Review - Foolish Mortals
2025 has been a fantastic year for great video games, and Foolish Mortals is another one to make that top 10 best games of year list even more difficult to decide. It's already been an extraordinarily strong year for classic and interactive narrative adventure games with the phenomenal, The Drifter by Powerhoof, and the so far, excellent Dispatch by AdHoc. Also, it's heartening to see classic franchises Syberia and Simon the Sorcerer get new releases. But unlike those two, Inklingwood Studios have lovingly created a brand new intellectual property in Foolish Mortals. Upon first seeing it during its Kickstarter campaign, I had a feeling it could become something to watch. So, let's see what makes it so great.
Set in 1933, off the coast of Louisiana, on the spooky island of Devil's Rock. Exactly 33 years after the disappearance of an entire wedding party in Bellemore Manor. Protagonist Murphy McCallan, a young auditor and wannabe treasure hunter arrives on the island, in search of the fabled treasure of Bellemore Manor. Devil's Rock and Bellemore Manor are the perfect settings, intertwining the macabre into the unravelling mystery of the missing wedding party. Each new location around Devil's Rock is alive with personality and logical puzzles that require the thoughtfulness to observe and explore like all the best games in the genre.
Being a successful Kickstarter, Foolish Mortals had the added pressure of pleasing the campaign backers and delivering on the promise of releasing a point and click adventure in the vein of classics like the Monkey Island and Broken Sword franchises. Fortunately, Inklingwood Studios delivers with flying colours and makes it's own impression in the process.
Before developing Foolish Mortals, one of the main developers, David Younger, and a few others brought onto the project had a background in theme park design. This meticulous and storytelling mindset runs through Devil's Rock's design, which unravels purposely into a set of varied locations with clever puzzles chains and environmental storytelling theme parks are known for. Like the point and click great Ron Gilbert before them, who was inspired to create Monkey Island after riding the Disney Park ride, Pirates of the Caribbean and imagining what it would be like to exit the ride and live in that world. Instead, David Younger imagined a thematically similar world that could exist inside the classic ride Disney Park ride, Haunted Mansion.
Both the DNA of Haunted Mansion and the Monkey Island series runs through Foolish Mortals, but it doesn't take long to notice influences beyond video games. Environments and pirate stories resembles those in one of my favourite films, The Goonies. While the architecture and dark magic story shares imagery with Disney's Princess and the Frog. And the macabre and humourous nature of the ghosts and other characters made me think of The Addams Family. This alone is an enjoyable combination, that merges into something original.
Image: Foolish Mortals - Manor - Inklingwood Studios
However, these days, the adventure game genre has mostly moved away from the puzzling point and click gameplay, to focus purely on narrative choices. Audiences are used to interactive narrative video games like those from Telltale Games, Supermassive Games and now, Ad-hoc Studios. So, the more traditional puzzle based gameplay could be new to a lot of people. But all good point and click games rely on a handful of core pillars: a well-written story, memorable characters, logical and smart puzzles, and an eye-catching visual presentation. It would've been easy for Inklingwood Studios to obsessively rely on nostalgia, and don't get me wrong, Foolish Mortals is very nostalgic, but it's far more than that.
The story told in Foolish Mortals is on the surface, a simple one, but it twists and unravels enough times to reach a satisfying conclusion. The mystery of Bellemore Manor offers a spooky but never scary jaunt through a town impacted by an event that happened 33 years prior. Each corner of the island holds secrets and hints of the past and shares knowledge that relates to future puzzles. The story is impeccably designed to split the game into parts, much like Monkey Island. Cleverly inserting multi step puzzles and exploration into the narrative, so you're always directly impacting the story. Like all well designed games in the genre, this requires players to remember key objects and story beats to make use of later on in the adventure. Such as, the infusion of real world historical events like the prohibition that is additive to logical puzzles solutions and effortlessly cements the story in 1930s America.
Beyond the plot, the dialogue is what brings Foolish Mortals to life. Within the opening minutes of listening to the protagonist, Murphy McCallan, regale a taxi driver about his travel misfortune, I was reminded of the first time I heard George Stobart, on the hunt for a killer clown in the original Broken Sword - another witty and charismatic Indiana Jones archetype that uses humour as a shield. But as Murphy continued to speak, I sensed a touch of Guybrush Threepwood from Monkey Island in his delivery - a winning combination when done well. Although, a fine line exists between inspiration and replication, and David Younger's dialogue and characterisation ensures Murphy McCallan is uniquely himself and is able to stand alongside the greats.
Image: Foolish Mortals - Boat - Inklingwood Studios
Yet, George Stobart wouldn't be the same without the brilliant Nico, and Guybrush wouldn't be as quippy without his verbal sparring partners in Murray the skull, or Stan the Salesman. Neither would Murphy. Foolish Mortals has an eclectic mix of fully fleshed out characters, even if they're not all corporeal. Such as Evelyn, the journalist eager to make a story from anything; one of my favourites, Mallory Whisp, a young prankster with a morbid curiosity in all things occult and dead - a bit like a younger Wednesday Addams; Ned Kipps, a fisherman scared of ghosts. And then, there's the ghosts themselves - a manor full of eccentric characters with detailed backstories. But I won't go into detail about those, to avoid spoiling any of the games surprises.
Even though Inklingwood Studios is a small development team led by husband and wife duo David and Sophie Younger and outsourced staff, Foolish Mortals matches the quality of voice work in video games with far larger budgets. Their biggest achievement was getting the talented AJ Locascio of Telltale's Back to the Future game, to voice Murphy McCallan, breathing life and personality in such a way only certain actors can. But the small cast of experienced actors all produce equally solid work and clearly enjoyed becoming such varied characters.
