Review: Hidden Through Time 2: Myths & Magic

Belgian studio Rogueside is back with Hidden Through Time, something entirely else than Guns, Gore & Cannoli or their Warhammer game Shootas, Blood & Teef. In Hidden Through Time 2: Myths & Magic we search for hidden objects, animals or humans in a colorful and charming 2D world. I personally love hidden object games, think the games from Artifex Mundi or the adorable cat searching games from Devcats.

Just like the predecessor, released at the end of 2020 for Xbox, the sequel offers lots of replay value with the option to create your own levels. But there is also a brand new story mode where each level has some explanation, visually there are much nicer animations and there are a lot of gameplay improvements. Rest assured, you shouldn’t sit around searching for pros and cons yet, your searching skills may be saved for the game itself!

Time for a game! Can you find the purple car?

Things I liked!

• Single-player campaign | Hidden Through Time 2 has a small story mode with narration. Before you start a level you’ll hear a story about that time era. That little voiced thing brings a lot of personality, the voice actor is very empathetic and definitely an added value. One big difference from other search games is that there is no annoying progression limit. Usually you must have already found a large number of objects but in this game that is limited. Four eras are available in the campaign and with the new gameplay option to switch reality you have double the playable levels. We visit the 80’s, the Middle East and the Middle ages; all of them have unique characters and visual style.

• Make your own levels! | Developer Rogueside calls it Architect 2.0, making your own levels is more enjoyable with many more customization options. Sharing your creations is easy and an in-game reputation system allows you to find great community created levels easily. Compared to the first one, you can now put much more individuality into your self-made levels. Change your own terrain or customize the cute people who interact with the thousands of different objects. You can really be creative and make gems of levels. Not only can they be found ingame but you can easily share it with your friends (or social media) with the level codes. I will share my own creations soon, I’m taking my time with it as I want to perfect the things I make. Another positive thing about Architect 2.0 is unlimited content, in theory… you have some incredible available stuff from creators. A level full of apple trees where you have to find one different apple, A beautiful huge rock full of birds, a maze but the usual shovelware too. As quite a few people are creating easy Achievement levels. It messes up the top rated list a bit, hopefully that will be moderated a bit.
  
  
• Unique visual style | I’m going to make a strange comparison but Hidden Through Time 2 is a kind of water painting with all moving GIFs. When you have it in front of you yourself you are definitely going to understand me with the comparison. The very colorful levels are full of details and short animated objects. Biggest difference from the first game is that there is much more variety in the environments and more believable. A lot of attention has gone into believable events, people are having parties where everyone is eating or drinking something different. A mouse hiding from a bird of prey, or funny details like a toilet door with werewolves. Each level has something special, which only works because of the beautiful graphics. Definitely worth mentioning is that the reality shift is pretty cool to see. Each level has two versions and that visual change is funny and impressive at times. A certain event in the first version can be seen in the second version. Great job!
  
  
• Gameplay | In case you were still wondering what you do in Hidden Through Time 2, you have to find objects in the level and click on them. Easy enough you think but Rogueside made sure that your eyes will want to take a sunny vacation after playing this game for a few hours. Each object that you have to find has a clue but most of the times it is not clearly described. When you have to find a pixel-sized rock behind a tree and that tree is surrounded by Manyara National park things become rather challenging and annoying. BUT! The satisfaction you get from finally finding an object.. overwhelmingly awesome. Another new feature in this sequel is the ability to change reality, each level has two versions. So the weather can be terrible and wet or sunny. Some objects can only be found in a specific reality.

Time for a game! Can you find the frog?

Neither good nor bad

• Click to open a house or chest | I often found myself cursing because I wanted to click open a certain part of a house but the game refused to register it or opened another floor or basement. Frustrating in an otherwise calming experience. They could have solved this better with, say, standing on the building with your pointer arrow and then using the trigger buttons to change layers. Knowing what has multiple layers is another issue, although a small one.

Time for a game! Can you find the tape?

Things I disliked!

• Music | Hearing the same song in each era over and over again. I’m surprised that they didn’t change this up a little bit. Even if they keep the same song and change the rhythm or BPM a little. I got extremely bored of the music, so I quickly turned it off and played a playlist on Spotify.
  
  
• Performance | A few times the game crashed during loading, which take quite a long time anyway. Strange that optimization is so poor for the consoles. The performance while playing is also not always as smooth as expected. During the small cutscenes there are hiccups, too bad.

How long did I play the review before publishing? 3 hours, 45 minutes.
How long to beat the story? I would say about 8 hours
How many Achievements did I earn before publishing? 450 Gamerscore
How long to achieve 1000G | 8 hours
You’ll love this game if you like these | Where’s Waldo kinda games