Case 01: The Object (Unsolved Science) // Review

Case 01: The Object is a science-based mystery adventure from Unsolved Science. Your task is simple: investigate a mysterious object and, using science and research, discover what it is and where it came from. As it says on the box, “Challenge Accepted”.

Players: 1-4 // Age: 12+ // Playtime: 2-3 hours

What you need: A pen/pencil and paper. An internet-connected device.

Story

“Become the scientist and use real experiments and data to solve head-scratching mysteries. Work alone or as a group of up to 4 players to uncover why the space science division at the ill-behaved Zeta Intelligence organization is so excited about their latest discovery – a simple looking rock.”

First impressions

Case 01: The Object is an innovative take on a mystery game and I’ve been eager to take it for a spin for quite some time. Playing as a member/s of a research team investigating a mysterious rock-like object, you are tasked with determining exactly what it is and where it came from. The stakes are high as the Zeta Intelligence organization, known for flouting humanitarian laws, is currently conducting its own investigations. They will, no doubt, wish to use their findings for nefarious purposes.

Within the box are three investigation packs that are sealed within plastic yellow packets, along with a fourth which contains an answer sheet. You’ll work through these one at a time, verifying your answers after completing each investigation. I played the game over several evenings by working through an investigation at a time and found this to work well. If you have the time, you can play it all in one go.

Other items you’ll find in the box include a UV torch, mysterious powders, an ordinary-looking rock and other documents. It also includes some stick-on name tags and achievement stickers (‘Science Wiz’, ‘Best note taker’, ‘Don’t quit your day job’) which can be affixed to the name tags. This is a really nice touch if you are playing with kids as it adds another layer of achievement.

Gameplay

The Evidence Board

You can’t run an investigation without an Evidence Board to pull together the threads and interrogate the information you’ve collected. The board comes in the form of an A3 sheet with a column for each separate stage of your investigation. In each column, there are key questions for you to answer that will help unravel the mystery. This functions brilliantly as a way to keep track of your progress, log key information and ultimately solve the case at the end.

Questions are labelled with different levels of challenge, including some you can answer right away, and others that you may not be able to answer until you have completed subsequent investigations. A ‘dig deep’ label system is used to indicate specific levels of difficulty for each question. This consists of 1-3 pink dots: 1 for easier questions that you can answer during your current investigation, and 3 for questions that will require information from multiple investigations.

Astrosearch

To aid your research, Unsolved Science provides a bespoke search engine, Astrosearch. This can be used to search for key terms relating to the questions you need to answer and the experiments you are conducting. The benefit of it being a custom search engine is that you won’t find yourself searching endlessly among unrelated results and becoming overwhelmed. All the content is relevant and it is your job to draw together the right information to formulate answers.

You’ll use Astrosearch fairly extensively during gameplay, so be prepared to open and switch between lots of tabs. Search results include glossary pages for specific keywords, and articles, which usually include diagrams and more detailed information.

Investigations & Experiments

Case 01: The Object operates more like a deductive mystery than a traditional ‘puzzle’ game, in that you are pulling together information from various sources and piecing a picture together. There aren’t any ciphers to solve or logic grids. You’ll have to use keen observation skills, vigorous research and hands-on experiments to uncover the rock’s secrets.

Unsolved Science excels at the educational aspect of the game, which is interwoven seamlessly with the deductive/puzzle elements throughout. The hands-on experiments were fun and reminded me of being back at school (in a good way). I won’t go into the specifics of the experiments as it may ruin the fun, but they added an extra dimension to gameplay.

Although there isn’t great replayability with this game, there is a refill pack that can be purchased alongside the main game. This allows you to replace any consumables used and pass it on or resell it to someone else.

Hints & Difficulty

I played this game with my partner and we found it to be challenging in places, partly because we haven’t had to think about science so much since we were at school (which wasn’t that recent!). That being said, it is a good sort of challenging because you are learning new things along the way. All the information you need is readily available, you just need to piece it together.

Hints are available online if you need them and are helpfully tiered into three levels: Level 1 – Some subtle help, Level 2 – A bit more help and Level 3 – Spoilers. If you are still stumped, you can access the solution.

Verdict

About Unsolved Science

Disclaimer: Unsolved Science kindly sent me a copy of this game in exchange for an honest review. This in no way influences the content of my review.