D2 CITY OF SECRETS PLUS

I’m fine with tilt-based games, but this one is designed in a way that makes it physically impossible to avoid failure unless you catch a fortunate sequence of trash-truly one of the most frustrating experiences in recent memory. One is a minigame requiring tilting the device to guide trash on multiple conveyor belts into the correct receptacle. There are also two instances of large puzzle activities that boast confoundingly bad design, at least on the iPhone/iPod Touch. Here the art style actually does the puzzles a disservice, as the content of the backgrounds often makes it unclear where to use a specific item.

One puzzle requires gathering almost twenty inventory items before assembling them. The inventory puzzles are often confusing and overwhelming. Simply looking at a few screenshots will undoubtedly provide the strongest motivation possible to try the game out, and it is a treat to see.īeing absorbed by all the strangeness will pass the time until the puzzles come into play-and this is where the game falls maddeningly flat. The art design, with its odd perspectives and strangely curved buildings and structures, is far more successful than the dialogue in conveying the strange personality of the game. The character animation is also exceptional, and the game makes consistently excellent use of shadows and lighting effects. The hi-res graphics are brightly colored and impressively detailed, often with multiple layers of background detail and constant unique visual embellishments. The game’s high point is its gorgeous visuals-this is without question the best-looking adventure game produced to date for iOS, by quite a margin. I’m not an expert in cultural differences in comedy-and I have never watched an episode of Black Adder-but the humor in this game felt decidedly British to me with its extreme droll sarcasm, similar to what you’d expect from the weaker parts of a Discworld game. But the humor in the game, which is nearly suffocating as the developers are not content to let a line go by without some stab at a laugh, often seems destined to fall flat in any language. Some of this must be attributed to translation-Eastern European developers don’t always have the easiest time getting their writing to properly come across in English.

And even knowing that wouldn’t give you any hint as to how utterly bizarre the actual writing is. The story synopsis doesn’t even scratch the surface of how odd every element of the tale feels and how unusual every new twist of the narrative is. It is in the writing, both the construction of the story and the dialogue itself, that the game’s strangeness shines through. Unlike the aforementioned animal tales, City of Secrets is a comedy adventure, and an overzealous comedy at that.

D2 CITY OF SECRETS PLUS

It's an ambitious task that involves such things as building a unique bait device, traversing the colorful and hideous innards of a snake and his musical intestines, plus a bit of old-fashioned detective work. Joining the revolt puts our heroes on the path to defeating the rats and helping the resistance accomplish its ultimate purpose of restoring the proper ruler of the city. There’s a lot more than a simple prison break to the story though-there’s a full-fledged underground rebellion rising up in this city against the mayor, who has his share of secrets to be unmasked. Rex ends up in jail and Moles undertakes the task of breaking him out. While enjoying some leisurely ice fishing outside, the two stumble onto a mysterious underground city of moles, the city of Poco Pane. In this case, our two heroes are Moles the mole and Rex the dog. Unfortunately, often not in a positive way.Ĭreated by Polish developer aideMMedia (a studio name worthy of praise for a palindrome-lover such as myself) in the grand tradition of Inherit the Earth and the Redwall novels, City of Secrets is set in a world of animals, where various species exhibit human traits and are usually aligned with good or evil. When I completed City of Secrets, a traditional adventure that was originally an iOS exclusive and since released on PC, I knew it was not a game I was going to forget very soon-and when I reflect back on it later, I’ll remember it for exactly what it is: a very strange game. The nature of the iOS revolution is that many of these games are cheap-and very forgettable. I’ve been playing a lot of iOS adventures over the past year.

D2 city of secrets