The Curse of the Golden Idol was one of my favourite games of last year, so I’m excited to get more.

Perhaps most excitingly, this content is set a full year before the events of the main game and features several of the characters you’ll already know and have met throughout the main scenario.

It also features some new faces and it’s up to you to find out who to trust, who has ulterior motives and what those may be.

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How to Play

Once purchased, the content can be accessed from the main menu and played at any time. Just click the image ‘The Spider of Lanka’ on the right side of the screen and you can begin from the first scenario, playing through three different mysteries. 

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Each scenario is very different from the other, all becoming increasingly more difficult. But it’s interesting going into it, knowing what events happen in The Curse of the Golden Idol and how this story is further setting up that tragedy.

Of course, it’s entirely possible to play this first if you’d rather. It might even be more advisable in some respects, though you’ll certainly pick up some context by seeing how events play out later on. And these missions are tough, so probably not the best way to onboard with the game.

Set in 1741, players will visit the Kingdom of Lanka, and in the first scenario you find yourselves in the midst of a perilous card game where many have lost their lives. As an example, it’s up to you to find out who killed who, in what order, and even which cards are more powerful than the others so you can work out who won in each match.

The mysteries play in precisely the same way as you’ll find in The Case of the Golden Idol, the only marked difference is the character animations are of greater detail and the cut-scenes are like comic books that pop off the page.

You’ll also find each scenario bigger, some as many as 5 or 6 screens for you to explore with many clues spread across. And there’s lots of individual layers to the mystery, with sub-mysteries for you to also solve so you can get the added context you need to fill out the story.

The puzzles are a good mix, some require some real thinking and researching, others can be teased out fairly easily with deduction and time.

At this price, for three compelling cases and for another bite of the cherry that is this great game, this one is a no-brainer. It feeds in wonderfully into the base game, gives players some additional context for that first scenario and beyond, and really shows the depth this wider mystery has, giving these characters even more layers to uncover.

It’s over pretty quick, though some puzzles and solutions are quite brutal at times, but this is a great additional piece of content and hopefully the beginning of much more to come.

Verdict

The Spider of Lanka gives a brilliant lead-into the first scenario of The Case of the Golden Idol and offers some great challenges along the way. It’s a pretty short and sweet piece of content with some really tricky puzzles to muddle through, but there are others you can spend time figuring out and deducing in good time. For the price it’s well worth the investment and it gives you another dose of a brilliant game. A must for Golden Idol fans who want more from the story. 

Pros

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