Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (2024, Windows) Review

FRANCHISE-SAVING FUN

Licence games ain't shit no more. When I was a kid, they were the bottom of the barrel. They always got churned out quickly and carelessly to capitalize on some big movie premiere. Most of them became platformers or beat'em ups. Little did they care whether those were fitting genres for the character in question. Luckily, today we have more genres.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle respects Indy. The game is a clear-cut genre exercise - it's an immersive sim - but implements it in a sensible way. It lets the player control the adventuring archaeologist from his point of view as he explores historical sites, smacks nazis over the head and parkours with the grace of an ox. If I were to compare it to any game, it would be Dishonored with a bullwhip and fedora.

Voiced by the chameleon actor Troy Baker, whose method acting seems to have gone to the lengths where he underwent throat surgery to adapt Harrison Ford's vocal cord configuration, Indy leads us through his best adventure since Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). Baker's bravura performance channels Ford's gruff charm, nazi hatred and enthusiasm for ancient secrets with conviction.

Taking place in 1937 (chronologically one year after Raiders of the Lost Ark) the plot is ridiculous with a straight face. In other words, it follows tradition. A scary giant of a man breaks into Barnett College, where Indy is a professor, and steals a small cat mummy statue. Indy goes out on a worldwide search to get it back and crack its secret, which leads to a weapon of frightening power. As per usual, the nazis and fascists, led by the maniacal Emmerich Voss, are also trying to find it.

On my way there, I kept getting sidetracked by amazing side expeditions, with puzzles and storylines just as intricate as the main quest. I went to great lengths to solve them all. Whether rescuing kidnapped wannabe archaeologists, or aiding young damsels as they go spelunking through ancient jungle temples, they were all constructed with almost wasteful care and attention to detail.

Above all, the story provides fertile soil for fun action set pieces and weird archaeological puzzles. I'm not surprised that Machinegames are capable of replicating the Indy experience this well. Their reboot of the Wolfenstein games were all deeply respectful, but no less playful interpretations of their source material. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is that and more; it considers how Indy's adventures would play out between important movie scenes.

We do get the cinematic stuff; the globetrotting, the action set pieces and the quippy banter between Indy and his female companion, the journalist Gina Lombardi. She's more Marion than Willie, a confident but sometimes aggravating presence. I don't mind her, but I didn't feel the romantic spark between her and Indy that's required to make her a great character.

Another minor gripe is that I didn't hear the classic John Willams main theme until the end credits. Sacrilegious! Sure, the score we get captures the same matinée spirit - it has the same orchestral setup - and even borrows the occasional Williams stanza. But it lacks the catchiness of the original score. In hindsight, I can't remember a single new tune.

Between all the linear cinematic stuff, the story is more of a slow burn. The maps are surprisingly large. I spent a lot of time in stealth or disguise, avoiding prying nazi eyes as I rummaged through their offices, tents and excavation sites. The clues I discovered led me through ancient temples and crypts in such diverse locations as the Vatican, Egypt and Siam (which today is called Thailand). I had to look carefully for resources like bandages, ammo and food items, because I needed them.

Exploration is nicely framed by the highly detailed environments. Every place feels real and handcrafted. No location repeats itself. Every single room in the civilzed settings looks unique in layout and decoration. Meanwhile, the dark crypts and tombs of Egypt are full of storied secrets. The sound design is great and surprisingly quiet a lot of the time. Hiding behind barrels or debris you can overhear fascists complain about their orders or reveal the location of some hostage you're looking for. It's a highly immersive world; had I played this as a kid, when Indiana Jones was my favorite hero, it would've been my favorite game.

From magazines to ancient relics, to solving puzzles or quests; anything interesting you find or do generates adventure points you can spend on skill upgrades. You get a camera in the Vatican, and taking interesting pictures adds even more. But in order to learn the skill you first need to find the corresponding skill book. These improve your fighting, exploration or stealth tricks.

The puzzles are amazing, and I sometimes had to rack my brain down to the stem. When I got stuck, it was usually because I overlooked some significant detail in the vicinity; some lever I needed to reach with the whip, or a vital clue in my notes. The puzzles come in all shapes, and can revolve around elementary things like light and water flow. Figuring out the numerical combination of safes in nazi camps are fun distractions in tense situations.

Pretty though the locations may be, they're not always that intuitive to actually traverse. The first open area, the Vatican, feels weirdly gated. Your map won't do you much good. You might stand ten meters from your objective marker but to get there, you might need to take a long detour up scaffolding, through windows and acroos rooftops. It gets better after you unlock certain shortcuts, but the layout remains confusing.

Siam is also a headache; it's monsoon season, so you have to travel via boat. The map is a maze of rivers, obstacles and islands. Embarking and disembarking all the time, as well as the constant mapchecking, becomes a nuiscance. Also, enemies are everywhere. You need to approach each new location with a bit of caution, which slows the game down further.

Most people would probably lambast the poor enemy AI. Enemies might spot you on a clear day, sneaking around with a baseball bat in hand, and the detect-o-meter above their head starts to fill. But as soon as you're out of sight, they'll say something like "probably just an animal". The meter disappears and they return to their patrols. But I'm not complaining; the forgiving nature of the stealth sections speeds up progress. The game is surprisingly long, especially if you complete the sidequests. It took me 29 hours to beat.

For a game that encourages caution, melee combat is remarkably entertaining. You may grab any object that's remotely handy as an improvised weapon and clobber the enemy on the forehead. It truly feels like a brawl. Frying pans, broomsticks, fly swatters - anything is fair game. Enemies can do the same. I laughed out loud when I woke up a sleeping nazi and he chased after me, plunger in hand. The only thing missing is the sound of a cuckoo when you knock them out cold.

Indy knows all the moves you'd expect - punches, dodges, blocks, combos - and your bullwhip can stun an enemy. The unique takedowns each improvised weapon demonstrates add slapstick qualities to the violence, and the resulting nazi ragdolling is hilarious. Ranged combat sucks, however. Aiming is hard, reloading takes time and firing off a pistol alerts the entire compound. They'll be all the more eager to return fire if you shoot first.

It's a shame the plot goes south a bit towards the end; I was well on my way to rewarding the game a full four stars. But the Siam exploration inconveniences, the Himalayas, the plane section, the final encounter - there's a string of disappointments that I can't overlook. The final boss simply pales in comparison with the crescendo the original trilogy always gave us. The melting nazis, the Kali-ma and the Holy Grail were highlights of each respective movie. This ending, however - I won't spoil it - is probably the low watermark of the entire game.

But nothing can take away the feats the led me to that point. In order to feel disappointed, I must first have been impressed. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a matinée adventure for the little screen. It has the unforgettable scenes, the locations and banter of vintage Indy. The mouse and keyboard controls like an extension of my own body, allowing the immediacy that's required when escaping the deathtrap of a rolling boulder - or whipping the gun out a nazi's hand just as he's about to pull the trigger.

Machinegames have showed the way forward for my old hero, and it lies not in movies, but in video games. Come on, announce a sequel already! From now on, studios who want to reboot a franchise would be foolish to overlook Machinegames as contractors. Fun fact: The Swedish game director and co-writer's name is Jerk Gustafsson, which makes him the Great Circle-Jerk.