Eyewitness Virtual Reality: Earth Quest

Eyewitness Virtual Reality: Earth Quest is an educational video game made for the Eyewitness Virtual Reality Series, by DK Multimedia and released for Windows in 1997. Although its name does not correspond to any episode from the Eyewitness television series, the introduction is from Volcano and the game also incorporates elements from Rock and Mineral.

## Setting

This game is set in a version of the Eyewitness Museum completely unlike that in the programmes. Not only is it darkly lit with a sandy floor and rocky walls to make it appear as if the museum is underground, but the museum is not shaped in the standard eye shape, instead being a central room with just three rooms that branch off from it.

## Sections

On arriving in the game, a map of the Eyewitness Museum is shown for the game. The option is given here to either go on a guided tour, create your own tour or roam the museum freely. The main sections of the museum are:

* Centre atrium – Earth Gallery
* Top room – Mining
* Right room – Shaping the Earth
* Left room – Violent Earth
* Bottom room – Lobby and Store

### Earth Gallery

At the centre of the Earth Gallery is the Earth Builder, a game in which the player starts with a molten planet core and has to build up their planet by successfully answering questions about geology, as well as collecting samples of different minerals. Once the Earth Builder is complete, it opens a map that allows the user to see how the continents have split apart (this is taken directly from Eyewitness Dinosaur Hunter).

Around the edge of the Earth Gallery are displays about sedimentary, metamorphic, igneous and extra-terrestrial rocks, carbonates, phosphates, cilicates, sulfates, oxides, hemides, native elements and gems.

### Mining

The mining section has several minerals around the entrance, which need to be collected to complete the Earth Builder. Once inside, a globe unfolds to show where in the world different elements are mined from. Other displays look at what mining is and how it is carried out.

### Shaping the Earth

The entrance of Shaping the Earth also has several collectable minerals arranged around it. On going through the doorway, the player is taken outside in an area overlooking a mountain. Here, there is information about the origins of the Earth and the planet’s history and also information about how Earth’s different environments are shaped.

### Violent Earth

As with the other rooms, Violent Earth has collectable minerals around the entrance. On going through the door, the player is taken outside to a lava flow coming down from a volcano. This section includes videos of volcanic effects, a volcano cross-section, a game that allows the player to build a volcano which has different volumes, viscosity and gas content of lava and can also be of different volcano types before it is allowed to erupt, a map where volcanoes and earthquakes are shown, videos of earthquake effects, information about seismic waves and a game that allows players to create their own earthquakes before testing its effects on a town.

### Store

Located next to the museum’s exit, the Store contains several things that can be printed out for use at home including stationery, postcards, envelopes, greetings cards, writing paper, labels and 3D gems that can be cut out and assembled at home, as well as a poster rack and images to use as screensavers.