Secret Files: Tunguska

The environments are perfect.

A nice point ’n’ click adventure with an interesting, albeit none too original plot. The puzzles are fine and the elegant inventory adds to the gameplay. A few illogical issues and the overly dramatic dialogue do not spoil the pleasure of playing the game. [Dec 2006]

Coming from an adventure game fan, I found it a very fulfilling addition to my collection, and from a relatively unknown German game developer (Fusionsphere Systems) I can offer only congratulations to them for a decent brain testing continuation of the genre.

So if you enjoy inventory based adventures that occasionally have you combining the most unlikely objects, narrative that rolls along at a fairly brisk pace, sumptuous graphics, a good soundtrack, and humour that owes itself to some inventive language translation as much as anything else... then I would recommend giving Secret Files: Tunguska a go.

A great, if not fantastic adventure game that any fans of the genre must get a copy of. It was surprisingly intriguing and has now perhaps spoilt things for me, as anything less than ‘Tunguska quality’ and I’ll be gaming elsewhere.

Since the game is so friendly and upbeat, it might work as a family adventure, as long as you don’t mind a few sporadic instances of profanity.

It won't blow you away with its narrative or characters, but Secret Files: Tunguska can still entertain with some interesting puzzles and easy to use interface.

The ability to search your surroundings is a much-needed feature in the genre, and makes the game, and the genre as a whole, a lot more enjoyable when you don’t have to continually search every pixel on the screen.

A highly-polished game, but suffers from an uninspired design. While it remains mostly pleasant to play, it is not as satisfying an experience as it ought to have been.

It has a fine mixture of humorous moments, special effects and seemingly random solutions that are sure to make it a cult classic. All you need to get through it is a few old episodes of MacGyver, a spare mouse and a Nancy Drew mystery novel.

Tunguska is a decent adventure game, but one that doesn’t rise above the crowd in any significant way.

Tunguska is one of those shining stars that even though it could have been better it is about the best that you can get for a game that you will only play once.

And the story's intriguing.

Despite lacking any significant innovation, the game features solid gameplay that minimizes obtuse puzzle-solving in favor of object interactions.

MacGyver-esque inventory puzzles make this an acceptable, if exceedingly conventional, adventure.

It makes some small progress in freeing point-and-click from the needless bonds of tradition but is it really a compelling, imaginative experience that proves mouse-based adventuring isn't dead? Nope. Not even close.

Tunguska suffers from a lack of true writing quality, which in the end is what matters the most, and what made the classic LucasArts adventure games so much fun to play. One for genre fanatics only.

I really wanted to love Secret Files but I walked away feeling disappointed. The moment I finished it, I cleared it off my hard drive, since there's practically no replay value and no part of the game that I enjoyed enough to replay.

However, the puzzles are downright asinine, suffering from illogical design and poor execution. [Mar 2007, p.72]

An adequate and traditional (read 'hugely dated') point-and-click, and there's some charm to the puzzles and story. [Jan 2007, p.76]

Tunguska's lush, atmospheric background art and slick FMV cut-scenes add measurable value to the experience, but its terrible English voice dubbing--Nina sounds like a teenage Nancy Drew--and the puerile(and occasionally sexist)dialog are often excruciating. [Feb. 2007, p.70]

A game so monotonous, it's inspired a new word - 'tediocre'. [Christmas 2006, p.90]

There are games out there that are five and six years old that do point and clicking better than this. That’s not to say that it’s distinctly flawed, because it runs along just nicely. It’s just not very good.

It just doesn’t do anything to make it stand out from the crowd.