[h1]An older hidden object title, but one that can still leave you stumped in places[/h1]
As a bit of a seasoned hidden object gamer, I came into this one, a indisputable 'backlog' title, expecting problems. Thankfully my feelings were not justified. It's a solid game, and the achievements are a relaxing collection of story-related un-missable ones, that's sure to put you in a good mood.
Following the 'detective solving a case' theme, I just kind of blundered along solving things and finding things. I love finding things, but I still come away from these experiences wondering why all those bars of gold and crowns and jewellery and mountains of gold coins are still lying on the floor of some cave or basement. Are people really that well off with their retirement funds? No one tries to collect these things? Madness!
Anyway, back on point.
I confess not to have paid much attention to the plot and the jabbering ghosts always getting in the way and wanting things. Not sure how a ghost could stop you from doing anything anyway. I was prepared to walk straight through that scary guard dog regardless of the size of its teeth. Some guy is bad, but we find out they're not bad, it was someone else, idk. The important thing is we get to craft a gargoyle out of a log in four moves. Yes, I'm so fast with a chisel I set the place ablaze. Also, we give a cookie to a hamster. \o/
The art is better than I thought it would be. Some HOG's suffer from shading differences on items you pickup in the mess scenes, making them super easy to find, but I saw no evidence of that here - most scenes have at least one item that is a pain to find, either by partially obscuring the item or by making it the wrong size or too well camouflaged - this last one typically applying to drawings on the side of wood grain walls etc. Some scenes give text clues, others give shapes as clues.
Most scenes are nicely filled out with detail but I think one or two seemed rushed in their design, kind of empty or full of big objects to try to hide it.
There is a good range of puzzles too, some I've never encountered before in a HOG. This might be because you get no clue how to do them until after you click on the (?). Even so, a few of the clues are vague or the puzzles have a minor glitch. I've got a few examples: 1) Everyone knows the cogs puzzle right, where you put all these cogs back in a mechanism and make all the teeth mesh? I couldn't for the life of me get it to register that I did it right. I later looked it up and discovered I had done it all correctly, all the cogs were in the correct places, but the second half of the cogs weren't turning. I switched two cogs around that were both the same size and lo! Suddenly the puzzle is finished.
Much later in the game I stumble on hiccup 2) Genetics puzzles ask for selected numbers and types of symbols, but the chain appears not to care for the actual sequence or how anything connects or branches off.
One element I enjoyed was looking for things in the form of backtracking. First time through, scenes may require you to get things for your current objectives, but for future objectives you don't yet know about, such as statues hands or chess pieces, you can't pick them up yet. This actually makes sense, even if I was MacGyver with infinite pockets. Unless you have a compulsive cleanliness disorder or something. But wait, there's more!
Tools like your shovel and knife are kept after the first use! MINDBLOWN. I'm not completely sure but if the shovel got destroyed after every use the game might have had up to six shovels to find and get disintegrated. Imagine pressing play in steam and having a loading screen for shovels. <ONE MOMENT, LOADING SHOVELS> It's just so nice when people understand the importance of intelligence and how it relates to more skill points at level up.
Anyway, to wrap it up, nice art, a bit bland but there's some pretty rocks and gems, couple of annoying ghosts (that totally ignore social distancing laws) you can un-summon with gifts like wine and food, watch out for zone transitions on the SIDE of the screen (good thing its not a 3D virtual game otherwise you might have to click on yourself to go back which might inadvertently fold the universe in half and create an unstable wormhole), praise the sun for indestructible shovels, and you can squee with delight when you get the cookie cuz you'll know hamster will be next.
You know Ashley is too hot to handle when she finds a gun at the start but doesn't equip it ;O
