Mercury Blue: Mini Episode

Ever since tools like Unity and Unreal Engine have made game development so easy, the “Free” section on Steam is constantly flooded with dozens of titles every week. Granted, most of them are bad, probably because Unity can only make the developer’s job easier, but it can’t make the actual games any good without hard work and dedication.

However, every now and again someone comes along with a bit of talent and passion for the trade, choosing not to include any microtransactions and focusing on attracting players through quality. When this happens, you begin to remember why modern development tools are so great and you instantly forget about all the PUBG clones that clutter the Internet unnecessarily.

Mercury Blue: Mini Episode is a point & click adventure game with puzzles, snarky dialog and, according to the developers themselves, all the fart jokes you would expect to find in this particular niche. You are instantly bombarded with Borderlands flashbacks as soon as the intro sequence is over, but rest assured, Mercury Blue is definitely not that kind of game.

Instead, you are supposed to solve puzzles using classic point & click rituals, with a few action sequences every now and again in order to keep the explosion quota at an acceptable level. As for the main character, his name is Jake Hunter, but he is not alone in his adventures.

In fact, Jake has his very own sidekick, namely a helpful robot called FU-2. Sometimes it’s actually difficult to tell who’s the sidekick, on the other hand, especially since FU-2 appears to have a much tighter grip on the situations that arise along the way. The dialog between the two is seasoned with all kinds of jokes and sarcastic remarks, making the duo quite lovable from the first minutes of gameplay.

The story is not fully fleshed out yet, given the fact that this is more of an introduction to the universe and the characters. In essence, Jake is on a mission to stop his nemesis Vandros, the leader of a ruthless mining corporation. This mission takes our hero and his robot friend across a variety of planets, each one of which poses unique dangers and difficulties.

Gameplay-wise, the fans of the point & click genre should feel at home from the first few clicks, since everything is more or less as classic as it gets. You can interact with items, examine them or talk to them, as well as pick them up for later on. Objects can also be combined, and there are plenty of puzzles that require a bit of tinkering before you are able to come up with the right solution.

You are also free to move using the WASD keys, so you don’t actually have to click all the time in order to take a few steps. As for the graphics, they resemble a mix of Borderlands and No Man’s Sky, which is not a bad combo, truth be told. There’s also voice acting for every dialog line, which is a rare sight in a free game nowadays.

There’s not a lot to complain at the moment when it comes to Mercury Blue, especially in terms of story or gameplay. The dialog is funny, the characters are charismatic and likable, and the interface functions as intended, without too many bugs or bad design choices.

Hence, we can only hope that the developers are just getting started with the series, because it would be a shame not to see more content from them in the future.