Evil Pumpkin: The Lost Halloween

29.5.2020. Game #127 [h1] I bought this game to support my country. I regret it [/h1] Evil Pumpkin: The Lost Halloween might be remember on Steam for one thing and one thing only. It was the first video game ever to be released on Steam by Serbs. Being an effing Serb myself, I felt like it was my civil duty to buy this game (on sale) and support the developers. I tried hard to like this game but I just couldn’t. [h1] The sad truth about Hidden Object Puzzle Adventure (HOPA) games [/h1] While our neighbors in the north-west are making games like Serious Sam https://store.steampowered.com/app/41000/Serious_Sam_HD_The_First_Encounter/ and The Talos Principle https://store.steampowered.com/app/257510/The_Talos_Principle/, us Serbs here are mostly stuck making, almost exclusively, HOPA games. Hopa games are an interesting breed of games. They mostly consist of really detailed still images, some texts and very light puzzle solving. I actually really like HOPA games. They can be a lot of fun. Not only are they relaxing to play but you can also give your brain a nice workout and even improve your vocabulary while searching for that one hidden item. The problem is that… HOPA …

One of the worst "puzzle" games I've ever played. It is over-written so poorly by someone whose first language was obviously not English that it's hard to follow anything in the story. The puzzles aren't consistent with each other or even themselves, the cursor doesn't change as it should when finding areas, it's stuck in a 4:3 resolution, the hidden object games incorrectly display clues, the puzzles are astoundingly obtuse, and the first thing you have to solve in the game is a godawful "sliding tile" puzzle.

[h1] Very mediocre point & click adventure. Plenty of HOG elements, in some places got stuck so had to check out guide. Story is forgettable and characters a bit bland. For Halloween game it's ok, otherwise skip. [/h1]

This was finally a challenging game, which I had not have in a while. Not the HO scenes, but the riddles you had to solve to continue the story. Well done.

This game had a lot of potential but fell really short. The pro is that it is long for HOG. Unfortunately, it can be really frustrating. Puzzles are sometimes really hard to figure out because there's no explanation. The story really loses steam and there is a ton of backtracking. Overall, it's not a great experience.

How did any of that make sense? Reliant on tapping, clicking around and hoping something might work. Actually made me angry. Finished the game but not without an awful lot of wtf moments.