Genre: Point-and-Click Adventure
Release date: June 9, 2016

Tick’s Tales is a retro point-and-click adventure game from Phoenix Online Studios. It’s a classic throwback to the point-and-click adventure games of old.

You play as Tick, a boy who wants to become a knight in order to impress a girl. The best way to become a knight is to pull the sword from the stone. Legend says that to pull the sword you must pass tests of strength, courage, and wisdom, but before you can pass those tests, you must find them. You’ll do so by exploring the land, talking to people, and picking up everything you can. Once you become a knight, the story continues, as you must use your newfound knighthood to protect the town.

Puzzle-wise, there’s nothing in this game that’s too hard, but I did get stuck a few times. Surprisingly, the hardest puzzle for me was the one with the most obvious answer. Puzzles are mixed between conversation puzzles and inventory puzzles. They are well-integrated into the story and progress throughout the game feels natural.

Tick’s Tales is built to be retro and it shows. The graphics are pixelated and look especially bad full screen on a large monitor. I don’t enjoy pixelated retro-graphics as much as some do. The game lacks a hotkey to show all the hotspots on the current screen. In fact, I was already some distance into the game before I realized that the cursor changes color slightly to show you where you could click. For awhile I was clicking on everything trying to make something happen.

The sound effects are all 8-bit, but I feel they’re well-done. They really brought back the feel of games before modern sound cards. Voice overs, however, were missing. It’s been a long time since I played a game where the characters weren’t voiced; but by the time I finished the first task I had acclimated to it. I read text faster than I can listen to it anyway.

If you approach this game as a budget title with minimal production values, then you won’t be disappointed.  If you like games with more modern sensibilities, avoid this one.  I enjoyed my time with the game, even though it was short visit.

Grade: B-

(find out more about our grading system)

+ Perfect for an afternoon play + Retro-inspired graphics and sound effects – No voice acting

System Requirements

MINIMUM PC:

OS: Windows 7 
Processor: i3 or better, or equivalent processor
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: OpenGL 2.0-compatible with 128MB memory
Storage: 150 MB available space

MINIMUM MAC:

OS: Mac OS X Mavericks or later
Processor: i3 or better, or equivalent processor
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: OpenGL 2.0-compatible with 128MB memory
Storage: 150 MB available space