Tangle Tower

 Switch
User Score
7.7

Generally favorable reviews- based on 27 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 18 out of 27
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 27
  3. Negative: 4 out of 27

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  1. luc1996
    Jan 15, 2020
    10
    Tangle Tower is one of those games that sucks you in and doesn't let you out until you've completed it. After that, it goes on to torture you because you want more of it, but there is no more. From the spot-on voice acting to the music to the beautiful art and story, it just leaves you in love.
  2. AliceFalling
    Oct 27, 2020
    10
    This games feels like true nostalgia of old mystery PC games. It is a true upgrade between the art work, the story, the music, and overall design. From the moment you start you will hear captivating voice acting which serves to bring characters to life. If you get yourself truly involved with the story, and focus on little clues throughout the way, you will find yourself excited to moveThis games feels like true nostalgia of old mystery PC games. It is a true upgrade between the art work, the story, the music, and overall design. From the moment you start you will hear captivating voice acting which serves to bring characters to life. If you get yourself truly involved with the story, and focus on little clues throughout the way, you will find yourself excited to move forward. This game does a great job at slowly revealing things, and a lot of things you just need to pick up on yourself. At one point I audibly gasped as I realized I had already solved part of something from early on, only later to discover I was half way correct, on my way there, but of course their was a twist. The story is intelligent. The puzzles are hard enough, not so hard you will be googling tutorials although hard enough that when you finally finish a puzzle you feel accomplished.

    I highly recommend this game, as it is enjoyable, fun, mysterious, and it makes for a great interactive story.    … Expand
  3. crotch
    Jul 14, 2022
    9
    If you like Professor Layton, you’re gonna like this game. The locations, the characters, the music, the puzzles, the mystery. It’s all here.
  4. Skurttish
    Nov 15, 2020
    9
    A well-designed mystery game with a great story and interesting characters, a distinctive art style, and excellent music. What more do you want?

    One of the few mystery games that really made my wife and I exclaim audibly when the big reveal came around, and yet, when it happened, we found there had been subtle clues all along that we could have picked up on if we had been just a little    A well-designed mystery game with a great story and interesting characters, a distinctive art style, and excellent music. What more do you want?

    One of the few mystery games that really made my wife and I exclaim audibly when the big reveal came around, and yet, when it happened, we found there had been subtle clues all along that we could have picked up on if we had been just a little bit sharper. We have spent the last half a day still talking about the motive behind the crime, the other characters involved, the possibility of the ending not being the true ending (meaning some loose ends were not actually resolved, although they were presented as resolved), and etc. That seems like the mark of a great mystery to me.

    All in all, a really fun game. I am only giving this game a 9 and not a 10 because of the price—this game took me and my wife about 6 hours to complete, and $20 MSRP is too expensive for that length of a game, in my opinion.    … Expand
  5. Rincryo
    Jul 1, 2020
    9
    Pretty art style, good gameplay, and an interesting story, personally one of my favorite mystery/puzzle games right now. Characters are also very cute
  6. CasualGamerGirl
    Oct 18, 2020
    9
    Pros: Good soundtrack, voice acting and graphics; unique art style; fair puzzles.

    Cons: Slightly predictable and cheesy but fun nonetheless.
  7. nusco
    Dec 24, 2019
    8
    I used to love whodunit novels–in particular the sub-genre called "locked room mysteries", where the murder itself seems impossible, as in the case of someone stabbed to death inside a locked room. In those mysteries, understanding how the crime happened is even more of a challenge than identifying the culprit.

    I believed it would be impossible to turn one of those novels into a working    I used to love whodunit novels–in particular the sub-genre called "locked room mysteries", where the murder itself seems impossible, as in the case of someone stabbed to death inside a locked room. In those mysteries, understanding how the crime happened is even more of a challenge than identifying the culprit.

    I believed it would be impossible to turn one of those novels into a working game. Investigation-based games tend to fall flat, because it's just too hard to convey those subtle literary hints through gaming mechanics. Investigative games generally boil down to clicking around blindly, exhausting all the possible avenues of investigation, until the unraveling of the mystery is finally dumped on the screen. (One recent example of that problem is "A Case of Distrust".)

    Long story short, Tangle Tower is a point-and-click locked room mystery that works. The game does steer you towards the right detective-y deductions, but it does that subtly, making you feel like it was *you* doing the reasoning. The mystery itself is involved and intriguing–dark, but full of humorous characters and dialogues, with great animations and voice acting.

    Like in many literary locked room mysteries, the final reveal in Tangle Tower might be implausible–but these stories don't aim for plausibility. They aim for great entertainment that keeps you wondering at every step. Tangle Tower is the first game that I'm aware of that manages to pull that trick.

    By the way: like in many such mysteries, I was convinced I'd identified the murderer at one point–and like in the best of them, I was quite wrong.    … Expand
  8. MindWanderer
    Jul 1, 2022
    6
    There are three key components to a murder mystery: means, motive, and opportunity. You spend most of the game on the first of these. You never establish opportunity: one suspect lies about their alibi and you never prove otherwise. Motive is never even touched on until the end, and it has to be spoon-fed to you because there aren't any clues at all. So as a murder mystery, it's veryThere are three key components to a murder mystery: means, motive, and opportunity. You spend most of the game on the first of these. You never establish opportunity: one suspect lies about their alibi and you never prove otherwise. Motive is never even touched on until the end, and it has to be spoon-fed to you because there aren't any clues at all. So as a murder mystery, it's very unsatisfying.

