Adventure Gamers - Forums

Karlok - 12 June 2023 04:39 AM

Look at Putra’s drawing: they didn’t enter the building, they waited for him below the hatch in a boat. So both exits were guarded. When the guards in the boat got him, they must have signalled to Putra.

I noticed the drawing but missed the stairs beside the building. So I guess Oberon sent Yupik down the ladder beneath the hatch and Putra + one guard went down the stairs when the guards hidden in the boat below caught him. Oberon, dressed in Yupik’s cloak and with a fake beard, left the building through the door and killed the remaining guard. It makes sense, but there are blanks that are never filled in, such as why Oberon killed the guard outside the door. He either felt it best to kill him to have a better chance of getting away or the guard looked through his disguise.

Karlok - 11 June 2023 07:20 PM

.....Mary has two letters from Edmund and the date on the most recent one reveals that it was written after Edmund’s “death”. That was the big eye opener for me.

Thanks for that Karlok, I was a bit sloppy with dates & of course the name Lazarus!!!!! that you also mentioned.

Doom - 13 June 2023 02:43 PM

…………..
………..Maybe it is supposed to be played in the right mood and without large gaps between playthroughs which I currently can’t afford.

Yes. I had a large gap & as a result ended up replaying a lot so it’s definitely a game that you have to persist with without too large a break & with a lot of concentration. I found that some plot elements/details are relevant to future parts so worth paying attention to.

Doom - 14 June 2023 07:24 AM

The epilogue was probably the best part for me, I found the whole string of events logical and satisfying, and there was, thankfully, no word-hunting involved. As for the main revelation, I wasn’t really surprised since I found it hard to believe in Edmund’s sudden death and was expecting him to reappear, especially after that spell was revealed in Case 10.

Yes, I loved the epilogue but it still took me a while to work it out
& make everything fit

diego - 13 June 2023 05:39 PM

……... I would have wished for one option: when I fill one character with first and second name, that there’s a button like “Check”, without the need to fill all other characters, just so to know that I’m on the right road. It would save me a lot of time, and it’s sort of option that players can use or not, at their will. But I guess it also restraints players from using the brute force to solve it.

I think that’s an excellent idea as at least one right/wrong answer can help with the right direction.

diego - 13 June 2023 05:39 PM

……… hint system is not that useful on couple occasions I used it, and I don’t dig the need to match the item with names every time I need a hint. It would be better to deduce points from the final score or something like that.

I didn’t find it that useful either but found it quite helpful to remember characters & thought perhaps they could have been used more in the ‘exercise’ rather than the objects.

When I got really stuck, I found ‘Filthy Casuals’ on YT. I don’t usually like commentary if I resort to a video walkthrough but it was useful listening to these 3 guys exchanging theories & ideas which I found prompted me to thinking more before they got to the answer.

I’ve now completed the DLC which I played twice. 

The first time I played the first case I disliked it & found it ‘overwhelming’ because perhaps I rushed it before my week away. The second time I was more patient & found that the clues were definitely all there to complete the scenario without any help & now consider it one of my favourite cases.

In the next case I was able to work out the identities but struggled with the story elements as I’d missed important details which led me to being clueless about who the culprit was.  The 2 key clues that I missed were the the codes within the notes each sibling had, & how to work out the puzzle tests. They went over my head but easy enough to guess - was there any other way to work them out btw? I think if I’d solved those clues, I would have found it easier to piece some of the story together.
But why? would the son be favoured over the daughter enough for him to plot/be prompted to kill her? Were there any clues about that?

The last case was my least favourite as the solutions were mainly story-based & which again I couldn’t solve without help. Most of the child’s drawings only made sense to me after I knew what they represented. I truly did get lost with this last case & for me it was lacking…. but was it?

chrissie - 15 June 2023 04:27 AM

But why? would the son be favoured over the daughter enough for him to plot/be prompted to kill her? Were there any clues about that?

