The detective mystery sequel The Mermaid Mask and the meta-layered escape room Looking for Fael are both available now after releasing earlier this week. Both games have been in development and on our wishlists for some time now; let's take a look at each of them.
Filled with quirky, illustrated characters of all shapes and sizes, The Mermaid Mask has you joining detectives Grimoire and Sally to interview this colorful cast of characters and piece together what happened to Captain Mortuga, owner of an unusual submersible vessel off the coast of an abandoned town.
Examining 3D clue objects and interrogating suspects form the mechanical basis of this point-and-click mystery game which follows after Tangle Tower, a previous mystery starring our detective duo which got a good amount of attention and won some 2019 indie awards. Before that one came the origin of the series, simply titled Detective Grimoire, which debuted back in 2014 and picked up an IGF mention too.
I enjoyed Tangle Tower quite a bit when I played a few years ago, and I'm looking forward to the new one. These are lighthearted, whimsical mysteries full of hand-drawn charm that remind me a lot of the vibes you get playing Professor Layton games.
The Mermaid Mask is currently discounted by 10% on Steam, and the previous game is real cheap at 80% off.
Looking for Fael, meanwhile, contains decidedly fewer people. Billed as a "surreal, mind-bending and immersive escape-room game" this one looks to be one of those first-person puzzle games that doesn't fit super cleanly into a predefined genre category because it's doing a variety of different things. "Escape room" feels like the closest fit, but it appears that things get multi-layered and subversive pretty quickly:
It all starts with a strange voice message left by Fael, your roommate. Little by little, the apartment you thought you knew multiplies into a multifaceted maze filled with mysterious puzzles.
In search of a sign of life from your roommate, you'll have to learn to find your bearings in this enclosed space with its strange and lonely atmosphere. Advance room by room, decipher the clues left behind, and embark on the adventure that has transformed your apartment into a surreal maze.
So we'll be decrypting strange messages, interfacing with a range of contraptions and environmental puzzles that connect different rooms together, and also playing some Game Boy? There are clips of a faux-Nintendo handheld device that you'll occasionally dip into for some Tetris-esque block puzzles. Like I said, it's doing a lot, not to mention the narrative that goes places like "questioning the nature of reality."
Looking for Fael is available now on Steam (with a 15% launch discount) in addition to PS5, Switch 1&2 and Xbox.
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