Serpent of Isis Game Review

At the turn of the 20th century, your archaeologist grandfather uncovered a priceless artifact known as the Serpent of Isis during one of his digs while exploring the ruins of ancient Egypt. Unfortunately, the precious Serpent was stolen a few years later and was never seen again. Until now...

A mysterious letter from an anonymous party has tipped you that the Serpent of Isis has finally resurfaced, and is apparently being smuggled to London on the Mont Palu Express train. In addition, there's evidence that 5 suspects could be involved in this.

And so begins your journey. You board the Mont Palu train and attempt to uncover any clues as to the whereabouts of the artifact as well as find out more about the 5 suspects.

Your exploration of the various cabins on the train take on the form of your traditional hidden object game, finding hidden clues scattered all over the place. There are also items that when found can be used to interact with other items, or unlock more puzzles. For example, you might find a battery which would combine well with a flashlight. Or you could find a crowbar that would be great in prying open a locked drawer to uncover the clues within.

What's great about this game is that the puzzles here aren't the typical simple or straightforward puzzles that are common to hidden object games. These puzzles are pretty complex, similar to those found in the Azada games. You will also find that these puzzles aren't self-contained. A puzzle might seem totally unsolvable until you realize that an item you found in a different scene could be used to help solve it.

These puzzles and mini-games include the standard piecing together of a map and the cracking of a safe's combination common to other games of this genre. But there are also a lot of puzzles that are prety unique and complements the game pretty well.

If the entire game were to be set on the train, it'd be a very boring game. But as the train slowly moves towards London, you get to explore cities like Budapest, Vienna and Paris. Each location offers various places to explore (some of which are unlocked by previous puzzles) and more puzzles to solve in order to find out more about the artifact and the 5 suspects that you think are trying to smuggle it to London.

There's also a mini-game involving the 5 suspects that stretch throughout the whole game. Each of these suspects have certain favorite items (for example a certain suspect just loves fortune cookies) that you can use to place them in particular scenes. The more of these items you find, the closer you are to determine each suspect's involvement in this mystery.

The Serpent of Isis PC game is very polished, with art and music that has received a lot of attention from the developers. If you like a good mystery, moderately difficult puzzle-solving and good old-fashioned hidden object sleuthing... then this is one game you have to try! Get the Mac version here.

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