I gathered the son and daughter were favored by different people in the village itself, but for the Seven Seas Company it didn’t seem to matter which of the two siblings died. They gave the same hidden instructions about how to kill the other to both. The one who lost the first part of the ritual was supposed to kill the one who won (by killing the girl inside the machine). Still do not understand why the death of one of the siblings would be a good thing for the company though (see discussion above).

chrissie - 15 June 2023 04:27 AM

...& how to work out the puzzle tests. They went over my head but easy enough to guess - was there any other way to work them out btw? I think if I’d solved those clues, I would have found it easier to piece some of the story together.

I solved two of the three parts of the puzzle, which was enough to understand which sibling had won. They are the typical logical challenge often found in IQ-tests and not that hard I thought. There’s also a clue to one of the puzzles in a bush near the statue, left there by the warrior for the raja’s daughter. Did you find that?

Yes, I had found the clue in the bush but I still don’t get what the motivation might be?? I can’t find any reasoning as to why it worked out that the daughter was killed.  That whole second part just doesn’t gel for me but I appreciate your replies so thank you Veovis & Karlok!
 
I’ll keep looking to see whether there’s a teensy snippet that I’ve missed.

I just finished the game (but not the DLC). It was interesting.

I didn’t believe in Edmund’s death so I immediately assumed that he was Lazarus. I think that playing it straight with no break helped a lot with solving the later cases. I would have had a much harder time otherwise (and I’ve also relied on recognising characters from previous cases to figure out who was who.

The case that actually gave me the most problem was case number IV. David’s letter threw me off completely. . It’s the only case I ended up using their hints (which didn’t really help though)

I think my favorite puzzle was in Case V finding the text saying fourth one from every row and realizing it applied to the letter I also loved the dining table.

In the end, I feel that the mechanic itself is quite fun and original but maybe would be better with a different story.

Thanks Karlok for leading this.

Thanks for leading the playthrough Karlok. I too hope that the developers will make either/and more content/another investigative game!

Karlok - 18 June 2023 09:28 PM

@giom: if you like decoding messages you should play the DLC. 

I will for sure   but I’m first going to play other games in between. I like the Golden Idol but I think it’s a game where I would need a break between each DLC if they come up with more

So sorry! Real life interfered and left me with very few hours to sleep, let alone play or post anything. I keep telling myself to drop a line here that I’m behind (not that anyone cares, but I feel it’s a polite thing to do), but some days I don’t open anything but work stuff on my laptop, and it just slips my mind…

I have now finished the DLC.
I thought the first case was very well-balanced, and I rather enjoyed solving it, not much to add. I feel like the levels have progressively became better designed, not without flaws, but still better overall.

The second one was definitely more on the convoluted side, which is to say – I was surprised to read the details of how everything unfolded even after I solved the scroll correctly.  Maybe we aren’t supposed to guess all the minutia to begin with, and the game fills out smaller details in the end summary for us to learn exactly how it all happened, so we are meant to, sort of, do a rough draft when we are solving the case?

I liked the third case fine. It was, maybe, a bit too name-heavy and a bit too easy to be the final case in the DLC, but I still had good time with it.

Overall, this was a great experience – good deduction opportunities that mostly involved logic and thinking cap, and not that many instances of busy work. Complex story with tons of over-the-top moments and layers. Ideally, I’d like for a little less reliance on the previous cases to solve the current one, because it’s just makes it a lot harder to jump back to things if you forgot that there was a detail two cases back that really could have helped right now, but in general – pretty cool and twisty plot. The graphics are certainly not your average adventure game fare, but there’s a charm in this look, and with how good the game is – I also happen to appreciate it the more I played. Essentially, this game was a bit too messy (with really far-fetched explanations on occasion), a bit too uneven with the difficulty levels and overall flow, and sometimes too reliant on the “word search”, and yet fun, pleasantly challenging and really engaging, nonetheless.

I’m quite surprised, along with developers, that not many games are being made in this “deduction as its core” style, what’s with the abundance of all kinds of adventures out there. I feel like there’s quite a big audience that enjoys this kind of puzzle, and I know – I’ll gladly pick up another game in a similar vein. All recommendations are welcome and appreciated, by the way.

I really enjoyed this one, thank you, Karlok, for a wonderful playthrough and another good recommendation!