REVIEW: Hidden Office

Hidden Office is a cute-looking game where you have to look for hidden objects and cats in the same location several times with a different mechanic.

Released: Steam
Type: Single-player
Genre: Hidden Object
Developer: Anna Sevryugina
Publisher: Anna Sevryugina
Release date: 21 Oct, 2021

Intro

Hidden Office is a hidden object game where you need to find objects and cats hidden in an office. There are 109+3 levels in total, allowing you to play the 12 similar levels with 8 different filters.

Visuals

Hidden Office uses cute-looking, simplified 3D visuals, painted with soft, simple colors. Levels are usually set in an office setting, although other locations such as a garden and toilet are also included. The game might be trying to portray an office for big companies that care about their employees’ welfare, but since there aren’t any indications whether all rooms are located in the same building, we can only guess. One thing is for sure though: the rooms are messy.

The Game

Gameplay

The game is played out like hidden object games in general: your objective is to find objects that are shown on the left side of the screen. Most objects can be found in plain sight – I even clicked them by accident when I wanted to rotate the screen. However, although you can rotate and zoom to find the objects, it’s not possible to drag your position to look at a certain area in detail. Levels tend to be rectangle-shaped, and it’s hard to look at the corners because of it.

Levels tend to be similar. The game only has 12+1 original levels and 3 Halloween exclusive levels in total, featuring different locations in each of them. The rest of the levels are just a modified version of the 12 levels with a different mechanic applied to them. Some will force you to find objects in the dark, while others will let you find objects with an RGB split effect applied to the screen. Although some mechanics are clever, they tend to be annoying most of the time, especially the two that I just mentioned. The “finding objects in the dark” mechanic is not fun since the light source is very limited, while the RGB split effect mechanic hurts my head.

This mechanic might look clever at first glance, but it can give a problem because of its inconsistent lighting.

Levels that are played in the same location can end up as a memorization game. Most objects in these levels tend to be similar, both in shapes and locations. As someone who has a strong short-term memory, I ended up memorizing most objects that I needed to find without realizing it most of the time, relying on my memory to pass through the annoying mechanics quickly.

On the good side, hints are available in case you are stuck. The hint button might not obvious, especially with the confusing-looking interface, but the system is flawless. You just need to click on the hint button and find the red arrow that points to the object that you are looking for.

Length and Difficulty

The game only lasts for 1.7 to me. The difficulty varies based on the mechanic. The one that requires me to find two of the same-looking object give me difficulty most of the time because the game tends not to accept my solution when I found other objects that fit the same criteria. Other mechanics that give limitation to your sight, whether from an annoying filter or light source, also can take time to finish, although you can always use the hint button if you want to skip through them.

Looking for small objects beneath a large area can prove to be challenging.

Problems

The level selection tends to load the wrong level. You also can’t select the object apart from the ones in the top right corner in the mechanic with 4 screens.

Specs

Intel Core i5-9300H 2.40GHz, 8GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650

Verdict

Hidden Office might look like a cute game at first glance, but it feels rough in general. The interface is hard to understand, and the additional mechanics tend to be annoying rather than clever. I admit that some mechanics, namely the “find the difference” and the “four-screen mode”, interest me though. I wish that the game focuses on these kinds of mechanics instead of implementing mechanics that hinder your object-finding capabilities. As much as I hate to say it, I couldn’t recommend Hidden Office at the moment because of the annoyances.

Written by
aquatorrent
Join the discussion

Archives

Calendar

November 2021
M T W T F S S
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
2930  

About Us

Save or Quit (SoQ) is a community of fanatical gamers who love to give you their opinions.

See Our Writers

We’re always looking for new reviewers! Interested?