Review – Mystery Poster #1: A Greek Life by Argyx Games
Website Link – https://www.argyxgames.com/?lang=en
Price – €13 or $12.95 (when backed through Kickstarter, the game is not currently available for sale on their website as of 11/6/2022, but will hopefully be soon).
Disclaimer: we purchased the game with our own money, this review is not sponsored. All thoughts are our own.
The Product:
Argyx Games’ Mystery Poster #1: A Greek Life comes in the form of a A1 format (23.3 x 33.1 in) poster. Upon the poster, dozens of artifacts are pictured, which will be used to solve thirteen puzzles. Do players have what it takes to piece together the life of their great grandfather?
Mystery Poster #1: A Greek Life does require the use of an internet enabled device. While the physical poster holds most of the puzzle components, there are a few digital elements as well. Players will also enter their answers online.
The game is advertised for up to three players, ages 14+, for a total playtime of 2-3 hours. As a duo we completed the game around the two hour mark.
Our Thoughts:
Mystery Poster #1: Greek life is a low cost puzzling experience that hopes to provide players with some well-designed puzzles in a contained format.
When we first started this experience, we felt a bit overwhelmed with simply the idea of tying together 40-ish random items in order to fill in thirteen blanks. Staring at the poster, we saw a lot of clues, but couldn’t quite figure out how to put it all together. However, taking a step back to process what we had and figuring out what the thirteen blanks were asking for suddenly made the experience make a lot more sense.
We now believe that the overall experience is very well clued, but that doesn’t mean there still wasn’t plenty of challenge to be found. The difficulty of the puzzles is wide-ranging. Some took minutes while others required a lot more thought. This variety allowed us to find moments of accomplishment while still mulling over the harder pieces.
The puzzles themselves are varied and well-designed. Argyx Games makes the most of the space they’ve provided themselves and incorporates the digital aspects smoothly. Most of the work will still be done based on the actual poster, but the web-based components give the poster some flexibility on puzzle design. Personally, we enjoyed the challenge this game provided, which we found to be in the medium difficulty range as a whole.
For those who need it, there is an easy to use progressive hint system that is a simple click away from the page used to enter answers.
The narrative side of this experience is pretty light: you hope to figure out the details of your great grandfather’s life. During the game, you’ll fill in the blanks of his life story, and that’s pretty much it. Upon entering the final correct answer, we got our thirteenth green check mark and that was it. We felt the ending could have used a little more.
As a whole, we enjoyed this game, especially at its low price point. Also, the poster is left intact, so this can be an easy game to pass along to others. Mystery Poster #1: Greek Life is fun and contained experience that should scratch the itch for puzzle lovers. It lacks a bit of a wow factor, but makes up for that a bit with solid puzzles.
Official C&C Rating:
Narrative: 2/5
Puzzles: 3.75/5
Overall Fun: 3.25/5
Total Averaged Rating: 3/5 Stars
Chaos & Confetti 