I was having a gander through our news pages the other day, as one does, and a story caught my eye, about a new mobile game called Mystery Mania, that people are raving about. Now, the people who know me well know that generally, mobile games are of about as much interest to me as the 1903 Croatian Ladies’ football team, but after a quick read through of the story, I was intrigued.
So, bought, downloaded, and played with, to see what the fuss is about (and I eventually found it on Sony Ericsson’s own site, for £4.50).
Ooooooooooh, the little robot dude in it, F8 is reet cute! A little robot detective with a head apparently made from the monitor on an Acorn Electron has stolen my heart. The game’s story begins with F8 suddenly being brought online in a deserted mansion, with no memory of who he is, how he got there, why there’s an alarm going off, or where The Investor is. So, off you go, through the mansion, solving a little mini-mystery in each room, to progress further and further along, find out who you are, why you’re there and so on.
Pretty standard puzzle game type stuff, then. The interface is dead easy to master, and the puzzles (none of which are particularly taxing) are fun to work out.
What sets Mystery Mania apart though, as reviews of it have said, is the fact it’s got personality coming out of its earholes. F8 is eminently adorable, especially when you pick the wrong bit to use as a solution to whatever mystery presents itself, and he gets flung across the room in comical fashion. That leads on to my favourite bit of the game: you can’t die. Even when you do completely the wrong thing, you always recover (no Lara Croft style impaling on spikes, here), dust yourself off and carry on in the same lovably robotic way.
All in all, it’s not a long game, by any stretch of the imagination, and the puzzles aren’t particularly taxing (except for two rooms that had me pulling my hair out), but it’s fun. Pure fun. And if you want a game on your phone that you’ll really enjoy playing, get Mystery Mania, right now…
Favourite bit? F8 kicking a landmine to make it work…
(Reviewed on a Sony Ericsson X1)
Have you played Mystery Mania? Leave us a comment and share your love for F8!