A Ghostly Viking Mystery! – Ghosts of the Past: Bones of Meadows Town HD - A Supernatural Hidden Objects Game Review

Turn off the lights and get your flashlights ready! This one's a ghostly adventure. You are the new sheriff who is replacing the previous sheriff who mysteriously vanished in the historically Viking rich Meadows Town. You arrive during a storm, which has caused the town's people to flee; and you are investigating a series of murders and disappearances. The abandoned town gives an ominous sense of creepy isolation. Upon arrival and due to the storm, you are involved in a car crash, which is a theme that is well overdone in many Big Fish games. You meet the very cute deputy who assists you in collecting evidence throughout your journey; and the evidence items, such as newspaper clippings, photos, and film strips are pieced together on the evidence board located in the police station. Here you will make associations between the suspects or victims and the relative pieces of evidence to figure out who's connected and somehow involved in the mysteries. You can also just click on the "Sheriff" tab in the lower left hand corner to open up your evidence board. As the story progresses, you are pursuing a ghostly figure who tries to hinder your investigation; and you meet some Viking ghosts who are protecting their treasure. The graphics are slightly grainy, but the artwork of the scenes is nice and clear. The dominant colors of purple and blue in the scenes seem to be consistent throughout. You also use a mystic orb to identify paranormal activity and to collect energy in some scenes; and when the orb is full, you learn parts of the Viking history and uncover secrets. The HOS are varied and fun. You have "find the difference", "matching pairs", and you put back items into the scene as well. The puzzles, 14 in the main game, are fairly simple, but become more fun as you move along. One involves coloring parts of a picture according to small scraps of paper. There is not an over abundance of either puzzles or HOS so there is an even balance. You are collecting 40 rune stones in the locations, and they are also hidden in the interactive zoom-ups so watch out for them. There are four modes of difficulty, including the ability to customize, which I love. I can take off all sparkle indicators. The inventory is labeled, and the map is a fast teleporting one with objectives and labeled locations. You can also see the location names when you click in a direction throughout the locations. I had fast travel between locations as well. What I did not like was that the map, hint button and strategy guide were all cramped together in the same area, which can cause one to accidentally hit the undesired option. The bonus area includes the bonus chapter, workshop, replay of puzzles and HOS and wallpaper, etc. The bonus chapter includes some new scenes, which is nice. I did not come across any glitches; and I gave the game four stars because even though the demo was short, the game with bonus was lengthy and became more interesting with progression. Some of the puzzles became more fun as well where you had to work them out a bit, such as moving the rune stones to their center positions in accordance with the numbers on the rows and columns. I am still enjoying it and hope you do too.
Review by KimMeadow on Ghosts of the Past: Bones of Meadows Town HD - A Supernatural Hidden Objects Game.