Hidden Games - Professor Charlie's World Tour - Advent Calendar 2024 - a Puzz...

I try to get fun different types of Advent calendars each year for my boys, this year 5 & 8. This is a fun new challenging version of one. There is a website to give hints when your stuck without just giving the answers away. I think there has been on so far that we haven't been able to solve. I would love more versions of these adventures. Enjoyed by all.

If you’re in doubt - BUY IT! Our little family had the most best time with this game/advent. We looked forward to it each day and got us really excited during the holiday season. It was nice to have something to bring us all together at the end of a long day and gave so much enjoyment. If you’re on the fence the puzzles were well thought out and the story was engaging. Just a really fun way to look forward to spending tie DAILY as a family. I’d even recommended these outside of the holiday season. Our family has bought a few of the “escape room” type advents last winter to keep the tradition going and we cant wait to start back on our winter tradition. (I will say though that this one will always be the pinnacle that you look back to - it’s THAT good!).

Every year I order a few advent calendars for my kids- and sometimes for myself and hubby too! I ordered this as one of them this year, and it is by far the most favorite advent calendar that we’ve ever purchased! My son (who just turned 16) actually beats me to it before I get home from work every day! It can be used individually by several family members (just pass along each daily puzzle after you finish it), or together with tweens! Most of the puzzles are relatively easy, yet cute, but a few of them took us a bit! And I am totally going to pass this on to my brother and his wife so they can use it next year! Great concept, easy to follow, and totally worth every penny!

The media could not be loaded. Loved the overall excitement to figure out the clues. Some were straight forward enough to crack but most of then you have to look up the hints in the provided website-I can’t imagine anyone not needing to as the letters are really being just cracking the clues harder than the escape room we did! Once you get a hint or two sometimes three-then you get how to even go about solving them and even clues we solved without hints required us to look up hints to even figure out the relation to the next envelope. But it was an activity we could do together and get laughs out of. My favorite and no hints needed part was the map you get to mark up which gives you the final destination! We also like the ones you get to paste things on! Lots of variety-even origami as seen in our video!

Let me first say that Professor Charlie's World Tour was an enjoyable experience overall--and if Hidden Games ever comes out with another such product (or an "escape room in a box" game) I would gladly purchase it based on my experience with this one--but the game has several problems.There are two envelopes where, if you go to the Hints page (which eventually you WILL have to do for one of them, after wasting a lot of time), it indicates that there is an error in the puzzle. For games that were manufactured before the errors were discovered, okay, there's not much else they can do; but once the errors were discovered they should have been fixed, or at least an errata sheet should have been included with the newer manufacturing runs.Several of the drawings are pretty bad (in fact, the drawings are one area where they really skimped on quality), either to the point of where you can't figure out what something is supposed to be, or the images are just plain missing significant features.Another puzzle requires that you orient some pieces correctly; but when you do, you don't get the answer. The answer is only revealed if a couple of the pieces are reversed.Then there's one puzzle where you have to "add a little imagination" (direct quote from the Hints page) in order to derive the clue, but then the clue refers to an object not found on any of the envelopes. [Or to put it another way, the translation from the original German (?) edition to English was poorly done.] But at least you can make a reasonable educated guess on this one to get to the correct envelope.And then there was one puzzle in particular...============= Spoiler Alert =============Skip the following paragraph if you don't want to know! I don't give the answer, but I reveal significant information about the puzzle.On one puzzle you have to call a phone number to get the clue. That's bad enough and really rubs me the wrong way in a board game. What makes things even worse, however, is that they log your phone number! I had to call back a second time (the first time was more of a test to see if that was what we really had to do), and the recording was different the second time, beginning with, "Oh, it's you again." How do they know it's me again unless they log my phone number into a database? I hope they're ethical and don't use it nefariously, but we ARE getting a lot more robocalls this year, even though we're registered in the national "Do Not Call" registry. Coincidence? Normally I would suggest that you just go to the Hints page and look up the final answer on this puzzle rather than risk calling a dubious phone number; but the problem here is, the answer given on the Hints page is the 4-digit numeric PIN that must be entered via the dial pad in order to receive the final answer over the phone. So you have a choice to make: Either call the phone number, or open the remaining envelopes to find the next letter. [The letters (not the envelopes) are sequentially numbered, so you can tell which letter is next without spoiling the game.]=========================================And more. All in all, I counted nine envelopes that had "technical difficulties" of one sort or another, which is over 1/3 of the envelopes. Most are small and can be overlooked (and many readers might not think anything of them); but a few are significant.Like I said, though, overall Professor Charlie's World Tour was an enjoyable experience. Some things could be improved--like the use of the Internet could be toned down--but it was still a fun time just the same. The last piece of advice I'll give is to treat this game like an Advent Calendar (even though the product description says it can be played in one sitting). Hidden Games did a beautiful job of keeping the game non-seasonal, but once all is revealed after the final puzzle is solved, that's when you realize this is indeed an Advent Calendar. Another tip: There are 24 envelopes... but in order to figure out which envelope to open first, you have to solve the puzzle in Professor Charlie's introductory letter (i.e. the box contains 24 envelopes, an instruction sheet, a world map for you to follow along with the journey, and an opening letter explaining what's going on and to get you started). So... open the box, read the instructions, and solve the opening letter's puzzle on Nov 30 if you want to solve the last envelope's puzzle on Dec 24; or begin on Dec 1 like normal and solve the final puzzle on Christmas Day. Or just play it whenever the heck you feel like it (my wife and I did it as a Thanksgiving countdown since we already had EXIT: The Silent Storm as our "real" advent calendar), but realize that the final reveal might be a little out of season.

I can not recommend this enough! I bought my daughter an advent and decided to see if there was one for dad. I took a chance on this one as he really loves games and brainteasers. I could have never predicted how the little boy in him would come out and how excited he gets to open the next one!! The puzzles are not simple either, they do take some thought and work. If you would like to make the man of the house feel special and thought of and he likes challenges, I HIGHLY recommend this! I hope they have a new one next year!

My young adult son and I have been having fun with this calendar. I highly recommend it. Puzzles vary in difficulty but remain interesting for adults. Some general knowledge (or Google searching) is required. Just be aware that though this is packaged in a box with physical clues, one needs access to the internet and a phone to solve some of the puzzles. Disappointingly, one puzzle was misprinted and one had to go to the hints for that specific day before being told this. At the least, making this known on the main hint page would be useful.

I was looking for an advent calendar for my 13 year old son and stumbled across this. Everyday you are given a clue, a puzzle, or a code and it’ll bring you to the next location to your journey. It was so engaging, even my younger kids wanted to help. At times it required adult support, but it was an opportunity for everyone to collaborate. If you get stuck, there is a website that will give you hints ! Highly recommend