memcglone's Profile
Stat Summary
- Average Rating:4.7
- Helpful Votes:94
- Reviews Submitted:6
- First Review:June 6, 2016
- Most Recent Review:March 18, 2022
- Featured reviews0
memcglone's Review History
A breathtaking voyage through dreams, reality, and places in between!
Overall rating
5
/
5
12 of 13 found this review helpful
Finally - a game that makes you think!
PostedMarch 18, 2022
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Adventure, Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
4
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
Storyline
3
/
5
(Review based on demo only since I only buy SE's).
What a refreshing change of pace after so many cookie-cutter HOPAs! This one harkens back to the old days of "examine everything" and "make good use of available tools". Finding inventory items is often less than obvious, and frequently very original. Puzzles tend toward the easier side (at least in the demo) but often involve paying close attention to the environment to find the clues necessary to solve them "properly" rather than by simple brute force random tries, which is also occasionally possible (unfortunately).
What a refreshing change of pace after so many cookie-cutter HOPAs! This one harkens back to the old days of "examine everything" and "make good use of available tools". Finding inventory items is often less than obvious, and frequently very original. Puzzles tend toward the easier side (at least in the demo) but often involve paying close attention to the environment to find the clues necessary to solve them "properly" rather than by simple brute force random tries, which is also occasionally possible (unfortunately).
The adventure steps are where the game shines, with very original takes by the developers on what to do and how to find the needed objects. Their originality really makes for a fun game, and one that requires more thought than many of the other games out there today. You can of course resort to the Hint function or Strategy Guide, but solving the challenges on your own is definitely readily do-able and far more satisfying. The map is less revealing than in many other games, since it lists scenes with "things to do" even when you do not yet have the inventory necessary to do anything, but it also tells you when there are objects in the scene yet to be retrieved and identifies whether any collectibles remain to be discovered there. Though I initially found the listing of "things to do" even if I could not yet do them an annoying thing, by the end of the demo I was happy for it, since it made the game actually require thinking and gave me more satisfaction at solving things on my own rather than continually being handed the answers.
Normally I'd rate this game as a 4, but mainly because I'm a hard grader & think 5s should be restricted to just a few games offered each year. However, this game is a decided breath of fresh air compared to the simplistic, do in your sleep, HOPAs we've been inundated with these days. AND, it needs a boost after some of the ridiculous downgrading 1-star ratings some others have appended. BTW, you ARE given the opportunity to skip the tutorial (unlike the review from the person who gave this game all of 4 minutes of play before giving it a terrible rating merely on the basis of their erroneously "thinking" they could not skip it). This game is a hidden gem that harkens back to the days when HOPAs were fun, challenging, and satisfying to play! Give it a try and form your own conclusions!
I recommend this game!
Find your own Halloween inspiration with Sweet Holiday Jigsaws: Halloween Night
Overall rating
5
/
5
7 of 7 found this review helpful
Great Features + Add Your Own Photos
PostedOctober 27, 2020
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
If we gave prizes for responsive developers, Graphium Studio would certainly be high up in the competition. Each of their jigsaw puzzle games so far has included several new features requested by their players, and Sweet Holiday Jigsaws: Halloween Night is no exception. It has a number of the features I've always wanted in jigsaws - in addition to a large selection of puzzle images, you can join pieces anywhere on the board and they snap together with a reassuring thud, you have several options for how to arrange the pieces on the board (around the finished-picture frame or in a nice grid), the background can be modified to improve how well the pieces stand out, you can choose from a variety of connector styles (the triangular form is my favorite), and you can set the number of pieces from 30 to 961. You can also choose to show a ghost image of the puzzle, show the finished photo, or just show edge pieces only. You can move the board and zoom in or zoom out, to give you more room to work the puzzle or to separate pieces out and/or work on sections independently.
