If this game was one of the Seven Dwarfs, it would be ‘Happy’
One year has passed since the seven dwarfs helped Snow White defeat the evil queen, and now they’ve retired to a quiet cottage deep in the forest.
But happily ever after is never that easy, and evil is rising once again! The evil queen’s followers plan to use the poison apple to bring about her malevolent return. Snow White has tasked you to destroy the devious fruit once and for all, and rumour has it that the only way to rid the world of its evil is to cast it into the very centre of the earth.
Now it falls to you to save the day. Answer the call, hoist your pickaxe, and prepare to dig deeper than ever before to defeat the evil queen!
We’ve been big fans of Improbable Escapes for a long time and I’m still extremely jealous that Liz got to play one of their games in real-life a couple of years ago when she was in the area and played ‘Legend of The Mayan Temple’. The closest we’ve been able to get to their games lately is by playing their online games and suffice to say, they’re great! We’ve now played all of their online offerings; Neverland, Cure for the Common Zombie, The Hot Chocolate Incident, and the TriWizard Trials. Seven Dwarfs Mining Mission was the final game we had to play to complete the collection (although we’ve heard rumours of a new game coming in 2022).
Games by Improbable are best shared with friends or family, so we invited along James and Charlie from Deadlocked which always ensures a good time. Despite being in different locations, we tuned in using the links given in our introduction email and then all met up in the Zoom call that Improbable had arranged, then, it was time to finally see what all the fuss was about with this game.
CONCEPT/EXECUTION
Like the other online games by Improbable, Seven Dwarfs starts with a slick intro video that has all the feels of a Disney production and it certainly gets you in the mood for what is about to come.
Seven Dwarfs Mining Mission is a ‘real’ game that has been beautifully adapted to the online world and although I have no doubt that it would have been slightly different and perhaps more fun to play in real life, the online game was a great substitute and offers great value for money when you factor in that we didn’t have to purchase flights to Canada.
Online Avatar games are all about the visuals and what you can see in the room, but without being in the room it can be hard to see details. Fortunately Improbable Escapes have used their regular inventory system that enables players to investigate items in greater detail. Not everything is on show from the start, so as we played and discovered items our GM would give us passwords to use to unlock areas in the inventory – simple and effective.
Often a downfall of online games is when there are audio puzzles, or something in the room that involves a TV screen. Once again, Improbable Escapes have thought about this, so for one puzzle where we needed to observe something a bit more closely, it magically appeared in our online inventory.
PUZZLES
We played this game as a very experienced team of four (two of our team are also puzzle designers) and we found the puzzles to be on the easier side compared to some games that we have played. ‘Easier’ puzzles is not necessarily a bad thing, especially when playing online and you only have one pair of hands you can use. Although we managed to complete this game in 40minutes, it was 40 minutes of pure fun and excitement!
This game would have been a real delight to play in person, as so many of the puzzles were tactile and involved manipulating items in the room to find solutions. Because of this, a lot of the puzzles revolved around observation. There was also some light searching (nothing too sneaky here), a bit of logic, pattern recognition, and at least one puzzle that involved colours.
Despite being on the easier side, all the puzzles were fair, extremely satisfying to solve and revolved around the usual high quality props that we have come to expect from Improbable.
GM/CLUE SYSTEM
I must confess, I didn’t actually catch the name of our GM so apologies to her for that – I think we just got lost in this Dwarven world and focussed on the puzzles. Our GM did a great job of being our feet on the ground and was able to follow our instructions without overly guiding us to a solution.
Upon entering a space, she would take time to do a brief tour and explain what was in the room, just to make sure we saw everything. It’s a nice touch and it gave us time to get our bearings and see what was around that we could interact with.
I must confess that I’m not the best with story, so I can’t quite remember if there was a reason (storywise) why our GM was in the room. Personally I think it would have been quite cool if she had played a character, perhaps one of the dwarfs? She could have mounted the camera a bit lower to give a different height perspective on the room. That may have been cool and added to the immersion, but in terms of games-mastering, she was spot on.
FINAL THOUGHTS
We’d been waiting to play this game for a long time, and I’m so glad we finally did. It was wonderful and instantly made us want to head back to Disney. This game is sure to be a family favourite, so round up your little people and get booked in!
GOOD TO KNOW
- Number of connections: 1-30 connections
- Price: CAD$29.95 per person, minimum 3 player price requirement
- Devices: Dual screen or two devices (one for inventory, one for video) suggested
- Platform: Zoom/Web Browser
- Inventory: Yes
- 360º View: No (Pictures Provided)
- Time Zone: EST (Kingston, ON)
Final Rating:
Puzzles | |
Concept/Execution | |
GM/Clue System | |
Value for Money | |
Enjoyment |
Team: 4 players
Time Taken: 40 minutes
Website: https://www.improbableescapes.com
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