The Jim and Frank Mysteries – The Blood River Files, a puzzle-filled adventure game from 99 Games and Chillingo, is now available from the app store. As the closest thing to a Professor Layton game to appear in the app store, The Jim and Frank Mysteries is sure to strike a familiar chord and appeal to a wide range of gamers.
The Jim and Frank Mysteries Pros:
- Nicely illustrated scenery
- Simple controls
- Lots of puzzles
- Hints/skips are easily earned
The Jim and Frank Mysteries Cons:
- Puzzles too easy
- Voice work is only used in the early going
- Too linear
Jim and Frank are teenaged boys who embark upon a quest set forth by their grandfather. They meet a wide range of characters along the way and encounter a plethora of puzzles to solve in order to make progress in their journey. Most of the puzzles are fairly simplistic. They reminded us of puzzles found in a children’s activity book, ranging from simple algebraic equations to untangling ropes to classic word puzzles. Solving them on the first try earns the full amount of gold nuggets available. Erring will reduce the amount of gold you can win. If you get really stuck, you can skip a puzzle or purchase a hint using Eurekas, the in-game currency collected by finding Eureka bucks in each scene in the form of hidden pictures. Eurekas can also be purchased through DLC, if necessary. In addition to the puzzles, mini-games are spread throughout the game, too, offering more of a reactionary element to the game.
Graphically, the game is pleasant, with nicely illustrated and detailed static scenes. Moving from screen to screen requires tapping on the shoe icon in the lower right corner and then tapping on the pair of shoes that appear on-screen. Items with which you can interact will appear to glow, and people that you can speak with will have a red arrow over their heads. The game is quite linear and it seems to hold your hand the entire way. The game appears to be geared toward a wide audience, but it dumbs itself down so as not to exclude the younger players, to the detriment of the older players. Puzzles based on chosen difficulty levels would have been a nice addition. The backing track utilizes acoustic guitar music that is rather nice. While the game starts out with some decent voice-over work, it quickly abandons this in favor of text boxes and animated mouth movements. This was a bit disappointing, as we liked the audio quality. Controls are touch-based, as you tap to collect Eurekas, move from screen to screen, select people and items to interact with, and access your backpack, which contains the puzzle index, stats, a photograph that must be recreated from pieces collected during the course of play, and more.
Replay value is minimal, as knowledge of how to solve the puzzles reduces the enjoyment and intrigue of any subsequent playthroughs. However, with 60 puzzles and 8 mini-games, the initial playthrough should take several hours to get through. At a price of $2.99, The Jim and Frank Mysteries comes in well below most other adventure games on the iDevice, which may be enough to attract a large following. The Jim and Frank Mysteries offers 4-Dimple gameplay that’s fun for all ages.
