I played Labyrinths of the World: Hearts of the Planet when it was first released and enjoyed it. While it wasn't anything all that different from other Domini games that I have played, it suited my mood at the time. Your criticisms of the game, Reenie, are certainly valid and I pretty much agree with them, but none of what you mentioned bothered me at all.

I can't even get back into Black Swan as the .exe has stopped working. Don't much care though.

Tonight I played about an hour of Blue Tear and so far I rather like it. I ran into a couple of different, fun puzzles and one kind of hard HO scene. We'll see how it goes!

Keep us posted! This is yet another unplayed game in my Purchase History. I think I have two or three games by this developer.

Finished Blue Tear tonight. I'm not sure how you would like the game. For me it started out better than it ended but I did like it. It was sort of weird. I skipped one puzzle that I feel I should have been able to figure out but after 3 different sessions of not figuring it out, I was ready to move on. The rest of the puzzles were easy enough. I spent about 10 hours on the game. I'm not really sure how else to describe it.

That's a really long playing time again, which is good to know. I will probably give it a try at some point.

And some of these games are kind of weird, so I think I know what you mean when you say this. Depending on the level of weirdness, it can sometimes make the game more interesting. Or less.

I seem to take a lot longer playing these games than most people do Marian. I'm not sure why. Maybe because I wander aimlessly instead of using the maps. Or maybe I'm just not that smart!

I think it's because you make a conscious effort to try not to use the hint or skip buttons. Developers would appreciate more players like you, given the effort that is put into making the games.

I have just been playing Cruel Games: Red Riding Hood for 2 hours and I am really enjoying the game a lot. I am playing from a disc on my Windows 7 computer but also have it as part of a bundle from Steam.

I played Cruel Games a few months ago and enjoyed it very much. It was one of the best standard-version-only games I played this year.

I just finished playing Endless Fables: The Minotaur's Curse CE and really enjoyed it. Now I'm starting Endless Fables: Frozen Path CE (the second in the series).

I have the Endless Fables series but I haven't played any of them yet. Good to hear you enjoyed the first game smitty145!

I have played both Minotaur's Curse and Frozen Path (the latter just in the last few months). I liked them both.

Well, I'm sorry to report that I was disappointed at the end of Cruel Games: Red Riding Hood for two reasons. The first was that I had to skip a puzzle where you categorize 9 books between 3 shelves. I didn't know most of the stories so I ended up Googling but still couldn't figure it out. The second was that I'm not sure I understood the ending. Oh well. On to the next one!

I don't even remember the ending so can't comment on it. I wish I did!

I tried to play Sherlock Holmes: Mystery of the Persian Carpet (Steam) but the game seems to freeze and I can't do anything. I thought maybe I wasn't doing something right and found a walkthrough here by MaG. I created a new profile and tried a different mode but same thing. I don't see anything I was doing wrong or not doing, so instead I switched to Sherlock Holmes: Hound of the Baskervilles (disc). Only played a half hour so far.

I believe I know what the problem is with Persian Carpet. I too thought the game had frozen when this happened. If this happened where I am thinking it did, the solution can be found in this thread.

Marian, I'm not seeing any "conversation" in that link?? I'm sure that is the right spot though.

Never mind. I went directly to Steam to look at it. I'll let you know!

This is almost certainly your problem. I had the same thing happen to me during the tutorial.

Well, I'll check it out later when I boot up my Windows 7. I had read something about how long something takes. I know I have to click where it is pointing but it was not allowing any clicking at all, so maybe I will just let it sit for awhile to see what happens. I'll update later.

Thanks Marian. I had looked at the walkthrough and at the (bad) reviews to see if any of them said the game didn't run but they all just seemed to not like the game, not that they were having technical difficulties. I didn't think to look at "discussions".

Another person online said that you also need to click on the red x in the upper right-hand corner of the screen, but I don't remember if I needed to do that. I'm just throwing it out there as something else to think about when you are looking at that screen again. What makes this part particularly confusing is that the game won't allow you to exit the game or go to the main menu, so it really does seem like the whole thing has frozen up. I think I ended up hitting control/alt/delete and rebooting my computer as I was that certain that there was no other way out. This screen just isn't intuitive.

Here's an old thread from Big Fish for the game - as you will see, some folks are posting about the "freeze" in the tutorial. And one of the posters said this by way of reply:

I just went to page one of that same Big Fish thread and found my own post explaining what to do in that Cement Works screen. How nostalgic.

"I just went to page one of that same Big Fish thread and found my own post explaining what to do in that Cement Works screen. How nostalgic. grin "

Well, I don't know what my problem was. I did click around where I was supposed to but must have missed the matches which I could not see. I didn't have any problem with it tonight. The items are very small though and hard to find. Thankfully, the silhouettes show the description when you hover over them to help you figure out what you are looking for. It is a pretty tedious game though so far. Then, it showed that it was saving after I finished Level 2 so I was going to exit out of the game, but no, I had to first click where the game told me to click before I could access the main menu. I am very happy that there is a MaG walkthrough available if/when I want to use it.

Anyway, I'm glad I mentioned the game and that you were able to help get me going in it Marian. Thank you!!

I am really glad that you mentioned it too, oldbroad! You are welcome.

I just finished playing Labyrinths of the World: Hearts of the Planet. I have played 12 games in that series and found four of them to be excellent and I will Replay them at some point. A few were not very good or had arcade play which I don't like in my games. The others were OK, but not stellar.

This game was a bit of a disappointment. It felt like a completely different crew of game designers had been involved, one that equated a good game with lots of colorful smoke, Disneyland scenics and no real plot, motivation or character development. A couple of the puzzles were poorly explained and obscure to solve. If it were the first game in this series that I had played, I doubt I would have gone on to play any others.

Still, I can strongly recommend other games in this series: Easter Island, When Worlds Collide, The Wild Side and Lost Island. Good games, long, pesky puzzles, sometimes a bit cartoony, some with timed puzzles, but OK. I plan to Replay those.

Thank you for the review, Reenie. I enjoyed the game despite its flaws. Good to hear your recommendations for other games in the series.

Just broke into MCF: Moths to a Flame. Wow; different! I like it, but might become hairless very soon.