Sherlocked – Mibo Island [Hivemind Review]

Mibo Island is included in our recommendation guides for Play On-Demand Online Escape Games and The Best Online Escape Games for Tweens and Families. For more of the best online escape games in these styles, check out the recommendation guides.

Sherlocked will offer Mibo Island as part of the Game Hall at RECON (August 22-23, 2021.) If you’re interested in playing this game, or any of the other amazing experiences offered, grab yourself a play pass here. Hope to see you there!

Mibo Island is a 3D point-and-click game created by Sherlocked in Amsterdam.

Format

Style of Play:

• Online native experience (can NOT be played IRL)
• Play on demand
• 3D point-and-click

Required Equipment: computer with internet connection

Recommended Team Size: exactly 4 players

Play Time: about 60 minutes (significantly less for experienced puzzlers, but also, you can stick around in the virtual environment after solving the game)

Price: €25 per team of 4

Booking: purchase and play at your leisure

Description

You are little computer avatars that move around in a 3D space. In order to solve the puzzles, you need to move around, click things, and communicate with your teammates.

Hivemind Review Scale

Matthew Stein’s Reaction

The Mibo platform is brimming with potential, and this is exactly the sort of web-based video chat environment I’ve been excitedly waiting to see enter the market. You enter a fantastical 3D virtual world as a robot avatar, with your live video as your robot’s “face.” You use intuitive mouse and keyboard controls to explore the world, with proximity-based audio (i.e. you can hear only the players close to you) and simple click-based object interactions. Mibo combines the best of 2D platforms like Gather and Topia with the feel of social VR to create a seamless, low-latency, user-friendly experience which I could see one day seriously challenging more commonly used video chat solutions.

Mibo Island brilliantly doubles as a robust tech demo and a beginner-friendly adventure that’ll appeal to both corporate audiences and escape room enthusiasts alike. Lightly puzzly, the game is chock full of “environmental ahas” – invigorating realizations about what actions and transformations are possible in a virtual world which would be impossible in a real-life environment. In this sense, the game makes exceptional use of the medium, smartly leaning into the zany, whimsical, and fantastical. The voice acting was perfect, and I had fun collecting hats.

I’m incredibly eager to see what more puzzly experiences Sherlocked creates using this tech in the hopefully near future, and I’d very highly recommend Mibo Island to any and every escape room and immersive theater enthusiast. Early adopters, pay attention – this is the future.

Joel Smileypeacefun Reaction

We were little computer avatars in a Wild West setting, trying to catch an evil A.I. that wanted to stop us.

At its best, the game turned the players into such fun avatars. Looking at each other was already a blast. It was easy to learn how to move around in the 3D game with the onramp provided. Communication and teamwork were the keys to solving most of the puzzles. Exploring the scenes was super cool, even exiting the game after we finished was great.

At its worst, the game is a bit short and easy. It feels more like a tech demo than a full game. It could be enhanced with more puzzle content.

I’m extremely intrigued to see what they do with this great system that has the potential for amazing puzzle games.

David Spira’s Reaction

This first Mibo Island game was a strong, beginner-friendly puzzle video game – and a wonderful introduction to a new and compelling video-gamified online chat system.

The first thing that struck me about Mibo Island was the design of the player avatars. We looked like old computers given life. The monitors displayed the webcams of each player. I loved the whimsical approach to displaying video.

As I began wandering the Mibo Island’s virtual world, the second thing that struck me was how incredibly well this ran – in a web browser – on my 6-year-old laptop. We never had to install any other software.

From a gameplay standpoint, Mibo Island had a smooth difficulty curve that felt deliberately designed to gently introduce players to an assortment of puzzle and challenge styles. It wasn’t a hard game, but it was fun.

Finally the playfulness of the experience was accentuated by the voice acting that ran through the entire game. For escape room insiders the vocal performance was by Nick Moran (former creative director of Time Run, currently Spectre and Vox).

Disclosure: Sherlocked provided the Hivemind reviewers with a complimentary play.