In addition to improvements to several of these features (including some holiday-specific connector types), this game also brings at least 3 new features requested by the players of the last game. The best - you can add your own photos! This is great fun as you can expand the set of images and also get the enjoyment of putting together photos that may mean something special to you. In addition, the developers have improved the ability to save away puzzles. If you quit a puzzle without finishing it, the game automatically saves it away & allows you to come back to it at any time. No more having to finish a huge piece-count puzzle in a single sitting, plus you can choose to work some smaller size puzzles in-between until you are ready to attack a large one again (or if you just feel like working with a different palette for a while). You can save away multiple puzzles and the game nicely marks them as incomplete for you on the puzzle selection screens. (And you can abandon a saved puzzle if you find, for example, that you do not enjoy working with some number of pieces or find you just are not having fun with one). A third enhancement for this edition is a significantly improved tutorial that shows you how the various features work - it is simple, concise, well-presented, and readily available when you first use a feature or at any time you may want a refresher.
All in all, a great addition to any puzzle-lover's library and yet another great step forward in responding to user requests!
I recommend this game!
Complete fully customizable puzzles designed with warm and inspirational scenes to help you achieve a sense of peace while you play.
Overall rating
5
/
5
26 of 26 found this review helpful
What a delightfull game!!
PostedAugust 7, 2020
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Adventure, Brain Teaser, Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
Storyline
4
/
5
What a delightful game! A jigsaw puzzle that includes many of the things I most like: a great (and really large) supply of images, the ability to join pieces anywhere (and they connect with a satisfying thunk so you know the match is correct), a "shuffle" feature that allows you to spread out the puzzle pieces so you can see all of them (around a frame of the picture or in a nice grid), and tons & tons of customization features. You can move the playing board to easily accommodate working on different groups of pieces one at a time AND you can zoom in or out to give you better visibility to a set of pieces. There is a timed mode, a number of selections for connector type (check out the neat triangle one!), and a huge range for # of pieces. There are also achievements for those of you who may be interested in those. As pennmom said, the developer has actually LISTENED to our comments on the 1st game in this series and provided us with a number of fixes and improvements. All in all, a great addition to any jigsaw lover's library and promising many hours of fun playing.
I recommend this game!
Enter the enchanted 'Netherworld' where your destiny was written in blood and which whispers of true love.
Overall rating
5
/
5
18 of 28 found this review helpful
Great, Innovative Game from a New Developer
PostedJune 6, 2018
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Intermediate
Favorite Genre(s):Adventure, Brain Teaser, Hidden Object, Large File, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
Storyline
5
/
5
What a delightful and refreshing change of pace in HOPAs! Great gameplay with innovative and challenging puzzles, unusual and fun HO scenes, and some interesting adventure steps. All wrapped in absolutely stunning visuals, great voiceovers, and with a novel (and touching!) story to boot. Darkarta puts some new twists on gameplay elements that made me feel "clever" at being able to solve them, but never terribly frustrated, which always adds to the enjoyment level. This is definitely the best game of its genre that I have played in a long time.
The extras are extensive & include pretty much all typical fan favorites, plus a well-drawn comic book that provides a great backstory for the game. Be sure to check out the “Memories” section in Extras for some engaging depictions of little Sophia. Darkarta provided easily more than 7 hours of gameplay for me. Congratulations to Tuttifrutti for providing such a fascinating, beautiful, different, and fun addition for any HOPA-lover's library - a great achievement for a new developer.
BFG is the leading publisher of quality HOPA games and it is disappointing that it has taken over a year for them to make this excellent game available to us, well after it appeared on other sites. One would hope to see them making a greater effort in being a leader in encouraging new talent and breathing new energy and vitality into a genre that otherwise is tending too much into a cookie-cutter, same-old same-old mode. Hopefully they will continue to provide a platform for such worthy entries from emerging companies...for their own commercial success and for our delight in new takes on genre. Darkarta has renewed my enthusiasm for HOPAs, which were otherwise becoming somewhat stale for me. Hope to see more innovative games like it.
I recommend this game!
Get into the spirit of the holiday with 120 exciting nonograms! Stop by and visit Father Christmas!
Overall rating
4
/
5
11 of 12 found this review helpful
Surprise - Tougher Than It Looks!
