Adventure in the Museum

This week, I find another adventure game--Escape the Museum. I feel that it is just like Azada or the Dream Chronicles, which are adventure with puzzles in hidden object games.

Escape the Museum is a unique game pulling on the familiar Hidden Object mechanic while building on the casual-friendly Adventure game play. It is an utterly fascinating adventure game for both Windows and Mac that reaches into room escape territory for inspiration.

In Escape the Museum, you play as Susan Anderson, who is a museum curator showing her daughter a dinosaur exhibit when a fierce earthquake rocks the building. Falling debris knocks Susan unconscious, and when she wakes she discovers she's trapped in the room and Caitlin is missing! To find the objects you have to reach the exit, and then recover precious museum artifacts when walking on the way through the rubble searching for her daughter.

Susan is in contact with several co-workers who provide hints via cell phone, telling her which items she'll need to clear a path to the exit. These usually consist of simple assembly puzzles that require you to locate items or item components and use them in the appropriate area to continue. For example, finding a flashlight and then having to locate batteries and a bulb to make it work, all of which are second nature to room escape fans and adventure enthusiasts alike. Once you've reached the exit, another worker asks you to recover precious museum property from the broken exhibits in a seek-and-find-style.

There are two types of item hunting scenes you'll come across in Escape the Museum. The first is the usual "find the list" fare where you have a specified set of items to locate in the rubble. The second is to find ten of a particular item in the scene. Some of the latter puzzles are a bit vague, bordering on the unfair (find ten dinosaur bones in the room with a big dinosaur skeleton?!), but the challenge level is just about right for us casual players.

In addition to puzzle solving and object finding, you'll also complete several jigsaw-style levels where you'll find and piece together precious items within the museum. And what archaeology-flavored experience would be complete without the Indiana Jones-style "grab the item and replace it with something of equal weight" gimmick? Escape the Museum has them all, and they're nicely woven into the story and don't feel too contrived.

To adventure in the Museum! Have fun as Susana!