I’ll be honest, the first I saw of The Case of the Golden Idol, I thought it was a typical point and click adventure with an “ugly” art style to fit some sort of comedic/parody plot. I was so sure of it, that I completely filtered out the positive reception the game was getting up until very recently, when I saw it being compared to the amazing Return of the Obra Dinn. Confusion turned to determination to play the game for myself and I’m really glad that I did.
So yeah – it is basically a 2D Return of the Obra Dinn. Not like that’s a bad thing either. Obra Dinn was a really cool take on an investigation focused adventure game and one of the most “smart feeling” examples in that direction. Having a new different game follow a similar idea, at least now when this doesn’t happen often, is great. Especially, since The Case of the Golden Idol does approach the same concept slightly differently.
The base idea is very simple – you have an animated freeze frame of a situation that usually involves someone dying. With the point and click interface you can click on objects and people on the screen (and sometimes the scene takes place across several screens) and get some keywords or just context of the situation. That’s you Exploring mode. And at any point you can flip to Thinking mode that presents you with several unfinished prompts to fill in. Usually it’s a list of all people you looked at for you to put names to faces, a timeline of events with missing words keywords can be put in and some additional information. Once all of the sections of the Thinking mode are filled in, you win the scene and can move on to the next one.
Game handles this really well. There is a hint system too, though I’ve never used it so I don’t, actually, know what it does. But there’s a really fun gradual build to the complexity of the situations you have to unravel and explain. And the genius of the Thinking mode is that it’s essentially a task list, going from simpler tasks to the complex ones that you will, most likely, fill in using the answers you’ve come to (and had confirmed by the game as correct) in the simpler tasks. It helps that the story is really engaging and figuring it out is fun. Oh and the “ugly” art style is really cool in motion, while the soundtrack is really good.
So if you enjoy playing investigation focused adventure titles and especially if you liked Return of the Obra Dinn, you absolutely must play The Case of the Golden Idol. It’s an incredibly enjoyable game that will make you feel smart, while also being very entertaining.