Although, even with an engaging and fun story packed with memorable characters, it's the puzzles that can make or break a traditional point and click adventure game - a tricky balance between being both logical and challenging enough. These puzzles are often solved by using the objects found in different areas of the map, or combining objects in a multi step puzzle chain. Much like the first main quest, requiring Murphy to locate seven different items. Each object represents a separate quest line that more often than not pushes you to interact with different characters and areas of the map. These puzzles start out simple, like remembering a character has a knife that can be used to cut a rope to open a new doorway. Each puzzle chain is varied with fun story beats, and after some thought and examination of scenes, conversations and the inventory, everything is doable. Nothing feels frustrating. Even puzzles with timed solutions are enjoyable, which is rare when many adventure game greats have at least one illogical or badly designed puzzle.
Image: Foolish Mortals - Beach - Inklingwood Studios
But my favourite puzzles in Foolish Mortals were the interactive ones, where you spend time figuring out the mechanics of the puzzle and then have to use that knowledge to put the solution in place. Like a particularly fun one in the ballroom, where you are tasked with figuring out the order of a dance routine, and another where you have to work out the correct route through a dream like labyrinth esque staircase section.
The only minor downside to the puzzles was in the backhalf of the game due to some backtracking and reuse of the same items for similar solutions. Although, logically this makes perfect sense and I understand why these choices were made, and all in all, these puzzles were still enjoyable.
But it shouldn't be understated how impressive the game design is, to create a good narrative interwoven with puzzle chains. Even the controls are fluid and responsive. Everything is controlled by the mouse: a left click walks to an area or interacts with an object or character, a right click examines something, and a double left click activates Murphy's fast walk or fast travels to an entrance or exit. Everything else is accessed by hovering the mouse cursor at the top of the screen. This accesses the inventory where you can examine, select or combine items. Or hover over the top right corner to access the menu to save the game at any time, or access the other key features that make the game more approachable to newcomers or anyone that wants to tweak the game for their playstyle.
Firstly, like many modern adventure games, Foolish Mortals includes a hotspots feature, which highlights every clickable location in each scene. This doesn't give solutions per say, but it does ensure that nothing is missed, which can be a real help in this type of game.
Image: Foolish Mortals - Church - Inklingwood Studios
Next, the developers have created an in depth hint system in the form of Murphy's diary. By hitting D or selecting it on the upper right corner, players can see the current quest objectives written in the diary. Then, if you're stuck on a particular objective, you can click it and the diary adds a written paragraph as if Murphy is narrating what he's done to solve it. Each press reveals another paragraph that nudges you further along the puzzle chain. These are written in an intelligent manner so that they nudge you in the right direction before completely giving away the solution. But if someone wants the answers, they're available. However, when it comes to hints, the developers have included a second less obvious system which can be scaled to your liking. This system makes Murphy give audible nudges of what to do if the game sees you've been stuck for a prolonged period of time. I left the frequency bar at default and never found Murphy to be intrusive, but if you'd prefer extra help rather than using the diary, you can always increase how quickly Murphy offers assistance.
The final modern feature is fast travel. Murphy has the ability to fast travel to any previously visited major location and load there instantly, which is always a welcome feature in any game. Especially one like this where you suddenly have that voila moment and need to zip across the map to collect the solution to a puzzle that's stumped you.
But without a strong visual presentation, a point and click adventure game can struggle to stand out from the crowd. Foolish Mortals has a cartoon art style, similar to the line work of the cartoon realism in Broken Sword, mixed with some of the thematic stylings and colouring of The Curse of Monkey Island and Voodoo Detective. I was particularly fond of the background artwork. Nothing was too busy and everything served the purpose of making a place feel real within this ghost story. Understandably, the animation work on the backgrounds is intentionally just enough, but still plenty to breathe life into each scene. Like the smoking chimneys in the town or the flash of thunder outside the manor. But it's the inside of the manor that is full of spooky charm and interesting characters.
Image: Foolish Mortals - Mill - Inklingwood Studios
This attention to detail carries through to the character models. Each complimenting the art direction. Every character is uniquely dressed and shaped, fitting the personality the writing and performances give. I did find Murphy's fast movement animation a bit slow and underdone to begin with, but over time, it felt appropriate to the pace of the game and never cumbersome. I did encounter a few instances where art and animation clipped or played at the wrong points, but nothing game breaking. As everything else in my 8 to 9 hour playtime was faultless.
I also found the meticulousness carried through to another important part of the genre: the cursor and item artwork. Each flawlessly blending into the world of Foolish Mortals.
I would be remiss if I didn't highlight Foolish Mortals effective use of sound. The instrumental score is a wonderfully spooky delight, reminiscent of Haunted Mansion. I was already enjoying the pitch perfect sound effects that build the atmosphere, when Inklingwood stepped the sound up a notch with the inclusion of a musical puzzle interlude that furthers the plot at a crucial moment. This is the only song with vocals in the game and stands out as a highlight.
As a lifetime fan of point and click games, Foolish Mortals is one of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I've had this year, and is a game I'd recommend to anyone; an all round great game more than worthy of its cheaper price. Inklingwood Studios set out with the aim to create a point and click adventure game inspired by Haunted Mansion and the classics of the genre. For any development studio to finish and publish a video game is a herculean accomplishment in itself. But to release such an impressive debut outing is something special. I truly hope people give Foolish Mortals the shot it deserves and that it sells enough for Inklingwood Studios to continue making more games for years to come.
After a solid few years of point and click adventure games such as The Drifter, Locomotive and Kathy Rain 2 rejuvenating the point and click adventure genre, Foolish Mortals does more than enough to pay homage to the greats that influenced it, whilst making an original story that stands tall alongside them. It's an emphatic recommend.
Image: Foolish Mortals Review Score - 9.0/10 - Inklingwood Studios
