In August we visited such far-flung locations as the Bermuda Triangle and Davy Jones’s Locker, travelling via flying machine, enchanted portals, and even magical soup. We rescued children trapped by malicious entities, escaped an asylum intent on lobotomizing us (but should we have?), and finally solved the century-old cold case of Jack the Ripper. But hey, it’s all in a month’s work of casual adventuring, and we lived to tell the tale, no matter how grim some of our adventures may have been. It all adds up to another sea of choices, so read on for the latest on all the top hidden object and lite adventures available. (Note: Age of Enigma: The Secret of the Sixth Ghost will be getting a full review of its own in the coming weeks, so it isn’t included here.)

Page 1: Hidden Expedition: The Uncharted Islands, Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom
Page 2: Grim Tales: The Bride, Redemption Cemetery: Children’s Plight
Page 3: Twisted Lands: Insomniac, Sonya
Page 4: Written Legends: Nightmare at Sea, The Secrets of Arcelia Island
Page 5: Lost Souls: Enchanted Paintings, Mystery Murders: Jack the Ripper
Page 6: Sphera: The Inner Journey, Spirit Soup: The Queensbury Curse

Hidden Expedition: The Uncharted Islands
by Jack Allin

Call off the search party for the latest installment of the Hidden Expedition series. After leaving players in a cliffhanging lurch at the end of Devil’s Triangle, it was starting to look like Big Fish’s casual adventure series was going to be the latest victim of the Bermuda phenomenon. But now The Uncharted Islands has emerged at last, completing the journey begun last time while offering a fairly entertaining hidden object adventure in its own right. You really shouldn’t start with this game first, but returning players will find more of what they liked before in the varied item hunts, unique puzzle presentation, and familiar yet slightly surreal environs that are not only trapped in time, but unlike any other found on Earth.

The game picks up right where the last left off, as instead of escaping to freedom you crash land again in the Bermuda island chain hidden from the world. Your memory hazy from the crash, you’re met by a woman named Kathy, who tells you that everyone is in danger and fills you in on the details so far. It’s an admirable attempt to bring new players up to speed and serves sufficiently for the basics, but without prior experience you’re likely to feel a little lost as characters like Gideon the scientist and Undertow the immature pirate are introduced, not to mention the many references to Leonardo Da Vinci and bizarre steampunk inventions like the “Mechanized Mona”. The plot itself isn’t all that complicated, however. Undertow leaves childish notes and warnings behind, taunting you of his intention to take over the islands and destroy the power node that keeps the islands protected. Why you actually want to prevent the latter isn’t clear, but your task is simple: follow Undertow and sabotage his Dynamo Gang’s efforts along the way.

Standing in your path is an interesting mix of obstacles, requiring you to repair a hamster-powered rocketship, mix grog, slingshot a crow’s nest lookout, and disable a giant fish-shaped submarine, along with the relatively more mundane canal draining and water wheel repairs. There are numerous puzzles to solve to accomplish your tasks, most of which have at least been dressed up to feel organic, though they’re ultimately still fairly standard fare. Opening a dam may involve coloured chickens and egg nests, but it’s still a sequence puzzle at heart. From sliders, pipes, and grid challenges to more complex symbol-matching and pattern identification puzzles, there’s a fair bit of challenge to be overcome, sometimes more than once in a row (a puzzle practice that should be forever outlawed). Part of the difficulty is due to the poor instructions and hint system. Each standalone puzzle has a full set of directions, but they’re often multi-stage obstacles and the instructions quickly begin to feel vague and unhelpful, especially since you can’t view them at the same time as the puzzle. “Hints” in the main environments, meanwhile, do little more than point you to the nearest puzzle, which you’ll likely already know. Hotspots on the game’s easier setting are highlighted by default, but exits are not, and these are often far more difficult to find than interactive items to collect.

Hidden object hunts are a regular part of The Uncharted Islands, but they’re far more varied than in most casual games. There are the usual lists of random clutter, a couple of which repeat while one screen scrolls side to side, introduced without warning out of the blue. But some searches involve finding complete sets of items and others require finding related pairs of items. Still others are layered item hunts that serve as hyper-streamlined inventory sequences: find a few items, use those to affect the screen in some way, opening up a new set of items to gather. Only working your way through five or six such mini-levels will you reach your ultimate goal. It’s a welcome change of pace from both the main adventuring and straightforward items searches, though it’s hindered by a lack of useful feedback, which is especially damaging because hotspots only become active when the game deems them necessary, even if there’s no obvious reason to wait.

The islands are interesting places to explore, though you’ll make a cursory pass through most of them, as there isn’t much interaction offered. You’ll pass by an old river boat and ascend a crashed “treeplane” at night, and visit an art studio in a flooded town in sunny, broad daylight. You’ll encounter some common creatures like crocodiles and others that remind you that you’re truly wandering uncharted islands, like a (fortunately peaceful) eight-legged amphibian. Much of your time will be spent underwater, however, as you’ll don a diving suit (once acquired) for a little deep sea roaming through poisonous blowfish-infested waters. The artwork is excellent, with plenty of ambient touches like rainfall, swimming fish, and lovely waterfalls enhancing the scenery. Sound is appropriately muted underwater, while offering a range of jungle and weather effects above ground. The musical soundtrack provides a pleasant backdrop, though it’s not particularly evocative of a place, and there is no voice acting at all, which is a surprise given the number of supporting characters who make a brief appearance, from a young boy to a half-man/half-sea creature.

