May's Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville

For some unknown reason, the guys from V5 Play Studio have mislabeled their last creation as a HOG, while in fact it is more like an Adventure game or, taking into account how many riddles there are, a Puzzle game with Adventure elements. So remember, no matter what the developers claim, May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville is not a Hidden Object game, so don’t expect it to offer you numerous scenes with tons of items to find, short dialogues and ordinary puzzles. It definitely won’t!

Let’s go further. The view of the first location is quite disappointing. If playing in full screen mode, the cutscenes seem to be cloudy or washed out. They are not so numerous, though. The graphics looks cartoonish, but not bad. All backgrounds, as well as the characters, are drawn by hand. In some places, you’ll be even able to notice where the brush strokes start and end, which makes an impression that the game was made in haste, and designers did not really sweat over it’s graphics. While the simply drawn cartoon characters look rather nice, the first locations are not pleasing to the eye at all. However, don’t let that shortcoming stop you from playing further! Firstly, only the first locations are so unsightly. Secondly, such primitive graphic style adds much on game atmosphere, making it even more relaxing and fun. And last but not least, combined with the brilliant animation, it creates an enchanting feeling, as if you are inside of the painted world.

One more rather important disadvantage of the game is that you need to click the compass each time you want to move to the next location. Perhaps, it was made to protect you from accidental moves, but you can’t even imagine how annoying it is each time to drag the mouse to the right corner of the screen and click the compass to show the arrows that you are to click on in order to move around. In addition, the pointer does not change the way it looks when hovering over an object or a NPC you can interact with, therefore you have to click on anything that seems to you interesting, so that not to miss something important.

And now, if you’re still reading this review, let’s move on to the benefits of the game! First of all, I want to mention a very entertaining fantastic storyline, which, combined with great atmosphere of adventure, creates a good mood as soon as you dive into the game. In short, while traveling in a hot air balloon, two young siblings, May and Tery, were caught in a storm. Their balloon crashed, and the girl found herself alone in the vicinity of an odd town named Dragonville, each resident of which is ready to offer her a couple of fascinating puzzles in exchange for his or her help. The player is given complete freedom to explore the game world. In other words, you are allowed to freely wander around the city looking for things to do and characters to chat with. Keep in mind that there is way too much dialogue reading in the game. The NPCs are terribly talkative, and much of the things they say are absolutely useless. Still, we strongly recommend you not to skip the dialogues, as they are imbued with a subtle sense of humor and sometimes contain helpful tips. To be honest, funny remarks of Mayor Doyle or, for example, Lukatello made me smile and even laugh out loud, while the others simply raised my spirits.

As for the gameplay, May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville contains the puzzles of all known species, including rhythmic games, hidden object scenes, tasks with matches, mathematical problems, number placement puzzles, classic riddles, and so on almost indefinitely. So, in my opinion, it might be of great interest to all puzzle lovers. Bear in mind that most of the conundrums you will face are absolutely unique or at least not typical for computer games. Some of them are pretty simple, while the others are so hard, that you have to spent hours racking your brains or stretching your fingers to find the right solution. Most of the mini-games presented in May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville are based on logic, but there also are several hidden object scenes. Despite the fact that most of them are badly littered, they are finely detailed and generally look pretty good. In casual mode the hint button recharges quickly, and there is no penalty for random clicks. Still, you won’t be able to skip any of the story puzzles, including the hidden object scenes, unless you have enough hint points. These mysterious points can be obtained by solving both story and bonus puzzles from the category of your choice. You can’t re-take the puzzle you’ve already solved, but over time the number of available tasks and categories is constantly increasing, hence you will always find an interesting riddle to earn some hint points in a fun way. By the way, the story puzzles that you have skipped appear in the Story Puzzles tab, and you can wrestle with them any time you have such a desire. In addition, in May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville there is a completely unique category of puzzles called Write Answer, that require you to type the correct answer in the appropriate box. To tell the truth, in most cases the answer is in plain sight, but the innovation is still pretty enjoyable, as it takes the interaction between the player and the game to a whole new level.

Probably, you’ll need some time to get drawn into the game. It might seem a rather mediocre installment during the first fifteen minutes of play, but once you meet Mayor Doyle, May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville will reveal all its charms, so arm yourself with patience! To tell the truth, it is one of the few games you can play with your children, and both you and your child will be addicted. So, if you have some time to spend in the warm circle of family or simply adore puzzles and wish to test your brains, May’s Mysteries: The Secret of Dragonville is just what you need! This game is so outstanding, and made with such love to each detail, that you simply must play it, no matter how many disadvantages it has! Have a good time!