Some video games take the slow burn approach to getting you hooked. Green Mist over Portland, however, had me hooked in mere minutes. I’d have a video to share here, but OBS decided not to save the recording. 🙁
“A detective noir puzzle deduction game. Explore a non-linear timeline during the cold war on a globe-trotting adventure following a trail of spies from a quiet English harbour town to a frozen Finnish fishing village and the corridors of an intelligence service rotten at its core.“
The upcoming puzzle-mystery Cold War thriller from Bushmonkey (Will Picard) immediately establishes a strong sense of atmosphere. Its blend of historical inspiration, intriguing worldbuilding, and globetrotting adventure made me want to learn everything I could about its characters, locations, and hidden mysteries. Being rooted in the Cold War, with various story elements set in earlier years, gives Green Mist over Portland a layer of authenticity and intrigue, because SPYCRAFT!
There are mystery games that will beat you over the head with exposition, but Portland isn’t one of them. You’re not told to find X, Y, and Z to move on. Finding information has you piecing together clues from a myriad of places, from one character at the archives at MI6, to another character, a clairvoyant who can journey into memories in the right set of circumstances, discovering each clue was a well-earned EUREKA moment and led me to want to dig deeper and deeper into the mystery.
Bushmonkey cites Return of the Obra Dinn, The Case of the Golden Idol, and The Roottrees Are Dead as inspirations for the game, and fans of those three will immediately recognize the emphasis on observation, deduction, and making connections.
Even with that, one of the opening puzzles nearly ended my run before it really kicked off.
I love puzzle and detective games and how challenging they can be. I even appreciated that Green Mist over Portland has a built-in hint system. But the cipher puzzle introduced early in the demo felt like a significant spike in difficulty compared to other things I was doing. After spending far longer than I expected trying to decipher the solution from the hints presented, I found myself inching oh-so-close to rage-quitting territory.
If Bushmonkey gives this a read, I hope the full release includes an optional tutorial or some sort of onboarding for players. Ciphers make sense for this kind of game, and I hope I run into more of them in the full release, honestly. I’m sure I’m not the only one, but I love getting taught how to do new things.
The user interface was also the source of some confusion. Because you’re switching between characters and locations (and years), there were moments where I wasn’t entirely sure where I should be clicking or moving towards. You could also pin documents and photos to the side to keep track of things, but it took me some time to figure out how to unpin them. Will it become more intuitive in time? Maybe, but perhaps some elements could benefit from clarity before the final release.
Even with those frustrations, Green Mist over Portland left a strong impression. From its compelling mystery and excellent atmosphere to its historical foundation, the game has a distinct identity.
One thing I didn’t realize until after finishing the demo is that Green Mist over Portland is a sequel to The Red Pearls of Borneo, which came out in March this year. That discovery immediately moved Bushmonkey’s earlier title onto my backlog. If Portland’s mystery captivated me this quickly, I’m curious to see where the story began.
Despite a few rough edges, Green Mist over Portland is a demo that accomplished the most important thing a demo can do: it made me want more. With a planned Q4 release on the horizon, it’s firmly on my radar, and I’ll be checking out The Red Pearls of Borneo while I wait to see where the mist leads next.
Is it for you? It’s absolutely worth adding to your wishlist if you enjoy narrative mysteries, historical settings, and detective adventures that don’t shy away from challenging you.
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