The Clockwork Man: The Hidden World

This is a review for both "Clockwork Man" and "Clockwork Man: The Hidden World" since I played them back to back and they share the same lead character. Actually, I've played both these games many times on a different PC before I got into Steam. So my playtimes you see for each will probably be less than a normal playthrough since I can whiz through the games by now. We'll start with game #1: Pros: - Nice graphics and good character designs. The main girl, Miranda (YAY, she has my name!), is quite lovely. - The voice acting is also good, for the most part. I really like who they chose for Miranda. Some of the others can be a bit cheesy but it is amusing rather than irritating. - Interesting story. - Both games have a very neat hidden object feature. Scrolling and zooming. Not every scene but many allow you to move around the area. Some items are sneakily hidden behind others but just one click to the left or right will reveal them. - Both games also have an interesting ...

The hidden world is a good name, this puzzle game should be hidden so it never sees the light of day. Like the last game, this game suffers from low resolution objects, objects that are a few pixels in size, and objects where clicking right on them may be a futile effort. Playing this game is similar to being locked out of your house while drunk take all your keys off your keyring throwing them wildly about then attempting to find and pick up your door key with your elbows. The voice acting is very good, but the story isnt enough to keep anyone playing, in fact this game is good at putting you to sleep. Puzzles due to the low resolution, and being finicky, are just so tiring to complete making the game experience feel labored without satisfaction. There is no way to skip puzzles or solutions, or hints, or a guide in this game which can lead players stuck unable to finish the game. Rating: 1/10 Value: $0.50

The Hidden World continues the story of Miranda Calomy and her clockwork-friend, Sprocket. Like its predecessor, the basic goal is to search a series of beautifully drawn scenes to find a bunch of hidden objects. However, the sequel increases the scope of the original, both in length and gameplay. Where the first game lasted maybe 2-3 hours, this one seemed a bit longer (maybe around 3-4 hours, depending on how slowly you take things). The interface and quality of the puzzles have also improved as well. This time, the puzzles are much more involved, and actually require some real thought at times! Amazing, I know. It's a nice improvement. However, with that change, one positive trait of the first game is now lost - the sequel is no longer kid friendly. Thinking back on it, there are probably a couple of puzzles in here that younger kids wouldn't be able to solve on their own (one involving classic works of literature springs to mind), and most of the puzzles are at least a bit more dif...

What a lovely game! A prematurely silver 21-year-old engineer named Miranada repeatedly and politely puts down any sexism against her from the male characters with her competence and confidence. There's an adorable robot. There's an adorable squirrel. The interactions with the squirrel made me nostalgic for the Ken and Roberta Williams days of the old Sierra King's Quest games. Very clever; great attention to detail. The art is beautiful. The puzzles are interesting and engaging. For a Hidden Object Game, the plot is absolutely spectacular and the characters are rich and entertaining. Great casual, low stress game for next time you're stuck in bed sick for the day.

[h1]An engaging HOG with high production value[/h1] The first Clockwork Man game was not so good; while it was well presented, the gameplay itself was quite frustrating or unfair at times. This sequel is improved in gameplay and presentation. [b]What I liked[/b] [list] [*]A mix of HOG and point-and-click problem solving. [*]I mentioned high production value: excellent art, music and voice acting throughout. [*]A simple but interesting story. [*]Some scenes let you scroll or zoom for more searching, which is fun. Takes some getting used to. [*]Dialog between characters is fun enough that you won't just click through it. This is helped by the excellent voice acting. [*]Throughout the game, the main character keeps a journal that serves as summary of the story and a reminder of what needs doing next. It's well written and beautifully illustrated. [*]As in the first game, there's an elaborate hint system where you can choose how exactly you want to be helped: a preview of what objects look...

It's better than the first game, but that's not saying much. The first one was absolutely terrible, while this one is merely awful. The hidden object scenes very inconsistent in difficulty. Most of the objects are glaringly obvious but there's often one or two that are tiny and blend with the background, making them almost impossible to see. This is only made worse by the low resolution. The difficulty progression is also way off; many of the early scenes are far more difficult than ones later in the game. The items in the scenes are quite boring and the player is often required to find multiples of the same object. Some objects are mislabelled, quite badly so in some cases. The puzzles are for the most part pathetically easy, although, again, some are much harder. And again, this seems to have nothing to do with progression through the game; some are just randomly hard for no apparent reason. Some puzzles lack context, meaning that the only way to solve them is to randomly try thing...

This sequel to The Clockwork Man is a significant improvement. It has more and much better puzzles, and a bit of old-fashioned point-and-click adventuring. The name, by the way, makes no sense, because [spoiler]there is no clockwork man: he was destroyed in the first episode[/spoiler]. I'll copy-and-paste some things from my review of the previous episode, because they are all relevant here: Some hidden-object scenes are innovative, in that they involve zooming (dumb) or scrolling (cool). Otherwise, they are of moderate difficulty, and sometimes not quite fair. Another innovation is in the hint system, which involves constantly upgrading your robot helper. But ... the whole point of playing such games is to avoid the hints and enjoy the hidden-object scenes! I never used the robot, so this innovation was lost on me. I'd like to thank the developer for supporting Linux, but unfortunately the Linux port isn't good. I could not activate fullscreen mode (though at least I could maximi...

This is the second in the series and if you liked that one then you'll like this one as it's just more of the same. Hidden object scenes with puzzles and adventure elements galore. Very pretty graphics, engaging storyline if just a tad predictable. Worth a look for HO fans.

No matter what you try, this game won't work on Windows 10 64bit.

It's always annoying when technical issues get in the way of enjoyment of a game. I'm doing this to compliment or complain about design decisions, not coding errors. Where's the fun in pointing out that someone forgot to add a colon somewhere in the thousands of lines of text that make up the framework of a game? Still, sometimes games are so badly compromised that it must be mentioned. Clockwork Man: The Hidden World is one such game. It tells the story of Miranda, a young scientist bent of uncovering the secret behind her parents' disappearance nearly a decade earlier. She'll travel to Thule with the help of her clockwork robot sidekick - a small golden droid who speaks entirely in bleeps and bloops, turning him into a sort of combination C-3P0 and R2D2. Sadly, this journey is hampered by both design errors and technical gaffs, which I'll detail as we move through the... Hidden Object Criteria! Criteria 1: To what degree do the puzzle screens look like a thrift store vomited on my ...