I'm in the early single digits, sitting in the lounge room eating ice-cream when the theme tune starts. "The Mysterious Cities of Gold" plays on ABC TV in the afternoon just before dinner. I remember the giant metal bird, lots of light rays, a smaller green bird, and something about the Spanish. But I was likely 6 and didn't know what Spain even was.

Anyway this is a game where you make a bunch of kids stand on pressure plates.

Ahhh, the 17th century. Apparently episodes of the game were unlocked as the show played. Which really feels like some obtuse horror of the 1600s. And I suppose it makes sense. Trying to sit down and play this one in one hit is difficult, but a scheduled release may actually of done it a favour.

Levels are unusually long. Too long. Even the short ones feel like they've taken far, far longer than they actually did. Sure, once you know where everything is you can go back and speed run it, ignoring the rather zoomed in camera and complete the thing far quicker.

It is just... so... frustrating. All the colours and charm here are not doing enough to get me to stick to finishing.

The three kids must be navigated through a small maze like level opening gates of various forms to get to an end point. Swapping between them as.

Thankfully there is something more to game loop. Estaban can use his amulet of MacGuffin to activate ancient stone pillars. Zia can slip through thin gaps (because gender bias, girls must be thin). And Tao can read out translations of ancient writings... Which is kinda useless, so they also gave his companion bird the ability to steal things. Yeah, the POC child is a thief. Fun!

And then... You press a button, pull a leaver, or stand on a pressure plate. This opens doors allowing the other members of the party to advance. Sometimes you have to sneak past line of site pirates patrolling various areas. It almost has a Lost Vikings vibe, just without the complexity, humour, and what I have just learned is not the voice of Gilbert Gottfried because I played LV2 about two decades ago and my memory is filling in some gaps...

While you can lock yourself out of accessing the special chests, I didn't find a way to lock myself out of level progression. And there's next to no backtracking, which is always a plus!

Aside from the chest, there's also a level timer. No penalty if you miss it, it is just something to get you to come back and try to beat it later. This timer is not on screen though, and only seen on a menu. Both good and bad, as you don't feel the pressure to reset as it counts down, but you may feel the pressure to constantly check it once you know it is there.

And finally there's the level scrolls. Perhaps the only chunk of backtracking in the game. While white scrolls can be picked up by any character, coloured scrolls can only be collected by running the correct child over them.

What I did enjoy was the cut scenes placed between various levels. Though chaotic, and based on the reboot cartoon rather than the 80s original, there is somewhat retro feeling to them. And an unusual thing to see in a game this basic.

It is... Fine. I enjoyed what it is trying to do, and if you liked the show or this genre it is absolutely worth some time playing through it. For those of us savvy with this type of game, there's just not enough here.

Did you know the Spanish killed millions of people and committed various trying to conquer the continent?

Game Acquisition: Bundle Stars (Frenzy 1)
Platform Used: Steam
Tweet Threads: 1 - 2 July 2022
PC Used: Scorptec Master-RTX2070 2019 MK1

OS: Microsoft® Windows® XP / Vista / 8 \\ Processor: 1.2GHz processor
Memory: 1 GB RAM
Graphics: Card supporting Pixel Shader 3.0 and Vertex Shader 3.0
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Storage: 2 GB available space