The main adventure is fairly substantial, providing nearly four hours of gameplay and a fully-resolved ending this time around. The bonus chapter in the Collector’s Edition is quite disappointing, however, particular for those who played Devil’s Triangle back in the day. Returning players will find themselves back aboard their old submersible, still broken down and needing repair through additional puzzles like repetitive memorized pattern tracing, valve rotation, and even a short maze. The ending is completely anti-climactic, emphasizing the safe return of the bio-coil, which doesn’t even play a relevant part in this game. There are the usual other extras, and the strategy guide may come in handy in lieu of the wretched hint system, but for the most part you’d be much better off with the regular version of the game. It’s a step back from its predecessor in terms of originality, but those who played the last game certainly won’t want to miss The Uncharted Islands for its intriguing locales and enjoyable blend of puzzles and lite adventuring, though anyone new to the series is better off going back and getting themselves lost first before working their way back out of Bermuda.

Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom
by Jack Allin

After drowsily poking around her dreamless castle and delving an accursed fairy forest in Boomzap’s first two Awakening games, Princess Sophia’s search for her lost people really makes tracks in Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom. And I mean that literally, as you’ll need to board a train for the first leg of your journey before taking flight via a makeshift flying machine with your fire-breathing, pocket-sized dragon and owl guide in tow. There’s much to do on the ground in between, however, as the third installment is packed once again with nearly wall-to-wall puzzles, plus a few varied hidden object tasks lightly sprinkled in for good measure.

While many casual games are heavy-handed in their HOG searches, here they appear quite infrequently and are often so disguised you won’t even recognize them as such. Sure, there’s the odd standard list of partially-interactive items to scavenge, but you’ll also solve riddles to identify pairs, spot unique symbols in a sea of uniformity, identify irregularities, replace items back into their environments, and locate landmarks through a telescope. The highlighted interactive items aren’t always reliable, but no screens are ever repeated or triggered unannounced, and overall the item hunts offer a refreshing mix of assignments throughout. ALL hidden object adventures should take a page from Boomzap’s design book in this regard for a little more creative diversity.

The lack of repetition doesn’t extend completely through the puzzles, unfortunately. To be fair, that’s at least in part because of the sheer number of puzzles available, many of them both clever and unique. Quite a few involve matching colours, symbols, numbers, patterns, and themes in a myriad of ways, but there are plenty of standard tropes as well, from jigsaws to ring rotators to tile swaps. Some are so easy they can be completed in mere seconds, like mixing paints, organizing a puppet show, or arranging a moon phase sequence, while other multi-stage challenges are very difficult given the vague instructions you’re provided. There are a number of minigames to play, from “Goblinjong” (which plays exactly like its near-namesake) to Match-3 variations, a few quizzes to successfully answer, and even a couple mazes to navigate once you’ve pieced together the necessary clues. A few activities include an element of timing as you click valve gauges and lock tumblers, and there a couple of finicky line-tracing exercises, but these are very simple and you can skip them if necessary.

If this sounds like a rich smorgasbord of casual gameplay, that’s because it is… and then the repeats begin. Not everything, but you’ll face the same (but increasingly difficult) pipes puzzles, tangrams, and overlapping strand challenges far too often for comfort, sometimes in a row. It’s a shame the game falls into this trap, as at times it brings the adventure to a grinding halt. It’s a rather slow-moving journey to begin with, as you move your way through a snow-covered goblin town to a gnome-inhabited fungal forest and back. You’ll pick up various items along the way, many to complete sets such as gems, picture scraps, and mushroom spores, while your dragon pal helps out with a few timely sparks (though alas, he’s too small for any large-scale melting of a frozen land). You’ll also need to collect coins to purchase items from a shady-looking peddler who appears periodically and always seems to have exactly what you need. Apart from the text-based hint system, that’s all the help you’re going to get, as the newly-crowned goblin king has declared war on humans, while the gnomes require you to complete three trials in order to prove your worthiness of their Oracle’s help.

Given the possibilities of its fantasy setting, this game is surprisingly bland-looking for significant chunks. No offense to goblins, but their kingdom is DULL. A combination of snow and brick and broken-down machinery makes for an uninspiring backdrop. The gnomes have a much better decorator, as their forest is dreamlike in its purple/blue hues and mushroom-lined caves that are far more visually appealing. The epilogue also has some beautiful mountain path scenery done in gentle pastels, though much of the time will be spent indoors forging keys in a smithy and tending to a unicorn. The only voice acting occurs during mid-chapter cutscenes, though a variety of gnomes and goblins pop up to briefly converse with you here and there. Sound effects are minimal but the music provides a gentle backdrop throughout, though not one that’s memorable or particularly atmospheric.

It’s unclear to me whether the epilogue is exclusive to the Collector’s Edition or is part of the standard version as well. It takes place immediately after the events of the first four chapters, representing another step in Princess Sophia’s travels, but since neither actually completes the series with a reunion, there’s no real resolution either way. The epilogue adds another hour onto the generous five hours or so to reach that point, so either way you’re getting great value. IF you like puzzles, that is. Even with some ill-advised repetition padding the time out, Awakening: The Goblin Kingdom is a puzzle-lover’s delight, and a breath of fresh mountain air for hidden object fans tired of the same old thing. It practically sleepwalks its way through a minimal story of goblin treachery and a still-as-yet-unrevealed master plan behind Sophia’s travails, but if you like the sound of bumping into puzzles at every turn, you should be gobblin’ this one up today.