Unlock! Timeless Adventures designed by Aristide Bruyant, Cyril Demaegd, Guillaume Montiage, and Yohan Servais and published by Space Cowboys
Another set of three Unlock! escape room-style games in one box. Each of the games is a deck of cards and one supporting item that is used in one or more of that game's puzzles. The box also comes with the standard tutorial deck.
The first adventure is "The Noside Show." Infamous Professor Noside has taken over a traveling circus. Players similar to those in previous Noside adventures. The game even comes with a circus program that is part of the puzzles. We found this quite delightful and imaginative though we did brute-force our way through one of the puzzles, thus the eight minutes of machine penalties below. Maybe that's why we got the thoroughly average three-star score? The experience was a lot of fun.
"Arsene Lupin and the Great White Diamond" is an adventure in Paris circa 1900. Arsene Lupin is a famous gentleman burglar who has set a challenge for the orphans of Paris. Lupin has stolen a 180 karat diamond from the world expo and hidden it somewhere in the city. The players are a group of orphans chasing around, solving puzzles and traps set by Lupin and by another roving gang of orphans. The theme is a lot of fun and very engaging. In addition to the deck of cards, there's a letter from Lupin with a map of Paris on the back showing various places to investigate. The puzzles are enjoyable and, I thought, easier than the Noside adventure. I only used one hint and sailed along quickly and happily through the adventure.
"Lost in the ChronoWarp" has the player investigating the disappearance of Alcibiades Tempus, a friend who lives nearby. In his living room are clues that lead to a time traveling adventure that goes far into the past and the future. The player puts together clues to get the professor back to his own time and to restore the temporal order. The deck of cards is enhanced by a fold-out picture of Tempus's living room which changes as the game progresses (the player lays cards over the picture to change the images). I was bummed when the television changed from a weather report to a nuclear armageddon report! I did say the player has to restore the temporal order. I enjoyed most of the puzzles. The very first puzzle was inexplicable to me. Even after using the in-app hints to get the solution, I am not really sure anyone would get the first puzzle without brute forcing or making a very lucky guess. After that, the rest was a lot easier. I was surprised to see a four-star rating at the end. I was sure I did too many wrong things to get a good rating.
Overall, this is another fun set of Unlock! games. The extra component in each made for a more interesting challenge. My favorite was the Lupin adventure--it captured the race against time the best and brought back happy memories of visiting Paris. The time travel was a lot of fun too with the shifts in narrative as the player changes things in Tempus's past and nearly ruining his future.
Recommended.
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