doctor's job in a computer game.

If the game was centred on the social side, it could have been more of a success. But the real problem is far from design problems; it's right at the start. There is a reason why The Sims games do not let you control your sims at work : it is nearly impossible to simulate a job (right impossible in a doctor's case).

I would only recommend this game to die-hard fans of the TV show. Casual players will simply not find enough elements here to justify a buy.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/11/06