ARGYX Games - "Mystery Poster 1: A Greek Life"

Photo above is property of ARGYX Games

Company: ARGYX Games

Game: Mystery Poster 1: A Greek Life

Country: France 🇫🇷

Language: English

Type of Game: Tabletop Games 📬

Genre: Puzzles by Mail

Date Played: August 22, 2022

Difficulty (based on 2 players): 6/10

Size of Team: Unlimited (Recommend 1-3 Players)

Time: Unlimited (Approximately 2-3 Hrs.)

Price: €13.00

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As you open the door and enter into what was once your great grandfather’s office, you are welcomed by a room full of random oddities. Some more rare than others but each high in sentimental value that you are sure. Most of the items look Greek in origin but others are a testament to hobbies and interests your great grandfather had, like photography and music. All the effects though, represent the story and tell the tale of your great grandfather, Jules Daumier. Wanting to teach you more about your family, you father designed a puzzle connecting the pieces found in this room and Jules’ story for you to learn about his life.

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Unfolding the poster to its full size of A1 (or 59.1cm x 84.1cm for those outside Europe), you find a collage of items, photographs, and cryptic messages on the poster. On the bottom corner is a QR code to help start your exploration.

Photos above are property of ESCAPETHEROOMers

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Unfolding the poster, you can find a QR code on the bottom corner of this inquisitive poster. Scanning it will take you to a webpage that will introduce the back story to you and onboard you to the game. You can then go to the webpage that recounts the life of your great grandfather, Jules Daumier. The recounting though will be missing information from the story, which you can learn from solving the puzzles.

There were not too many twists in the story but it felt right for the game. We were not looking for some deep, dark family secret but simply learning the believable life tale of our great grandfather. One thing that this game lacked though was a more definitive ending. Once we solved all the puzzles and were able to piece together the full story, we were hoping for a wrap up and outro.

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An attention to detail is a must for these puzzles. For the most part, they required us to make connections to different pieces on all sides of the poster and figure out how to work with them, usually through similarities or notes. There were a couple of puzzles that required some research that we did have trouble finding the answers even though we knew what to search but for the most part, all the puzzles were solid.

There is a link to the hint system in the game which also has each puzzle ranked by difficulty. The hints were tiered in a gradual way that was well done. For the more difficult puzzles, there were more hints than the easier ones, which felt like we were never merely given the answers. The hint system also ranks each puzzle by difficulty. Though the order of the puzzles are not in order of difficulty, ARGYX recommends starting from easiest to hardest, which we would as well. There was a point as well that we just started making connections and followed them to see where we ended up. You will need access to internet and will need some outside knowledge to solve the puzzles, but we felt the game did a good job in cluing us to do so.

Photos above are property of ESCAPETHEROOMers

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Though story light, "A Greek Life" has a realistic memoir which made it feel more immersive for us. This game was puzzle heavy which had us racking our minds, trying to make connections, with some satisfying eureka moments when we were able to break through. This game was just a poster, but it felt like there was a full box of artifacts that we got to sift though and discover what mysteries they each held. This would be a great game for any history buffs, people who have a love of anything Greek or even those who are itching to travel to a new place. We would recommend this as a game for intermediate puzzles solvers and for people who love puzzle hunts. The game does recommend only 1-3 people but if you lay the poster out on a big enough table, you could probably squeeze a few more people around it. The poster was beautifully and enigmatically crafted and would definitely start a conversation with any visitors seeing it hung up in your house, where then you could tell them the story of your great grandfather Jules Daumier.

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Check out our interview with the creators to understand more on the development side of the game:

Video above is property of ESCAPETHEROOMers

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(If you do decide to try this game, give us a shoutout or tag us on social media so we know you heard it from "ESCAPETHEROOMers"!)

Disclosure: We thank ARGYX Games for providing us with a sample of their game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.

#MatthewLui #AtHomeGames #TabletopGames #PuzzlesByMail #OneOffs #ARGYXGames #France