Ludography
RHEM cover

2003 · Adventure · Puzzle

RHEM

Rhem is an adventure game in which the player explores a barren, maze-like landscape of water ponds, walkways, and brick buildings with the aid of a partial map. The game has several puzzles involving machines and symbols.

Released
10 May 2003
Platforms
WindowsmacOS
Genres
AdventurePuzzleRacingSimulation
Developers
—
Publishers
Got Game Entertainment
Series
RHEM (computer game series)
Modes
Single-player
Perspective
First person
Themes
ActionMystery
Engine
Adobe Director
Country
Germany
Age ratings
ESRB E

About

RHEM is an adventure game from Knut Müller and Got Game Entertainment. It is distributed as a Macromedia Director file. The player explores a barren, maze-like landscape of water ponds, walkways, and brick buildings with the aid of a partial map. The game has several puzzles involving machines and symbols. There are three sequels, called RHEM 2: The Cave, RHEM 3: The Secret Library and RHEM 4: The Golden Fragments.

RHEM, like Myst, is made up of a series of static images.

›Story

The player enters the city of RHEM on a railway car. The car goes into a dead-end station with a rotatable track. The player is unable to leave because the track is not yet rotated. While the player is on his way to the switch to rotate the station track, a previous prisoner of RHEM beats the player to the switch he was after and leaves in the player's railway car. The player must then wander the city of Rhem in search of a second railway station.

Each of the quarters of the letter is located in a different area not shown on the map provided in the game's package.

Keywords

  • ghosts
  • magic
  • mascot
  • steampunk
  • war
  • multiple endings
  • undead
  • talking animals
  • ogres
  • spider
  • attributes
  • customizable characters

Media

RHEM screenshot 1

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Story

The player enters the city of RHEM on a railway car. The car goes into a dead-end station with a rotatable track. The player is unable to leave because the track is not yet rotated. While the player is on his way to the switch to rotate the station track, a previous prisoner of RHEM beats the player to the switch he was after and leaves in the player's railway car. The player must then wander the city of Rhem in search of a second railway station.

Development

According to Müller, the following development tools are used to develop RHEM

Graphics:

Reception

RHEM received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. Robert Gerbino of GameZone praised its similarity to Myst in terms of its puzzles but criticized the graphics and repetitive gameplay.

Releases by platformdates and regions as published

PlatformReleasedRegions
Windows31 December 2002Worldwide

Editions and related releases

Expanded editions
Rhem I SE: The Mysterious Land
Built on it
Rhem I SE: The Mysterious Land

Games like this

Collections2 collections

Platform libraries

Description adapted from its source, CC BY-SA 4.0.