Today's game for Club Members, tomorrow's game for all.

You can download Mystery Trackers: Memories of Shadowfield Collector's Edition here.



As always, please remember to come back and tell us what you think.

Happy gaming!

One of my favorite series. Can't wait to try.

Thanks, Marian!

I hope you like it, Sparkle.

At over halfway through, it's safe to say that Memories of Shadowfield is better than most HOPAs. The set-up for the action is intriguing. Even if the first twist is obvious, I am hoping for another pleasant twist at the end to explain the first. That said, I wish the graphics were a skosh crisper. The evidence this is technically possible gets dangled in front of me in every game that prior to the opening displays a sumptuous image announcing, rather ironically, that the game experience is better with the sound on. Also in Shadowfield just after the audio advice screen is a visually stunning screen for options, etc., of a serious spectacled man in a suit his notebook at the ready; on small table to screen right ticks a metronome. I wish the rest of the game looked as great.

I'm posting now because I encountered or more likely manufactured a small glitch. When you are in a front yard, there is a simple arrange the zodiac puzzle on a key chain. Do it when you open it. Don't exit the game with the puzzle ongoing; go look up zodiac signs for probably the 100th time since playing Curse of Blackmoor Manor and every game thereafter that requires them; and then come back to Shadowfield. The good news is that I could still skip the puzzle. Possibly I could have completed it because despite the fact signs of the zodiac were no longer aligned with the slots, the signs could be slid into the receptacle; however, at that point I lost patience and skipped.

Thank you for all of that information about the game. I haven't played the last few Mystery Trackers games so I don't know how well the series has been holding up, but this one sounds worth taking a look at.

Finished the main game. If you care about length, this is way too short to justify the price. Length is something I don't much care about unless I really like the game a lot more than I do this one. My main complaint is visual dullness both in terms of mediocre technical quality and scenic choices. For example a forklift in an industrial exterior and a few tasks in an adjacent garage held no charms for me. Only two screens/sets had much visual potential and those remained largely unexplored. That said, maybe brevity was a good idea because I was toying with abandoning the game when I realized it was almost over so I finished it. My slant toward negativity is the result of hoping, based on liking several of the earlier games, for more than Mystery Trackers delivers in Shadowfield. If this were the effort of an unknown developer starting a new series, I might be thinking "hmm, shows potential" although my caveats would not change.

Thanks for all of that. I recently finished a HOPA, with my main complaint being that the game had too many industrial/dingy settings. A little of that is fine with me if it serves the storyline, but there was just way too much of it for my taste.

This is why I never pay more than $6.99 for CEs; I wait for those great sales. That way, if it's a short game, I don't feel cheated.

Someone else on the forum for the game commented that it was a short game, as well. I usually don't pay that much attention to that, because I don't know if the player skipped puzzles and used the hint button a lot. I don't think you are that kind of player, though.

Here's hoping for a brighter (and longer) bonus chapter.

Marian, I routinely use hints on the last item in an HO screen to cut the tedium, also in games that are both boring and lack a semblance of internal logic. Here's what happens when the game is fuzzy, pink and lavender or otherwise graphically sloppy, without much of a plot, and composed of constant to and fro to get cache objects: first, I start using the map; second, I get hints; third, I say the heck with this and don't finish. Shadowfield wasn't that bad.

Because I remembered liking earlier Mystery Trackers I am replaying Four Aces. I am as immersed as I was the first time and quite as embarrassed to be enjoying the animal helper. Four Aces is a brilliantly detailed casual game, so I only use hints on the last item in hidden object screens. Son of a gun, I had to skip a silly puzzle in a game loaded with better than average puzzles when I tricked myself about how to manipulate some refrigerator magnets. I recollect doing the same thing the first time I played. I readily acknowledge that even game developers a lot less accomplished than Elephant are usually cleverer than I.

I admire Oldbroad for always finishing a game she buys. I am not that disciplined a purchaser.

Four Aces was great, as were some of the other early Mystery Trackers games. I don't remember much about them at all now and they would be very good for a replay.

Oldbroad not only finishes most of the games she starts but is also very determined about not getting hints unless all else fails. Consider me impressed.

Aw shucks. Stop making me blush Marian. I'm sure I am not the only person who likes to finish the games they start. And, I get a lot of help usually!