The death of David Bowie left the world in mourning at the start of the week. Regardless of what you thought of his musical stylings, it’s hard to ignore the impact he had across the entire spectrum of entertainment mediums. The master of reinvention was not only an inspiration to others, but he was often on point in terms of upcoming trends. For example, in an interview back in 1999 he predicted how the internet would grow and transform with eerie accuracy.
If anything, it only further proves that Labyrinth was most likely a documentary, and that he really was a Goblin King with superpowers.
Anyway, I digress. The reason I bring Bowie up on DO is that back in 1999 he featured in an adventure game called Omikron: The Nomad Soul. It was the first game from developer Quantic Dream (of Fahrenheit, Heavy Rain, and Beyond: Two Souls fame) and it featured one of the first 3D open worlds I ever explored. I remember being absolutely blown away by the atmosphere and scale of it all, not to mention running across one of Bowie’s dopplegangers in the game, the lead singer of a futuristic band called The Dreamers.
As with all of David Cage’s stuff, it was an absolutely bonkers affair. That said, it’s still one of my favourite games despite the clunkiness of the controls, and it’s largely in part thanks to Bowie’s contributions in both the soundtrack and as a voice actor. It’s something you can experience for yourself, as Square Enix has decided to give the PC version of the game away for absolutely free until January 22nd. European gamers can just head to the Square Enix EU store and grab it, but US gamers will need to use to code ‘omikron’ at the checkout of the Square Enix US store to ensure the cost is zero. Both stores will grant you a Steam code for you to add to your already huge backlog library of games.