robinbobbin's Profile
Stat Summary
- Average Rating:4
- Helpful Votes:215
- Reviews Submitted:25
- First Review:January 14, 2012
- Most Recent Review:April 10, 2022
- Featured reviews0
Pack your bags for an unforgettable trip through sunny France!
Overall rating
3
/
5
0 of 4 found this review helpful
Duplicate items
PostedApril 10, 2022
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
3
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
4
/
5
Level of Challenge
3
/
5
Yes, this is very similar to the last episode and the objects to find are nearly identical in every scene. But the reason I'm not going to buy it is the sloppiness in having multiples of the same item in the same scene, but only accepting one of them as the answer. Example, level 3, the castle scene. There's an outline drawing of an apple on the wall near the bed. Apple is one of the clues. The apple on the wall doesn't count as an apple for this round, though. You have to go into one of the sparkly areas, and find a solid, colored illustration of an apple, nearly identical in shape to the outline in the main area. That is the apple that satisfies the clue.
Other games have the same flaw; I personally really like a different long-running series with the word Vacation in the title, and they've done this from time to time. It's clearly just a minor error. But since it wasn't grabbing me anyway, this was my tipping point.
Other games have the same flaw; I personally really like a different long-running series with the word Vacation in the title, and they've done this from time to time. It's clearly just a minor error. But since it wasn't grabbing me anyway, this was my tipping point.
When Santa’s sleigh is damaged as he’s leaving the North Pole on Christmas night, only one person can save the holidays. You!
Overall rating
3
/
5
5 of 6 found this review helpful
Too many lights
PostedDecember 5, 2021
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle, Word
Visual/Sound Quality
2
/
5
Every scene that I went to in the demo had bright snowflakes, twinkling lights everywhere, or both. It was nearly impossible to tell where the 'zoom' areas were, because the whole place looked like the zoom sparkles. It was very difficult to see in general. A few things moving in each scene is fine, but the entire screen full of moving things is too much for me.
As far as gameplay and puzzles, they were the same as most Casual Arts games, so perfectly fine, if not super-exciting. If not for the headachey lights, I'd have bought it with the BOGO sale the first day.
I recommend this game!
Piece together these beautiful photos and take some of the stress out of your day. Let the puzzle-solving begin!
Overall rating
4
/
5
10 of 12 found this review helpful
Great game, small bug
PostedNovember 16, 2021
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Match 3, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
I'm really enjoying this game. The pictures are beautiful, and the option to add your own photos is really great, even though there's already so many I don't think it'll be necessary. However, the option to change your avatar isn't working. It stays as the knight no matter who I select. Very small thing, doesn't affect gameplay.
I recommend this game!
In the debut release of Big Adventure: Trip to Europe, tour 10 amazing countries while you find hidden objects and complete challenging minigames!
Overall rating
2
/
5
13 of 17 found this review helpful
Low quality
PostedAugust 5, 2021
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
2
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
2
/
5
Level of Challenge
2
/
5
Storyline
1
/
5
The backgrounds were nice, and that's about it. The objects weren't hidden, some had been blown up so large that they were visibly fuzzier than everything around them. I only hit one mini-game, the suitcase one, and I was surprised that it continued for multiple levels all at once, but then I had 3-4 HOG locations with no mini-games between them. So I'd call that a wash.
I'm not going to harp on the similarity to Vacation Adventures, because a lot of these are very similar. I'm starting to think there's a hidden object game base kit for sale somewhere, that lets people churn these out so quickly, with so many of the same object images. They DID keep VA's ridiculously long lag time between finding the last object and bringing up the scoreboard so you can continue.
Since you can't skip it, though, the dialogue is the worst thing wrong with this game. A tour guide who delivered the facts bits would have been believable, if still a little weird. The children delivering them was ridiculous. And the non-facts dialogue was incredibly stilted and odd.
I don't recommend this game.
Complete beautiful number-clue puzzles using logic and unveil the mosaic gallery!
Overall rating
4
/
5
9 of 10 found this review helpful
Finally some higher level games
PostedJune 25, 2021
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Intermediate
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
This is a good, solid game.
