Undercover: Operation Wintersun

Spy-story noir meets ridiculous adventure-game puzzles in this misguided tale of Nazis and nukes.

On that score, Undercover: Operation Wintersun is enjoyable. Still, lots more could have been done with this setting, particularly in terms of adding in more types and settings that reinforce the War. The story, though brief, is definitely enjoyable but the voice actors just can't manage to work up enough energy to really get things going. The puzzles are at just the right level for us in terms of difficulty and most, though not all, make some sort of logical sense. There's an abundance of pixel-hunts in nearly every scene, which wears thin after a very short while. The novice mode can help you spot the items you can interact with but it won't make solving the puzzles necessarily any easier.

All the points listed above have one thing in common: they all prevent Undercover: Operation Wintersun from being a very solid, enjoyable adventure game. There’s nothing more annoying as a reviewer and as a fan of a genre when you see some bad design decisions having such a profound impact on your gaming experience. This won’t put me off future Lighthouse Interactive releases however and nor should it you. It’s clear they know what they’re doing and a few extra touches could result in a cracking adventure next time round, just not this time, however.