PostedDecember 15, 2016
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Intermediate
Favorite Genre(s):Adventure, Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
4
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
3
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
Give this one a try - you may be pleasantly surprised at the challenge it provides!! I was about to write this off as way too easy. After all, it was only 1 color, instead of the flashy multi-color puzzles we are used to now, and the pictures are only so-so. And the early puzzles were all as simple as I expected. Then I got to #13. I was about to write this off too, now with a sneer, since it seemed it could only be solved by guessing....a big no-no for nonograms. And then I realized I was wrong. It was perfectly solvable strictly by logic, but I had to work hard to provide ENOUGH logic. And I actually had to WORK at it. What a pleasant surprise after many other games where the logic is so blatant & simplistic that it makes the puzzles easy. Subsequent puzzles continued making me work to solve them. Hard to believe a simple 1-color game could revive the challenge that made me love nonograms in the first place!! Give this one a chance - it has more to offer than 1st glances might imply!
That said, there are some things I did not like about it. Its 7's look way too much like its 1's. And it marks off numbers in the clue as soon as IT decides they are satisfied, even if you have not realized you got it yet & have not put in the blocking X squares. I personally hate this because it leads me to errors when I often then do not "see" the dimmed numbers and think I'm working on a different part of the clue. And at least once, the marking was premature (ie, they marked off an initial "1" when there was an earlier unmarked square that "could" have been the 1). Nonetheless, I'm willing to overlook the drawbacks for the fun of having a challenging game...and so early in the sequence - usually takes games way longer than the 13th grid to start being hard.
I dont normally write reviews, but this game had none so far, was only a soft-release today, and on first impression was easy to write off as too easy, a game easy to be overlooked....and yet proved to be a gem if you just hung with it long enough. Give it a try - hopefully you'll be similarly pleased with the unexpected challenge!
I recommend this game!
Explore fascinating unexplored worlds and save the Earth from catastrophe in this thrilling Hidden Object Adventure.
Overall rating
4
/
5
20 of 22 found this review helpful
Surprisingly Fun, With Great Puzzles
PostedJune 6, 2016
memcglone
fromGaithersburg, MD
Skill Level:Intermediate
Favorite Genre(s):Puzzle, Hidden Object, Adventure
Fun Factor
4
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
3
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
Storyline
3
/
5
What a curious little game. Way too helpful in some regards, but then very interesting and challenging in others.
The puzzles in this game are definitely the high point. Very different from the ordinary collection in other HOPAs and require some thought. An absolute delight each time one pops up and, at least through the demo (which is all I've played so far), there are quite a few of them. The lack of instructions was annoying until I realized they do exist (just hiding till you click Hint). No handholding - e.g., do something wrong & it will often just stare at you till you get it right; construct-a-picture puzzle pieces do not click in place as soon as you get them right so you really have to figure out the whole thing, etc. The story sometimes unfolds as you complete portions of a puzzle, and this takes some getting used to, since the unfolding is not always as obvious as in typical story book pages. Looks like some puzzles are also replayable, which will be nice, because at least one that I did by pure trial & error looks like it would be really fun and challenging to try to solve "efficiently".
The HO scenes have some interactions to them and those are also more imaginative than we may be used to. You really do need to take in the entire scene to figure out some of the steps as they do not just jump out at you with "obvious" answers. Some cluing via cursor changes, but not always, which also helps with the fun and challenge.
There are some drawbacks to the game, some of which may tempt you to discard it early on - but stick with it through the demo & you'll find much to like. This is not a flashy game with slick production values, there are annoying sparkles that I do not think you can get rid of, some misspellings and/or misnamed objects, a story that begins oddly & implausibly, and some controls and other things that seem awkward.
But the net is, this game is fun and different and makes you think. Reminds me of the old days of gaming, but in a good way, with many of the things that made us love gaming in the first place. A definite buy for me. I'm also off to try the 1st in the series, which I havent played before. Give this one a try. If you enjoy puzzles, it is a decided gem.
I recommend this game!