My biggest negative is that if you run off track a little while dragging to fill in a large area, it disappears. I have other games where it just does whatever you wanted up to the the point where you went out of line. Very useful when you have unsteady hands and large chunks of the same color. But it's a minor annoyance.
The other negative would be that it starts at the same page each time, making you scroll through all the finished ones. An overview page that showed all the different groups at once would be easier, or to open at the last unfinished game.
But in general, very good mechanics, and starts right out with decent sized games with a little challenge to them. Building up to trickier ones. An excellent buy.
My biggest negative is that if you run off track a little while dragging to fill in a large area, it disappears. I have other games where it just does whatever you wanted up to the the point where you went out of line. Very useful when you have unsteady hands and large chunks of the same color. But it's a minor annoyance.
The other negative would be that it starts at the same page each time, making you scroll through all the finished ones. An overview page that showed all the different groups at once would be easier, or to open at the last unfinished game.
But in general, very good mechanics, and starts right out with decent sized games with a little challenge to them. Building up to trickier ones. An excellent buy.
I recommend this game!
Take a deep dive into the magical undersea world of Atlantis Solitaire! Voyage across 400 submarine levels and restore 10 breathtaking Aquascapes!
Overall rating
5
/
5
1 of 1 found this review helpful
Bonus solitaires are best part for me
PostedJuly 24, 2020
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
I enjoyed this game, it's very pretty and the gameplay is good. But the standout feature in my opinion is the multiple different solitaire variations you get as bonus games. It seems that all these big adventure solitaire games are the Golf variation, which is perfectly fine. It probably lends itself best to the increasing difficulty and the different obstacles.
But if you get a little bored, by the time you complete both maps, you've got over 15 different card games to try. I liked that the Help for each variation not only gave clear instructions, but also an indicator of whether it was more of a chance game or a strategy game.
I've probably ended up playing the Wasp variation longer than I played the actual game!
I recommend this game!
Discover a sweet and magical world in this fantastic point and click adventure!
Overall rating
4
/
5
9 of 10 found this review helpful
Fun game before the 'dream'
PostedAugust 26, 2019
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
4
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
4
/
5
Level of Challenge
4
/
5
Storyline
2
/
5
Based on the demo. This is a fun game of the purely visual type, that has zero words and minimal story. The art is bright and fairly clear, the whole thing has an upbeat feel, and so far seems kid-friendly while not being boring. Pictures give basic direction, the items you look for are usually in groups, and you use them to fix various things and do various tasks in order to move on. Puzzles are simple, at least at the beginning, the kind that don't need instruction beyond a couple of pictures or small animations.
Except. Once you finish that first set of scenes and are on your way to the next area, there's suddenly spliced in a chunk of dialogue overlaid on a darker, more realistic drawing. It frames your gameplay up to then as a dream that you find hard to escape and are consulting a doctor on. Then, suddenly, you're off again. What looks like an animation from the game loops behind a dark filter, and you're told you missed some things, before being back in gameland as if none of that ever happened.
It seems weird to me that the creators of the original fun-looking, non-verbal game chopped it up with entirely verbal bits of a seemingly darker storyline. It's almost like someone added those in later.
The "story" in the blurb just does not exist in the beginning of the game. I can't remember now if the demo was 60 or 90 minutes, but beyond that weird bit of dialogue with no names or back-story, there's nothing to even suggest a human's involved for the entire time that I played. If it's the initial game all the way through, with just a few more oddball interjections, it's definitely worth playing.
I recommend this game!
Join our detective and help recover stolen monuments in this unique logic puzzler.
Overall rating
4
/
5
40 of 45 found this review helpful
Old favorites
PostedAugust 12, 2019
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
This was nice! Link-A-Pix are my second favorite picture-forming logic puzzle, and there are very few games that have used them; mostly because like the 'original' paint-by-numbers/nonograms they're absorbing, and take some practice.
The concept is reasonably simple. Your grid is full of colored numbers. You link up identically colored numbers with a line of that color, that uses that number of spaces. The fun starts when there's enough room for there to be several ways for that line to travel, and/or several different options for it to end with.
