Treasures of Mystery Island Review: Uninspired Gameplay and Story

Break the curse of an angry god and find hidden treasure of unimaginable worth!

Alex was making a routine run across the Atlantic Ocean in his cargo plane when his girlfriend's lucky talisman started to glow. Moments later, as his pride and joy dove toward choppy waters, he found himself parachuting to the beach of an uncharted island. When a native rescues Alex, he begins a hidden object adventure that will take him to the heart of a strange island, where he'll find hidden treasure and unleash the curse of an angry god!

Your seek-and-find skills will be challenged like never before as you beat 20 captivating episodes set in a world time forgot. You'll need to not only find lost objects but also return them to where they belong to receive help from the natives. You'll also have to collect the scattered belongings of 24 clients, beat over a dozen mini-games and earn a slew of trophies! Can you solve the mystery of the island?

GAME FEATURES:

? 20 thrilling episodes to complete

? Over a dozen mini-games to beat

? Tons of trophies to earn

? Unlimited hints and tips

? Learn-as-you-play tutorial

? OpenFeint integration: you can unlock achievements and compare your results with friends as well as the rest of the world!

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More fun games from Alawar:

? GOURMANIA – Become the world's top chef in this addictive hidden object smash hit!

? TWISTED LANDS: SHADOW TOWN – Hidden object horror at its best! No matter how brave you are, it won't be enough.

? THE TREASURES OF MONTEZUMA – Trigger Power Totems in this dazzling match-three adventure!

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by Sarah Jacobsson Purewal, PCWorld

Alawar Entertainment's Treasures of Mystery Island is a hidden-object puzzle game that promises great excitement. Heck, even the description in the Play Store gives you the impression that you're going to take part in some sort of epic adventure. Unfortunately, the game doesn't deliver on the excitement factor: The story is bland, and I found gameplay far too easy.

First, the story: While most hidden-object games at least try for an interesting storyline, Treasures of Mystery Island does not. The idea is that you are stuck on an island with some really unorganized natives, and in order to unravel the mysteries that surround the island, you (as a character named Alex) must help them organize their stuff. Needless to say, this is not quite as exciting or "mysterious" as the title would suggest.

Flimsy plot aside, Treasures of Mystery Island is your basic point-and-touch hidden object game with a gameplay twist that makes the game kind of frustrating. Instead of looking for specific hidden objects, you're looking for parts of specific objects (usually three or four). The problem is that you see the objects as a whole, and you have no idea how they're broken up. This makes it more difficult to find things, since you're only vaguely aware of what you should be looking for.

On the plus side, since the parts of objects that you're looking for are weird shapes, you can get pretty far by just searching for things that look slightly off in the big picture. It's an interesting idea; it just isn't presented very well.

Treasures of Mystery Island comes in a full version for $1 and a simpler free version.

A few of the puzzles in the full version don't have you searching for various parts, and they're fairly easy to complete--once you figure out what you're supposed to do. These puzzles lack instructions, and it can be tricky to determine how to handle a specific challenge

All in all, Treasures of Mystery Island is a letdown. The art is just okay, the storyline is awful, and the puzzles are nothing more than annoying. If you absolutely adore hidden-object games, you may still enjoy this one, but otherwise I recommend you move on.

This app was tested using a Samsung Galaxy Nexus running Android 4.0.2.

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