Abe's Oddysee
1997 · Platform / Puzzle · PlayStation
Overview
Abe's Oddysee was a cinematic puzzle platformer in which a Mudokon slave named Abe escaped his meat-processing factory captors and returned to rescue his fellow workers. The possession ability — Abe taking control of enemies and using them to solve puzzles — and the GameSpeak system — issuing commands to other Mudokons through vocalisations — created a puzzle game unlike contemporary alternatives.
Deep Dive
Abe's Oddysee was designed by Lorne Lanning and Sherry McKenna at Oddworld Inhabitants and used pre-rendered 2D backgrounds with the character moving in full-motion on a 2D plane. The game's GameSpeak system — a limited vocabulary of calls and commands that Abe could issue — allowed non-verbal communication with NPC characters. The game's rescue mechanic, requiring players to save a quota of Mudokons to achieve the good ending, added a completionist dimension to what was otherwise a linear platform game.
Developer Story
Abe's Oddysee was designed by Lorne Lanning at Oddworld Inhabitants and was the studio's debut game. The concept was ambitious — five games telling a complete story — and the first entry took approximately three years to develop. The game launched in September 1997 in North America.
Did You Know?
- Abe's Oddysee was designed to be the first entry in a five-part series telling the full Oddworld story — only two games in the planned quintet were produced before Oddworld Inhabitants became a publisher rather than developer.
- The GameSpeak system — Abe's vocalisations — was recorded by Lorne Lanning, who provided the voice of Abe throughout the series.
- The game's factory setting — RuptureFarms, a meat processing plant that turns Mudokons into snack food — was designed as an allegorical critique of industrial agriculture.
- Abe's Exoddus, the 1998 follow-up, was produced in less than a year and expanded the GameSpeak and possession mechanics significantly while telling a story that continued immediately from Oddysee.