    The reviews of this game frame it as a puzzle game, but there are only about half a dozen puzzles in the game. You'll spend only a very small amount of your playtime on them. And if you're a fan of puzzle games, you won't find them remotely challenging. So as a puzzle game, it's also very unsatisfying.

    The bulk of the gameplay consists of talking to the suspects about each other and about the clues you find. Some of these are frustrating because they're gated behind certain other conversation options. For instance, one of the clues you find is a telescopic lens. If you've ever encountered a telescope or spyglass at any time in your life, you know what a telescopic lens looks like. And yet, when one character calls it a microscopic lens, you can't challenge them on it until you show it to one specific other character first. Several of them know what type of lens it is, but only one of them triggers the dialogue option. The game has several of these, which force you to show arbitrary items to arbitrary characters to make progress. So as an interview/point-and-click game, it's again very unsatisfying.

    I will say that the art, world-building, and voice acting are top notch. And the writing is also great except that the murder mystery part of it doesn't make a ton of sense. That's not enough for me to be able to recommend this game as a game, though.    … Expand
  9. Rotbeard
    May 12, 2023
    3
    A mystery with a nonsensical resolution is not a good mystery. I loved a lot about the game, but the complete let down of an ending retroactively killed it entirely. What a disappointment.
  10. bustee
    Jul 2, 2022
    2
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Tangle Tower is a beautifully looking murder mystery game, but apart from its gorgeous looks, it falls flat on any other issue that is important to the genre.it is all facade and no content.

    1. The puzzles:
    That amount of puzzles is decent, with most of them not really related to the story whatsoever. The puzzle is there, because there needed to be a puzzle. On top of that, they are without exception way too easy. Could be interesting to grade school kids, but that is it.

    2. The characters:
    The tower is filled with several quirky characters, none of which is well developed. They are all one-dimensional with badly written dialogues that mostly don't make much sense. 3. The dialogues: do not change with the investigation proceeding. You will still talk about missing items that you have already found long ago, because there is no system that keeps the dialogue en par with the state of the game. This is immensely immersion breaking. On top of that, most of the dialogues make hardly any sense to begin with. People deny trivial stuff and you are pressed to "prove" it to them, so the story can continue - albeit the information gained is negligible. Example: (Spoiler) the archetypical goth girl made a music tape for the victim. She denies this, although this would not cast anything negative at her. You then need to prove to her that in fact made the tape and the result from that is basically: "yeah, okay, I made the tape"
    This makes no sense and does neither forward story nor investigation. It is a pure filler!

    4. The story:
    The whole story makes absolutely no sense. In addition, it does not slowly unravel during your investigation. Instead, (spoiler) in the end, the murderer just appears in front of you and tells you his whole backstory, how everything happened and why. Apart from it making no sense whatsoever, you also had no chance to discover it by yourself, because you were never given any information on most of the stuff.

    The end feels like they decided to have enough content, so to wrap things up, they just tell you the whole story directly, because they did not manage to portray anything in the game itself. It is extremely lackluster.

    What remains is a lackluster game, with lackluster characters, lackluster story and lackluster riddles. The only redeeming point is the visual presentation. But this is not what makes a good game -- it merely is a selling point to people who roam the eshop!

    I bought this game with a 75% discount and still feel that is was too expensive. Might be okay for 1-2$ but not more. There are a lot better mystery or point&click adventures on the switch, which are in the same price bracket as this game or even lower. E.g. Agent Z sells for 1-2$ all the time, has a very similar feel, but with a real story and great riddles.    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

22
#22 Best Switch Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
85

Generally favorable reviews - based on 11 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 11
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 11
  3. Negative: 0 out of 11
  1. Gaming Age
    Sep 15, 2020
    91
    Tangle Tower is built around an excellent whodunit mystery that moves along at just the right pace. There’s a great balance of plot, puzzle, and humour, and it does a good job of keeping you invested all the way to the very end. In this respect, you could say that the game carries on in the traditions of the very best adventure games from a few decades ago — but it manages to do so in a way that feels undeniably fresh.
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  2. Cubed3
    Dec 16, 2019
    90
    Charming, original, and terrifically paced, Tangle Tower is a strong contender for the best point-and-click adventure of 2019. Puzzles require real wit without bogging readers down with irrelevant information. Each screen is filled to the brim with detail, blending colour and lighting into a living, breathing tower. Only a few hours long with a gripping mystery at the centre of its plot, Tangle Tower is a must play for fans of the genre.
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  3. Switch Player
    Nov 22, 2019
    80
    Tangle Tower is a pleasure to play. An interesting story, well-crafted gameplay, and a brilliantly diverse cast of characters marred only by small faults here and there still make it an easy recommandation for adventure game fans.
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