Game Review: Unlock! Series

After playing The House on the Hill as part of our twelve games of Christmas, we tried another Unlock! game. This one, called The Island of Doctor Goorse, has players divided into two teams as they parachute onto the eponymous island and land in two different areas.

Excited to try it!

The first several puzzles are separate but the groups eventually come together. We enjoyed that a lot, though one group was a lot slower than the other. On our first play, we missolved a puzzle halfway through and wound up out of order. We realized the problem pretty quickly and put the game away to play the next day. On the next try we swapped the two teams and proceeded in a much more orderly fashion. We needed hints on one puzzle that turned out to be something we felt we should have figured out on our own. Then we got to the final puzzle with about ten minutes to spare. We thought we solved it and tried one code which didn't work. After two more codes we ran out of time. We kept working it hoping to get the puzzle solved. Eventually, we went through the hints and got a code that was no where near what we came up with. Doing some research on Board Game Geek, others have had similar problems. After everyone went to bed, I was finally able to figure out how we were supposed to solve the puzzle. I didn't think it was at all obvious, especially given the instructions on the card, which are poorly worded for what players are actually supposed to do. Oh well! We got enough stuff right to garner two stars.

Island of Doctor Goorse results

We didn't give up on the series, especially when I saw that a lot of people on BGG said this was the worst of the games (and one of the original three, so they were probably working out kinks still).

Our next Unlock! game was the Wizard of Oz-based game called The Adventurers of Oz. The game generally follows the story of Dorothy visiting Oz from Kansas. Players take on the roles of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin-Man, and the Cowardly Lion. They travel from Dorothy's crashed house to the city of Oz and on to the Wicked Witch of the West's castle. The art is lighthearted and fun. The game includes a map and a special mirror that is used to solve puzzles and figure out how to move on. Our game play had some tense moments debating solutions to puzzles.

The puzzles were a little tricky but a lot more intuitive than our previous experience. The game is longer, starting at 90 minutes (as opposed to other games that give you 60 minutes), so our results weren't as bad as they look. We had one puzzle that was four of our six missed codes.

The Adventurers of Oz results

In the interest of trying something different, we printed out one of the print and play versions of the game--The Elite. I saw the demo tab at the bottom of the app screen and found out there are six adventures (as of this writing) that players can print at home. I downloaded the file from the publisher's website (click on the Download the Unlock! demonstration kit) and had a little trial-and-error printing session. I bought a ream of card-stock paper a long time ago and used that for printing so the cards are sturdier. The deck is twenty cards, so shorter than the sixty cards in a regular Unlock! deck.

In this game, players are investigators in Las Vegas trying to find evidence of a patron cheating in the casino. We go into the hotel room and start searching for clues. It was a fun adventure. We were surprised that it was sixty minutes at the start but soon enough something dropped us to thirty minutes.

We worked our way through the clues patiently and managed to solve it with several minutes to spare. And a full five stars!

The Elite results

We printed and played 5th Avenue, another early version of the game that was clearly a promo for the first set of games. In the story, players do a favor for Al Capone by committing a little industrial espionage. Sneaking in to a New York office building, players work to unlock a safe with a revolutionary new product inside.

We had one minor snag that slowed us down, otherwise the caper went like clockwork. We played with our four-year old, who insisted on getting several clues to help us out. I think that's what tanked our star rating in the results below. Plus one penalty for using the wrong tool on the wrong item. Whoops!

Fifth Avenue results

Tombstone Express is a store-bought game where players race to foil a train robbery. We play as a sheriff on the train, starting at the engine and working our way back, trying to find who stole a valuable gem that will settle a dispute with the local natives. A few random events pop up during the game, challenging players to do more than just solve the puzzles on the cards.

We enjoyed the game, though one or two puzzles were a little more complicated than they needed to be, at least for us. The game is rated two-lock difficulty (out of three). We did take a couple of hints but the final puzzle (identifying the train robber) we got right, which probably explains our five-star rating below.

Tombstone Express results

A Noside Story is a sequel to a previous Unlock! game that we hadn't played. The sequel was rated one lock and has cartoony art, so we didn't think it would be a problem. In this story, some foul smoke is plaguing the town and the local authorities call the players to investigate. That means going to the home of Noside, local villain/scientist/clown. At least, that's what you find out after you start the app on your device. The typical intro text on the first card is actually an audio recording in the app, an interesting twist.

Most of the puzzles were fun but we had three or four that were very difficult and much further outside our expectations for what we'd need to do. We used a bunch of hints and had quite a few wrong guesses at codes. Once or twice we did a puzzle too fast but two puzzles in particular were too poorly crafted for us to even guess at the right answer (especially the clock puzzle). I did enjoy the cartoony logic of many of the puzzles.

A Noside Story results

The Temple of Ra print and play has the players infiltrating the recently-discovered temple of Ra in Egypt's Valley of the Kings. An amazing fortune awaits those who can decipher the clues to the tomb of Ra. The theme is a very fun idea.

Unfortunately, that's where the fun ends. A lot of the puzzles are fourth-wall breaking and in an especially bad way. The family worked on this scenario for about half an hour before giving up. I came back to it several days later with some new, kooky ideas that happened to work. It has the sort of logic I'd expect from the Noside game. At one point in the tomb, there's a fancy bit of tiling that is clearly based on Arabic non-pictorial art, so completely anachronistic in an ancient Egyptian pyramid. The game also includes a completely useless red herring card that does nothing for the game and adds a lot of frustration for the players.

This was easily the worst game of Unlock! I have played--it was too hard in the worst sort of way. When I played it the second time, I did have a huge time advantage (that first half hour of playing wasn't registered with the app), but I used two hints, even though the final score shows only one hint used. I am totally confounded that I had a three-star rating for this game.

Temple of Ra results

Overall, I have to say I'm underwhelmed by the Unlock! games. Some were fun but others were just not entertaining. I like the idea that they can be replayed by other people (or if you wait long enough and are forgetful) but the format of using only cards may be too limiting for their puzzle design. Interestingly, both Oz and Tombstone include non-card components that open up some new possibilities. We might just stick with the Exit the Game series from here on out.