Review: The Treasures of Mystery Island
February 15, 2010
, Posted by App-reciation Reviews at 12:15 AM
Category: Games
Price: $ 3.99
Requirements: iPhone or iPod touch, OS 3.0 or later
Version: 1.1
What's good: Discover treasures hidden deep within a mysterious island in Alawar Entertainment's newest hidden object game, aptly named The Treasures of Mystery Island. In this engrossing and creatively unique title, you follow the story of a young pilot named Alex whose helicopter gets shot by lighting as he crosses the Atlantic Ocean and consequently ends up stranded in a strange uncharted island. There, you must embark on a classic seek-and-find adventure through over thirty beautifully crafted locations of intricate detail, designed to immerse you in an enchanting world with long-forgotten antiques and drifts of air from a past world. Unlike most other hidden object games, each item that you're looking for actually serves a purpose - whether it be a missing piece that you have to restore to its original setting or something that you need to take in conjunction with other articles of significance in order to create a functional mechanism or process. To make things even more interesting (and complicated), items are broken down into separate little bits that are then very trickily concealed in similarly pattered or colored backgrounds and objects. In the first episode, for example, you go in search of the town Shaman in order to borrow a phone with which you can call your family to let them know about your situation. When you find him, he tells you that he first needs to procure ingredients for a potion - these are in his hut amidst the clutter which you now have to sort through. Return to him with a clay pot, a lighter, and a bag containing the mixture and assemble everything over the fire pit to get the cooking going. In return, he gives you a crucial piece of a telephone that you will need to fix to use. It is this brilliant stroke of inspiration - combining a truly interactive and challenging gameplay with flawless storyline integration - that makes this title stand out from all the rest. Throughout the course of your hunt, you'll need to use logic and puzzle skills not only to return things back to where they belong or put them together into a working contraption, but also to find special objects and match them to their twenty four corresponding owners, each with a distinct personality. There are also several exciting and varied mini-games to add to the diversity as well as a collection of trophies to earn. With all these features, you'll surely be hard pressed to put your device down, so if you don't have it yet, why don't you check it out on the AppStore?
Suggestions for improvement: The hints system makes things a little bit too easy - we would recommend a maximum number of hints instead of the current arrangement, which allows players to get help after a short amount of recharging time. We'd like to see a time limit and penalties for too many wrong clicks as well.
Breakdown:
Graphics - 5/5 Creativity - 5/5 Gameplay - 5/5 Controls - 5/5
App-reciation - 5/5
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