The Secret Order 2: Masked Intent

Starting a game series with a sequel - the 2nd part - is a rather odd thing to do, however since the first entry isn't available on Steam, it's not a matter of choice. While The Secret Order: New Horizon was developed by the same company - Sunward Games - it looks inferior compared to the sequel regarding both gameplay and graphics, so while I would say it's not such a great loss not being present here, I'm still very much against this practice (developers only releasing sequels on certain platforms, even if it's probably due to legal reasons).
Needles to say due to this I started playing The Secret Order 2: Masked Intent with bittersweet emotions, but these quickly evaporated: the highly enjoyable gameplay, the amazing locations and the relatively large environments are enthralling and even the story is quite good (not usually the strength of most hidden object games) despite the time travel concept (often a lazy solution either in a game or a movie - except for the magnificent Back to the Future or the underrated Timecop.
(Obviously Planet of the Apes and The Terminator as well, but time travel plays a somewhat less important role in their case.)
After the Secret Order of the Griffins - a group that keeps order and balance in the world - is wiped out by a new initiate using a powerful magical mask, we, Sarah Pennington, daughter of the order's leader - must find and use the mysterious Royal Griffin, a frigate capable of time travel and find the last person, back in 1677, who knew the whereabouts of a scepter that can counter the powers of the mask.
The game does an amazing job of telling us what to do, where we have to travel and why. So our diary plays a very important role: it's not just there as a decoration, like in many other hidden object games - it actually lists our objectives, provides interesting background information and clues, which we may have forgotten to write down. Whenever we find something important, it opens up, letting us know that there's a new entry available (along with a sound effect) and it's been updated. It's a nice touch, which I'd love to see in other HOGs, so I'd actually use the built-in diary, instead of other useless, fancy features.
We carry our family brooch and a special key (both acquired very early on) around which we are going to use at certain points throughout the entire game - like in several traditional point and click adventure games. Inventory management is rather straightforward: we don't have to combine anything in our inventory, instead we have to collect several identical looking items in order to use them as one. Unlike in many other HOGs it does make sense (like collecting 7 gold coins for the guard in exchange for his medallion).
The amount and variety of minigames is commendable, there are literally all kinds of them here: jigsaw, pattern repeat, cogwheel, circle moving - just to name a few and while they are often rather easy to solve, some can cause a slight confusion, because the hints provided are written with unknown symbols. Because of this I was barely able to make gunpowder (for which the ingredients everyone should know ;)). Then the part where we had to assemble 4 sets of clothing as a disguise was also weird, since we could only wear 1 set... People who love hidden object scenes might be a little disappointed, since the number of these scenes here are far lower than in other games of the genre. But who loves HO scenes over minigames anyway?
Alternatively we can choose to play mahjong (an originally Chinese symbol-pairing game) instead of hidden object scenes, but I'd advise against it, as it breaks the 'Investigator' achievement (since we skip the actual HO scene by playing it).
Aside from the great selection of locations - a Naval Museum at night, a coastal town in the 17th century, a ghost inhabited, once prosperous mysterious island - another strength of the game in my opinion is the fact that it operates with plenty of relatively large areas we can go back and forth between, populated with a relatively large number of characters we can talk to.
The game was first released on Mar 17, 2013, but its graphics quality is surprisingly good despite that. Character animations look stiff and unnatural (yet still a lot better than in some recent, lazily made HOGs), but the frequency at which cutscenes are played is quite high: usually whenever we arrive to a new area or something meaningful happens. Graphics overall looks a bit more photorealistic when compared to most fantasy-themed HOGs, despite the largely picturesque and exotic locations.
steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3279042261
The selection of music the game has is fantastic: these are not the typical short-looping tracks usually used in other HOGs, but fitting (relaxing-suspenseful-atmospheric, whichever the given scene requires) music consisting of piano, violin and flute. Unfortunately their level of quality is fluctuating, at some points the speakers were crackling. Sound effects are on point and I also liked the subtle environmental audio, like the chatter in the town square.
The Secret Order 2: Masked Intent is a surprisingly outstanding hidden object game (despite the bad start - I mean where's the 1st part?) moreover, a thrilling adventure with never a dull moment. Even going back and forth isn't annyoing, since it has a purpose (unlike those backtrackings in other HOGs to hunt down another hidden object scene which just randomly spawned all of a sudden). As of now it's amongst my favourite ones right there with Crime Secrets: Crimson Lily and Lost Grimoires: Stolen Kingdom.
PROS
+ engaging gameplay with plenty of minigames
+ suspenseful and thrilling story (despite the time travel)
+ great selection of beautiful locations
+ lots of cutscenes
+ great music and audio
CONS
- during some of the tracks there's crackling
- few minigames' descriptions can be somewhat confusing
RATING
8/10
The developer, Sunward Games is a Hungarian company (where I am from), but that did not influence my judgement.

