Oh boy. My Return to Mysterious Island Experience was challenging to say the least. But mostly fun. And my entire experience cemented my love for the adventure game genre. But I’ll get to the details in a second. Before I get to the game itself, and my Filmaholic experience with it… I feel that I must mention the special sale we have right now.
Return to Mysterious Island And Our Murder Mystery Sale
Indeed. Our Murder Mystery Sale is a hot commodity here at IndieGala. And it’s not only the latest sale that we have but also one of the most exciting ones as well. More than 400 games are part of the sale, but you can also find cool criminal freebies, suspect deals and guilty giveaways.
Anything from the Monster Hunter series (available here) to Scarlet Nexus is there as well. Which is also available here. But when it comes to freebies, I must also mention that Return to Mysterious Island is one such freebie. It’s available here at IndieGala and as the name suggests… It’s free. But we do have the sequel Return to Mysterious Island for purchase (here) and the bundle with these two games (available here). They’re already waiting for you, so hurry up.
Oh, and don’t let me forget. You can also read more about our Murder Mystery Sales in our two separate articles (here and here) from last week. You’re welcome.
My Return to Mysterious Island Experience Was Difficult (To Say The Least)
Look, I’ve had adventure games in my Filmaholic Gamer Review Repertoire. Sonya The Great Adventure was one hell of an experience in that regard. And my Die Young Experience was another great one in the survival genre as well. But Return to Mysterious Island is also a restrictive Point and Click adventure and this is a first for me to be honest. I’ve never had a restrictive Point and Click adventure and I was excited. Do you know what else I was excited about? The fact that I’ll be playing with a female character. Over here my female character is non-negotiable, but when it is optional (for instance like in my Borderlands 3 experience) I tend to opt for a female character. I think Sonya Blade ruined me for life in that respect. But I digress.
Over here in Return to Mysterious Island, I played as Mina. A sailor and a recent castaway who must find ways to survive being stranded on a Mysterious Island. Some hidden puzzles and secrets are well kept on the Island, but her survival also depends on getting in contact with the rest of the world. It’s not going to be easy. But then again….Survival is never easy.
Different Puzzles and Different Gameplay
Let me tell ya. The puzzles here are haaaard. Way harder than I anticipated. I did mention just a few months ago, how I enjoyed the puzzles in Sonya The Great Adventure. And I enjoyed them here as well… But over here they were a lot harder. My patience and brain cells got put to a serious test in the past few days. Hey, it’s sooo hoooot here, so the gameplay took days. Yeah, and the writing of the article too. Much like with plenty of my recent articles I got to write them late at night, and this one is no exception. Seriously, I was stuck in a rut at one point that in a moment of panic I throw away my entire inventory in the junk bin. Dumb move I know.
Oh, yeah I did. Look, It was an accident, and I was in a state of desperation/confusion by that point, but yeah. It was a dumb move for sure. I barely kept Mina alive for a significant period after that incident. Oh and the things that quite surprised me (to be honest) were the various solutions to the puzzles. Don’t get me wrong I love the combining of the items and the craftsmanship of some new tools. But some of them were real head-scratchers for sure. And yeah. I struggled with a lot of the puzzles because of that.
Cool Camera Too
Oh, and the last thing that surprised me was the movement in this game. You are basically moving from one selected area to another and that’s about it. I struggled with the node-to-node system of movement I have to admit (and yes, that’s a brand new term for me that my poor long-suffering husband had to explain). The restricted movement was a bit weird at first, but I got the hang of it quickly. After a while, it didn’t bother me all that much. Oh, and get this! Once you arrive in a brand new area you can have 360 degrees view of your surroundings. Yeah, that was cool. The 360 camera sets up the atmosphere too, and I loved that bit. It’s also a new thing for me, and it took me a while to get used to as well. Yeah, there was a lot of going back and forth for sure.
Great Visuals In The Game
Oh, man. Despite being more than 15 years old Return to Mysterious Island’s visuals are amazing. Love the tropical setting, the mystery in the visual presentation of the game and the music is fantastic too. Oh, and the fact that it’s loosely based on Jules Verne’s Mysterious Island doesn’t hurt too. It’s one of my favorite books, and will definitely put you in a Robinson Crusoe mode. With a dash of Lost. But I digress. Much like with plenty of my other Fimaholic experiences I turned to Google/ Reddit/ Youtube to get myself out of a jam, and I’d like to thank all of the helpful gamers for that. But all in all, I enjoyed this game. Very much indeed. How about you?
Let us know in the comment section. We’d love to know your opinion of the game as well. Hit that comment section and let us know. We’d love to know all about it.