Each level is one picture, and 10 of them are tutorials. Good tutorials are important for puzzle games, and this one seemed to be pretty good. I was not able to play very far through yet; it did lock up, but I think that was my fault.
Hopefully this does well and we start seeing more of these puzzle types.
I recommend this game!
Take a Road Trip across Europe, visit beautiful locations, find the hidden objects and play fun puzzles
Overall rating
5
/
5
14 of 16 found this review helpful
Enjoyable variety
PostedMarch 5, 2019
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
I liked the variety of game types and puzzles, I like that it's kind of low-key, and challenging but not stressful. .
I really like the music too! It's one continuous loop, but it's upbeat and, like the game, has enough variety to it to keep it from getting annoying.
I recommend this game!
Can you keep the past from destroying the present?
Overall rating
5
/
5
3 of 6 found this review helpful
Enjoyable Flashback
PostedJuly 5, 2018
robinbobbin
fromGrand Rapids, MI
Skill Level:Expert
Favorite Genre(s):Hidden Object, Puzzle
Fun Factor
5
/
5
Visual/Sound Quality
5
/
5
Level of Challenge
5
/
5
I liked this game, it made a nice change of pace. If we have to have eternal Dalimars, might as well get some humor out of it.
Good things:
*Just HOPs and puzzles, no tedious back and forth, or walking past dozens of rocks to find a particular type of hammer to break the window with.
*A variety of characters related to previous cases.
*The HOPs didn't overlap much when you had to repeat a room. It seemed like a lot of items stayed cleared out the 2nd or 3rd go around, making it easier to see new things. Plus when I played again with a different profile, they were different lists than the first profile.
*A nice variety of HOP types. Nothing too fancy, but it kept it interesting.
*Just HOPs and puzzles, no tedious back and forth, or walking past dozens of rocks to find a particular type of hammer to break the window with.
*A variety of characters related to previous cases.
*The HOPs didn't overlap much when you had to repeat a room. It seemed like a lot of items stayed cleared out the 2nd or 3rd go around, making it easier to see new things. Plus when I played again with a different profile, they were different lists than the first profile.
*A nice variety of HOP types. Nothing too fancy, but it kept it interesting.
Bad things (pretty minor):
*Timers and morphing objects are a very bad mix. I don't like morphing objects anyway, but in a timed game they're infuriating, especially when -
*The timer running out, even at the very end of the level, meant you had to start the entire level again. That's not good at all. The only improvement is that you can at least turn the timer off completely.
*The final level was 10 identical mini-puzzles, of a particularly tedious type. It would have been much more interesting to have different ones, especially if they'd been keyed to the character or their original game.
*They cut the variety of crime computer puzzles; I was looking forward to a ransom note word find.
*The cut scene of walking down a hallway and opening a door was interesting the first time, but got old very fast. I did not want to see it every single time I clicked on a room.
*Only a couple of mini-games had this, but one of my pet peeves is games that rely entirely on fiddly controls or over-precise hot spots or just mouse speed for their challenge instead of mental dexterity.
*Timers and morphing objects are a very bad mix. I don't like morphing objects anyway, but in a timed game they're infuriating, especially when -
*The timer running out, even at the very end of the level, meant you had to start the entire level again. That's not good at all. The only improvement is that you can at least turn the timer off completely.
*The final level was 10 identical mini-puzzles, of a particularly tedious type. It would have been much more interesting to have different ones, especially if they'd been keyed to the character or their original game.
*They cut the variety of crime computer puzzles; I was looking forward to a ransom note word find.
*The cut scene of walking down a hallway and opening a door was interesting the first time, but got old very fast. I did not want to see it every single time I clicked on a room.
*Only a couple of mini-games had this, but one of my pet peeves is games that rely entirely on fiddly controls or over-precise hot spots or just mouse speed for their challenge instead of mental dexterity.
I used more words for the negatives, but they really were minor things that were heavily outweighed by the positives. Excellent job by the developers!
I recommend this game!