Last night I finished Simon the Sorcerer II. I won’t go into detail about all the things Simon did and only mention the most important bits. I’ll go into the puzzles that seemed obscure to me and give a final verdict of the game.

• Simon caught the cat in a clever puzzle, which he then used to get some plant saliva, with which he put the goblin guards to sleep.
• Simon got loaded dice from the goblins by throwing soda in the fire. This was a bit obscure.
• Simon needed wood for woodworms and although that seems like a common thing that might be found anywhere, the only place that can be acquired is by helping the imprisoned elf. He wants feminine perfume. At one point I got stuck and tried everything with everything and what do you know. It works to put soda in the perfume bottle. I hadn’t thought of that and don’t know if I would’ve thought about it. That was a bit random, especially because I’d already used the soda for something else. The next part was actually a funny bit because Simon first had the give the elf a cold before giving him the perfume. Very nice! The interface was a bit of a hindrance though, because Simon has to “give” the stuff to the elf instead of “using” it on him. That makes sense, but you stop using the give button by this point, because Simon keeps on suggesting that he’s not giving anything away. I think the game would have been better without the give button.
• Simon also needed to help the witches make a potion. He did that in a fun puzzle, but once again the next part wasn’t very intuitive. By using the potion on one of the players he transformed him into a dog, which seemed a bit random, after which he could win the game. Obviously the loaded dice were necessary, but Simon already had them. So he missed out on having to work through this puzzle. I would have been more fun if you could only get the dice after playing a first round.
• The last part was great! Working out how to get past the horror was fun. The only thing that was too weird was “wearing the puppy”. Maybe that makes sense to British people, but not to me. Once again this was only achieved by trying everything with everything. Not a fun strategy. Simon did mention that the puppy was very quiet, but that still didn’t make a lot of sense.
• The bit about getting the time stick and helping myself gave me strong Escape from Monkey Island vibes. That made me wonder if that’s a mechanic that’s used in a lot of games. Simon than ended up drawing the short side of the stick. That serves him well. Karma’s a bitch.

All in all I had great fun with the game. Probably more than I had with the original.

cons:

• less memorable music than Simon I and oftentimes the music was very grating.
• some parts would have benefitted from more sequential puzzles.
• Simon is not very likeable.

pros:

• nice/great graphics, especially towards the end.
• good voice acting helps elevate the humor.
• quite a few Monkey Island references.
• Just right difficulty with mostly rewarding puzzles and only a few moon logic ones.
• great ending. The annoying Simon got what he deserved.

I also finished Mario 3D World. That was great and made me want to play New Super Mario Bros. U. Just like 3D World, I have played that, but never finished it.