Geospots 1: Finding the Cache

What a fantastic surprise to find that a new Carol Reed game has been released! Of course I went to the MDNA website and bought it immediately.

This time Carol is moping around a bit because she doesn't have any cases to solve. Fortunely her friend Stina has a new hobby that she asks Carol for help with: geocaching! I reveiwed a children's book some years ago that had geocaching as a major activity, so I knew what it was. 

As with all Carol Reed games, we start by finding new places to go and new addresses, which show up on the map used for navigation:

Always a slightly different map for every game

Newly discovered locations appear on the map, and we click on the place names to go there. First we go to a bit of a maze, but Stina does give Carol a map showing where her cache is located. If you, the player, follow the map by looking at it after each move you will not get lost. If you, or for example, me, does not look at the map you will get lost. Look at the map.

Finding the cache leads to a puzzle, which is actually fairly challenging but doable if you just look for clues around the area.

We get to go to such nice places in these games. I would love to live in this house:

It has a pool!

And we always go wandering in nicely forested areas featuring beautiful landscapes. The scenery is a big part of these games.

Pretty, yes?

Don't miss this guy!

As the plot thickens, or rather, as we uncover new locations and new clues, which usually lead to new locations, we always encounter various kinds of puzzle boxes.

This first one was easy to solve, but I haven't yet cracked the second one:

A cinch.

Not a cinch.

I'm doing my best not to look at the hints. Normally they just nudge you in the right direction, but often they send you to somewhere you have missed. I confess that I missed three things, saved by the hints. 

To not miss things you really do have to carefully examine nearly each and every screen. It's really easy to just walk right by something important.

The game won't let you proceed without finding these clues, but it will let you wander around into infinity until you find the elusive hot spots. Hitting the space bar frequently should help, and I have not been doing that.

I think I will do it today! 

I have already met Carol's boyfriend Jonas, who turns up in all the games, and what appears to be the comic relief character, which used to be played by "Bigge." Bigge disappeared in the last game, but the same voice actor is still here for another character.

Jonas always helps

Not Bigge, but the same voice

Judging by how many locations I have on my map, I might be about a third of the way through the game. That's great, because I really want to play for awhile today! 

And hit the spacebar. 

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