Rupert’s Tune

Rupert’s Tune is an escape room style world with no horror element, but instead relies on crafting and mechanics to challenge players. It offers a variety of actions to perform and presents puzzles in a Valve-esque kind of way; you are shown what to do to solve the basic puzzle element and then builds, improvises upon that for each puzzle afterwards. While some of the solutions are a little tedious, the difficulty ramp is fair. There are only a few challenges towards the end that require some crunching to solve, but thankfully there are plenty of hints around. This world takes a few hours to complete and I love that there is a password save system so you can leave and come back, picking up where you left off. More puzzle worlds should do this so you don’t feel obligated to finish it all in one session. It also has multiple endings, so there is a reason to come back.

The only downside is that the introductory puzzles might be a little cryptic in terms of actions to perform. When I originally explored the space I had no idea how to begin and resorted to reading some of the clues to get started after about 15-30 minutes of uncertainty.

With the password recall system, there really isn’t a reason to not visit this one.

(Rating: 8)

My, my, my… what a puzzle/escape room world this is! Though it all centers in one fairly small room, it really feels like an old point and click adventure much like Myst or other 90s puzzle games of that type. For that, I really appreciate it. The main mechanic here is that items you craft can be combined in order to solve the puzzle, but you must do it in increasingly clever ways. It never really felt stale as there was enough variety in the mechanic to avoid boredom. There are a few head-scratchers here and there, but nothing too incredibly difficult especially if you have a few minds working together.

The world also offers one of my favorite features in any world where you can make ‘progress’: a password system, so you can pick up where you last left off. It benefited our group the most, as my computer ended up restarting itself twice during our adventure and I don’t think I’d have it in me to continue if this feature wasn’t present. Definitely check this one out if you’re a fan of escape rooms and puzzle worlds.

(Rating: 8)