“Mystery Mania” is not the type of game that I would typically pick up and play, let alone pay money for. It isn’t a first person shooter, there are no fancy graphics, and the overall theme and story arch is something ripped from a Saturday morning cartoon. After playing for 5 minutes, you may actually start to wonder if this game was made for a 5-year old or that you are just THAT good at games. Brought to us from none other than EA, the game is a point and click adventure, where you find yourself navigating a lost robot named F8 through an old mansion, trying to figure out why/how he got locked up in there in the first place. See, what did I tell you, straight from a Saturday morning cartoon, right? However, as the gameplay progresses, the simple mechanics help keep the pace of the game moving, while the difficulty level slowly starts to ramp up, making for a pretty enjoyable gaming experience.
The game is broken up into multiple rooms spread throughout the old, creepy house. Each room poses a challenge to the the player that you must solve in order to progress to the next room. The first handful of rooms are as easy as they come. Click on the candle to light the fireplace and a secret door opens up. Yes, some of these puzzles are that easy. However, you will soon find that they begin to get more involved and offer more of a challenge than one would come to expect with a point and click type game. There are 27 rooms in total, which isn’t too many, but it should keep you playing through to the end. Hopefully the game draws a significant amount of interest and downloads so we can hopefully see future updates that will add more rooms and puzzles to the game.
The graphics are simple, but are clean and crisp, giving the game a very distinct look. Most of the backgrounds are colored in shades of black, white and gray, with some periodic spots of color, which adds a nice contrast to the somewhat “kiddy” looking graphics. However, the overall production value just doesn’t fit EA’s past library of games. It seems more like a game from a developer who is giving their first shot on the iPhone. It lacks the polish that we have come to expect from an EA game. One very odd aspect of the game that I couldn’t help but notice were the numerous random achievements that you can unlock while playing. These include “kick the mouse” for clicking on a mouse cage, or “fix the floor” for clicking on a crack in the floor 3 times. It is nice to have these types of secrets in the game, but for something so random, they really should unlock additional rooms, or some other unique feature.
Although it may not be your typical game, Mystery Mania offers something different from the games you usually find yourself playing. It won’t win any awards, or blow your mind away with incredibly hard puzzle solving. However, the level of difficulty ramps up at a perfect pace that won’t have you deleting the app from your iPhone 5 minutes into playing. You will find yourself coming back for more to beat the next room and try to figure out the mystery behind F8 the robot (actually, the story will definitely not have you coming back for more). Or maybe you are OCD and want to unlock the unbelievably random achievements. Trust me, you will be shaking your head when the achievement icon pops up on screen, wondering how in the world you just earned it. Mystery Mania can be found now in the app store for $1.99.
[A copy of the game was provided by the publisher for review purposes.]
