The Dig

The Dig is the classic LucasArts adventure conceived by Sean Clark in collaboration with filmmaker Steven Spielberg, with dialogue contributed by award-winning sci-fi writer Orson Scott Card and special effects by Industrial Light & Magic. Robert Patrick of T2 voices the protagonist Boston Low, an experienced NASA veteran called in to handle an asteroid the size of a small moon on a crash course with Earth.

The setup is the easy part. Once Low's team — also including award-winning journalist Maggie Robbins and internationally renowned geologist Ludger Brink — successfully nukes the asteroid into safe orbit, a routine examination of its rocky surface reveals that the asteroid isn't what it appears to be. The three astronauts unwittingly trigger a mechanism that transforms it into a crystal-like spacecraft, hurtling them across the galaxy to a desolate planet Brink names Cocytus, after the ninth circle of Hell in Dante's Inferno.

The bleak landscape was clearly once home to a highly evolved civilization, with remnants of sophisticated architecture, advanced technology and intricate underground tunnels — but no Cocytans remain. The campaign covers nearly 200 locations and hundreds of puzzles as the team works out who lived here, what happened to them, why apparitions appear from time to time, and how to return home. The alluring Wagnerian musical score sets the epic tone for what is one of the most ambitious adventure-game stories ever attempted, equally about puzzle solving and about the philosophical weight of confronting the unknown.