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Genre: Adventure Developer & Publisher: Novasoft Interactive Ltd. Released: February 3, 2026 Requirements: OS: Windows 8.1 or higher Processor: Intel Core i5 Memory: 4 GB RAM Graphics: Integrated GFX card Storage: 2 GB available space Installation on an SSD recommended
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By flotsam Aurora Hills: Chapter 2 Novasoft Interactive Ltd Picking up where things left off in Chapter 1, Chapter 2 is more of the same. Which is a good thing. You get a “previously on” to get things going, which should bring you up to speed if it’s been a while since you played. When we left off, Ethan was following the trail of Jennifer Reid, his fellow Park Ranger. A note said she would set up camp and wait, but while he finds the camp it has been ransacked and Jen is nowhere in sight. Which means it is further into the forest, and so we begin. Like Chapter 1, the game is completely point and click, and uses a series of photo-realistic static images to create the game world. You click your way through them, exploring each with your mouse, and back out of each image in order to retrace your steps. There are three areas to explore, each only available after you do everything necessary to be able to move on. Within each area there is plenty to explore and numerous puzzles to solve, and the game has definitely been up-sized. I reckon its about twice the size of the earlier chapter in terms of doing stuff, puzzles included. Which is a good thing, as none of the puzzles are dull, and many are particularly good. Quite often you will find yourself having to recognise what clue/s go with which puzzle, and how do they go together to produce a solution. They are all logical, even if that logic escaped me once or twice. I enjoyed them a lot. You will also find and use a range of items, and combine a few of them as well. There are a lot of things to unlock, codes to discern, images and information to interpret. Fix some machines, restore some power, and change a tyre or two. It’s a satisfying bag of puzzling. When what to do eluded me, the magnifying glass top left could assist. It will be there if you play on Normal, and depending on when it is accessed will point you in the right direction, offer progressive clues to solving puzzles, and even allow you to ‘skip’ the puzzle altogether (i.e., have it solved for you). It might also indicate that you can’t yet solve a particular puzzle, which means there are more clues to be found. I liked that aspect a lot, as it encouraged further exploration and then contemplation. If you play on Hard you will be on your own, but you can turn the hints on at any time in the menu. So too an objective icon might assist, and between them both you shouldn’t be stuck for any longer than you want to be. As in the earlier chapter, there are no hotspots you can identify, and the cursor doesn’t respond as you search. If something seems interesting just click on it. You will certainly click on things that do nothing, but the game might tell you something like “there is nothing else useful in here,” which prevents you clicking on everything in a box/cupboard/trunk etc. just in case. While I missed an object or three, I didn’t miss the lack of hotspots, and thought the game did a good job of suggesting what things might warrant my attention. A camera icon bottom right will be a very handy item. The ability to take photos largely avoids the need for pen and paper. If you think something might be a clue or a significant piece of information, click the camera icon bottom left to take a photo, which will put the image in your album fo revisiting at any time. I took more photos than I needed, but it certainly helped when e.g., a puzzle required collating information from various sources and locations. I still made notes about where unsolved puzzles might be, and even linked those notes with a photo. The larger areas mean you might not remember which puzzle is where, or what still needs to be solved. Or maybe that was just me! There is a degree of necessary backtracking but never into an earlier area. Once you leave one area, you don’t/can’t go back; all the clues you gathered to the puzzles are no longer relevant, and only one (to my recollection) inventory item got carried forward. Which means its really three self contained parts, but it felt manageable rather than limited. Each scene is visually rich, supported by situational music and ambient sound. Your inventory ribbon sits left of screen, and you just drag items to try and use them in the game world. Combining items requires you to click the tool icon at the top of the ribbon, which opens a window into which you can drag the items you want to try and combine. A few cutscenes punctuate events. You can’t save manually, the game saving to a single point on exit. Just hit continue to pick up where you left off. It ends with a dramatic bang, and sets things up for an expanded narrative in Chapter 3. I look forward to it. I played on: OS: Windows 11, 64 Bit Processor: Intel i7-9700K 3.7GHz RAM: Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB DDR4 32GB Video card: AMD Radeon RX 580 8192MB
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