The clues lead the players to a perpetrator of the crimes. The players of the “Mystery Case Files: Huntsville” are role acting as detectives trying to solve crimes in the town of Huntsville by finding clues in various scenes.

This seminal game, Mystery Case Files: Huntsville, was a bit like the classic who-done-it board game Clue. Other games offer limited hints, maybe three or four per game or picture.Ĭonventional wisdom is that the first computer hidden object game was offered in November 2005 by the casual game portal Big Fish Games. Some games offer unlimited hints if the player gets stuck which helps if you absolutely cannot locate an object. When all the objects are found, you solve a mystery or complete a quest. Some of the games include a series of objects or clues to find with each clue building on the last. Many of the games require the player to solve the puzzle in a limited time. Other types are more complicated and include a series of clues you find in order to solve a larger mystery or complete a quest. The simplest version of these games requires the player to find a list of hidden objects in a complex room, scene or area. The hidden object computer games are the internet version of these classic paper puzzles. The games were passed out to occupy students during recess on rainy days or to keep a student constructively busy when they completed an assignment before the rest of the class. Similar hidden object pictures were a favorite with kindergarten and primary school teachers who would use the old mimeograph machines to replicate these puzzles for their classes. If you read the children’s magazines Highlight’s For Children or Jack and Jill when you were growing up you will remember the hidden pictures puzzle pages which were a regular feature in the magazines. The goal of a hidden object game is to find hidden pictures camouflaged in a larger picture or scene.

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