Machinika: Museum 12+

If you loved The Room series, then you will love this!

The whole aliens theme provides a plausible reason for examining completely foreign objects that we as humans, have no understanding of.

The game was slightly on the easier side for these types of games but I was happy that I did not have to resort to looking online for the solution to a puzzle that I had no idea how to solve.

The graphics are stunning and help greatly with immersing you into the world of the alien artefacts you are inspecting.

You may feel as you play that you are “fixing”/“working out” what each object is for no apparent reason. However, there is a pleasing payoff towards the end.

I had no problems with the gameplay or running the game even on my very old, very laggy, original iPad Air. The game crashed once, after tapping to start chapter 7. Maybe it’s because I played The Room series but I got straight into it without needing instructions or a tutorial.

I am really looking forward to the next chapter. Hopefully, these guys can do well with Machinika Museum so that Atlas does not take that long to arrive on our screens!

But, somethings not right! They are all way, way too easy - you end up completing the game in about a few hours (if you play slowly, like I do, without cheating yourself even more with a walkthrough), and wonder if it was worth it? I waited ages for this game, had high hopes for it based on playing the first chapter a couple of years ago! I have to warn other players that ultimately it will disappoint you! The chapters don’t really flow either and the controls are not really perfect and neither is the game save system, which is why you’ll probably want to play it in one go, otherwise end up losing your progress and starting the chapter from the beginning! If only Machinika Museum didn’t feel so incomplete! If only the puzzles had a bit of an edge! If only there was something challenging in it.... it really would have been note-worthy.

Having done all of The Room series, I wanted something more than the cartoony 'office' type alternatives that were out back then. Great graphics on this one. Not as long or polished as The Room, but still brilliant. Glitched on Ch7 (red button didn't activate side panel) so had to exit & reload, but was fine after that. Definitely want to see more mystery puzzle games from this developer!