Welcome to the first game in the series! Oh it says "2"? Well... Big Fish now owns the rights to it, so... You will have to play it off Steam. If you wont/can't... This is your first and second game at the same time!
I'll agree that it's annoying that you don't get the story from the first one. There are brief mentions about it in this game... But that's just it. It's more interesting to play through the story though.
This one plays a little differently than other H.O.Gs you might be accustomed to. Instead of walking through one scene to another... You can be in one scene, zoom in closer to an AREA in a scene... Then another zoom into an Area 2 in Area 1.
When I first tried it... It was a mess. Then you slightly get used to it. Then you realize there is a map and you can teleport on it. Cool.
As for everything else... It's just okay. Nothing is too complicated and Achievements can be gotten from one playthrough. Story is simple... Until you get side stories and then I was confused wth happened in the Land of the Dead. Oh well.
THE BEST part of the whole thing is... THE SHIP! YES! IT'S like an overpowered character. It can travel back in time. Repair any damages to it. Navigate without a crew. It's equipped with everything one might need and there is plenty of space for more!
Excitement about the ship aside... I hope the next games in the series will be more engaging. Although they can keep the ship. The ship is awesome!
Thanks! :>

Not one of my favorite hidden object games, but still a pretty decent Artifex Mundi HOG.

Good art. Story is ok but sometime hard follow. Puzzles is ok this game is not hard.

(Played 2x, so that's why the hours are so long. While it's a long game, it isn't that long)

A good game if you want more bang for your buck. Very, very long with tons of hard puzzles and HOPA scenes. Wonderfully challenging and fun to play. The only complaint I have is the use of 3D animation because it looks horrible. The game would have been better off in 2D. I don't like 3D HOPAs because companies don't have the money, time, or resources to make 3D look good.

But if you are willing to look past the really, really bad graphics and are more in it for the gameplay, then I say go ahead.

Definitely it is very far from the best HOGs I've played. But it is far from bad ones either. The first game is not on Steam so I didn't have a chance to play it. Thus, I can't say if the serie is progressing or regressing. I'll start by saying that I was not impressed neither by lore nor by it's story.
This is just a typical vinaigrette of clichéd subplots, carelessly mixed in one pot. Here you have science, magic, time travelling, dragons, kidnapping, etc. Neither of this stuff looks interesting. Characters are boring and unremarkable. They appear and disappear, and you forget them the moment you stop interacting with them. Voiceacting and animations are also rather mediocre to say the least. But local soundtracks, on the other hand, are very good.
As to the visuals - it's rather nice. Dated for sure, but still good and stylish. Local sceneries can be really impressive. There are also many vids. Definitely more than you can expect from an average HOG. And not gonna lie - they look rather good. There is no bonus chapter but the game is long enoug without it. As to puzzles and mini games - rather repetative and easy. Too easy as for me. Overall - not bad addition to HOG library.

Simply a great, entertaining hidden object game. The variety of and locations of puzzles are great. This is the kind of puzzle game I look for; just a bit on the dark side, engaging story, long enough to make the money worth spending on it, decent graphics and music score and the ability to customize the gaming experience a bit.