Inspectors' Review:
PAPER!
I can stretch on it.
Roll on it.
Take a nap on it.
Eat it (though boss doesn't like that).
And groom yourself on it!
It smells like the ocean...now where are the fishies!
I heard there were treats but I think the boss ate them!
Can my head fit into one of these envelopes??
Boss' Review
The Submerged Sentinel is the third instalment of The Enigma Fellowship's subscription series (the previous games are The Lost Knowledge and The Scattered Cards). The Enigma Fellowship is a table top escape room company based in Germany and spearheaded by Orsi and Anuj Sehgal. These games are in English and are released every other month. I have previously played The Scattered Cards and really enjoyed it (review will be added to page in the future as it is currently on Facebook) and after winning a free game in the Easter Egg puzzle I decided to order their next two games - this one and the recently released, Monsters in the Wild.
The Submerged Sentinel has you take a more aquatic adventure this time round. Michael Gurges, the president of the Enigma Fellowship, has tasked you in locating the missing submarine, ISS Sentinel and it's vitally important crew. Mr. Gurges won't go into a lot of detail but he says there is something extremely important about this submarine that makes this mission urgent and you can discover more as you investigate. Hopefully you are up for the task!
Now, this game is harder that it's predecessor. When I spoke with the creator he was motivated by many people saying how light The Scattered Cards was so he pushed to challenge players more. Taking this into account, this is not a light puzzle adventure and requires a lot more focus and switching between online content and the paper items you have in your envelope. I enjoyed the challenge but I admit more of a heads up would have helped seeing as I decided to initially start this game at 1:00am in the morning thinking it would be light...very quickly I decided to wait until I had more sleep before pushing onwards.
In terms of narrative, the story is well developed and has great progression. I enjoyed how each movement onto a new website provided mini chapter to push the plot in addition to give players instructions and clues on how to solve. I also really appreciate how they have audio and text to go with the narrative as I like to read along to what I hear. I find listening to the narrative encourages you to pause as a player. In many cases as escape room puzzlers we are rushing to push on but hearing the story has us slow down and not only understand the point of our journey but also listen to instructions that will make playing a lot easier. If I didn't have the audio I would have likely just opened the envelope and then been confused on what I am doing. I will also add they did an excellent job providing a strong narrative ending to the experience and as someone who enjoys narrative it made puzzle solving that much more satisfactory because it provided a reward past the regular "you did it!" There is also a puzzling epilogue (does not impact the game) for those who want the extra step but it is an easter egg puzzle with no hints. This epilogue easter egg left me feeling well rounded in my experience.
The puzzles were quite a variety with ciphers, pattern identification, logic puzzles, clue hunting, and often you needed items from previous envelopes that you already used. In this frame of mind, you need to be aware that you pay need to pull a document or website back up that you already used to help with another puzzle. These puzzles are ranged from easy to hard. They often require a lot of movement between the online websites and the papers in front of you so you need detailed notes or have confidence in your ability to track your movements - in particular this is key for the Hydrophone puzzle. In my sleep deprived brain I made quite a few silly mistakes in the puzzles because I really underestimated the game, which is my fault. I will note one of the password said the answer was something like "11 letters and 5 numbers" and I interpreted it as an 11 letter word and a series of 5 numbers but in reality the numbers are mixed with some of the letters. Setting aside my puzzling mistakes, I loved the layering of puzzles (the introduction letter for example) and the nuances that all the puzzles had that really kept the puzzling fresh. I will say this game for me took about 5 hours which was much longer than I expected. Overall, go into these puzzles knowing they will be a challenge and you will really appreciate them. The cherry on top comes from completing the Easter Egg puzzle which really makes you feel accomplished after all your hard work. For me, it redeemed me after my struggles with the Hydrophones.
As for customer service, Enigma Fellowship is excellent. They provided an really useful puzzle reference page at the beginning of the adventure to help out if you are still learning your way around ciphers and also on certain puzzle pages where the visuals of the puzzles were key they provided digital formats which especially helped with one particular puzzle (won't mention because of spoilers). Their games also release in a timely manner and arrive online in a protected sleeve...and I got a little treat with mine! They are really personable and I appreciate how much they want to engage with their customers because it shows they want to continue developing and improving their games by talking to the people who buy them. They included behind the scenes blog at the end of the game that I loved reading to hear about their development of the game as it showed the passion they feel for it. It is this kind of dedication that will keep customers who see the work going into the games. In addition, you have the satisfaction of knowing with every game you purchase, a tree is planted - thanks to Enigma Fellowship's environmental focus to reduce waste and support ecosystems.
Overall, this was a challenging and fun experience in my adventure with Enigma Fellowship. I enjoyed the narrative, felt satisfied with the puzzles, and appreciated all the work that obviously went into this game. While not the light puzzling experience I expected, this game is excellent for those puzzlers look for a challenge over the course of 3-5 hours. I am excited to experience their next game and for $22.00 these games are well worth trying out!
Check out Enigma Fellowship's website here.