Dark Parables: The Red Riding Hood Sisters is made out of the same stuff as most hidden object games, but it has a couple of differences that make it stand out like a wolf amongst dogs. For one thing, it adds a dark but intriguing twist to the old fairy tale about that red-cloaked gal who took the wrong path on the way to grandmother's house. For another, it's easily one of the most gorgeous HOGs you'll ever clap eyes on.
Tales of Terror: Crimson Dawn starts with a clichéd storyline and lacks any variety thereafter to make the experience stand out. Your brother has been kidnapped, and as the loving sister, you'll need to track him down in a seemingly deserted mansion, stop a cult from taking over the world, and make your way through an alternate plane (within mirrors) before your brother is lost forever.
Through the previous games in the Margrave franchise, we've helped Edwina Margrave search for answers about her family's past. In this latest installment, however, we're focused solely on the present, as Edwina must embark on a rescue mission to save the love of her life before he's lost in a town that appears only once every 300 years. Along the way, you'll meet lots of interesting characters and explore a slew of lovely environments, but the game still isn't without its problems.
The Agency of Anomalies: The Last Performance is a hidden-object game that's centered around freaks, monsters, and show business. It sounds like corny county fair stuff, though your experience with The Last Performance will probably feel more authentic than the time you paid a carnival barker $5 to gawk at what turned out to be a shaved goat. In fact, The Last Performance is a genuinely unsettling and engaging game. It won't keep you up with nightmares, but neither will you easily forget making the acquaintance of a man with a snake's body.
Perhaps my favorite ride at Disneyland is the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. With meticulous detail and theming of everything from the lineup to the attendants, it wraps you up in the creepy tale of a hotel haunted by the events of a fateful night during the Golden Age of Hollywood. It dances gleefully between reverence for classic films and for classic scares. Even if you haven't taken a trip on the Tower, though, bottle that feeling. You may just be getting a game that does the trick.
Lots of folks make hidden object games these days. The popularity of the genre means a lot of games on the market, and a lot of competition. It also means fast development times and the premature release of games that to put it bluntly, are not ready for prime time. The Dreamatorium of Dr. Magnus, the new hidden object adventure by Two Desperados, is one of those. Inconsistent in presentation and sloppy in the details, this is one adventure title that was definitely a preemie.
Asynchronicity is the new black. Hero Academy, Draw Something, Song Pop, Outwitters; not since tennis have we seen this big a focus on the back-and-forth. Not all game types are created equal, though, and Time Geeks & Friends seems to test the limits by filtering hunt and find through the magical asynchronometer. If there's one thing I know, however, it's that asyncrhonometer is not a word. Oh, and also? This idea works pretty well.
The Yard Sale series is one of the bigger names in hidden object gaming, presumably because it teaches people how to improve their yard sale hunting techniques. Now, courtesy of a partnership with Zynga, developer The Method is launching a new iteration of the series on Facebook and Zynga.com. Titled Yard Sale: Hidden Treasures, it will have you spotting rare antiques at block-wide garage sales in no time.