Evil Pumpkin: The Lost Halloween

Very Good Game. everything in this game fit well. this was the longest I've played a point and click HOG.

I did look at the steam hints and walk through guide a few times.

I also had to play through this twice to get all the achievements.

The only thing I don't like about this game is "You must get all achievements on 1 play through to get the final Pumpking achievement." my 2nd play through to get the pumpking achievement was easy.

look at the steam guide for the numberinth part. that's where I didn't know about the boyscout achievement and had to play through again.

It was a quite nice hidden object point and click, until it bugged in a way that was absulutely game-breaking. I tried everything to get around the bug, to no avail. It was early enough into the game so I don't feel I got my money's worth, even at $10.

Pros: Looks good, solid gameplay

Con: Literally game breaking bugs

10 out of 10

Evil Pumpkin is the perfect game for Halloween and a wonderful HOG/PAC despite some of the negative reviews. This is an Advanced Hidden Object so it is not for n00bs to the genre.

This game seems to focus more on Puzzles and Point and Click than Hidden Object and the atmosphere is perfect for Halloween. The story is fun and keeps you engaged.

This game is not difficult unless you are relatively new to 'point and click' games. You will have to use your brain to solve some of the puzzles but nothing too difficult. There are guides if you are not sure what to do next -which I used a few times.
My 5th grade niece played through the game without any issue. I found this game pleasantly challenging in parts so it is not so 'mindless' as some of the more basic entries in this genre. I was able to earn all the achievements.

All HOG/PAC developers should pay attention to this game. I would love to see more games like this.

Highly recommend to anyone wishing for a true challenge in the Point and Click/Hidden Object genre.

I really wanted to like this game. Halloween-themed Point&Click? What could possibly go wrong?
Well, while the story is nothing special but acceptable the game dynamics made me quit playing this game. It's annoying and buggy from the beginning but after some time I encountered a bug I wasn't able to work around. Reloading etc. didn't help either.
Didn't start anew, just quit the game.

It's rare that a game so thoroughly defeats me in the way Evil Pumpkin did. It's not that I wasn't able to finish the game - a slowly-recharging hint meter and the extremely helpful denizens of YouTube ensured I would be able to brute-force my way through the trickier sections. No, Evil Pumpkin foiled me by forcing me to resort to hints over and over again. A well-designed adventure game - and make no mistake, this is more of an adventure game than a HOG, to the point that the hidden object screens are actually optional - moves players through the story in a logical fashion, presenting them with obstacles to overcome and giving them fair clues and tools to allow them to struggle their way through.

Evil Pumpkin goes a different way entirely, loading itself up with nonsensical, sometimes buggy, puzzles and some of the least impressive HOGs in recent memory.

On to the HOG criteria!

Criteria 1: To what degree do the puzzle screens look like a thrift store vomited on my monitor?

It's pretty bad. While the game does a passable job of restricting its searches to areas that would logically be cluttered, many of those areas are littered with items which make no sense given the setting - and that's just in the logical areas. There are also plenty of screens where a load of nonsense is tossed in. A church pew? Seems like a good place for a gold bar, straight razor, bullet and tree! It's just a mess for mess' sake. And that's not even getting into the rampant cheating that goes into item placement. There isn't much size cheating - the game has a good grasp of perspective, at least. That doesn't stop it from defying gravity, changing colours, and going transparent whenever it suits the developers' purposes. Just shoddy work here.

Criteria 2: Are the searches justified by the premise/story?

Only in the most cursory fashion. There are the standard 12:1 item finding sequences, but beyond that, no justification is given for the searches. This is largely because the game is far more interested in its puzzles than its searches - on the 'difficulty select' menu, HOSs only appear as an element on the lowest difficulty setting, aimed at 'casual' players'. This suggests that serious adventure gamers wouldn't bother with hidden object searches, and should focus on the game's other, more nonsensical puzzles. Given this attitude towards the genre they're working in, it's no surprise that the game's hidden object screens are so lacking.

Criteria 3: How well do the various puzzles and object searches meld together to form a coherent whole?

Not well at all. The story follows a little boy on a journey to find out why his town is the only place in the world without a Halloween. It's not a bad premise, but his method of investigation never makes much sense, and the conclusion he comes to seems utterly random. This isn't helped at all by the game's terrible puzzles, which range from annoying to buggy. This isn't just a case of my distaste for sliding block puzzles rearing its ugly head once more. There's the equivalent of a jigsaw puzzle with pieces that don't fit together and offer no clue as to where they're to be placed on the board. There's an 'eliminate the subjects' game whose rules are so oblique that I could see people being driven mad. Then there's a puzzle which is just plain wrong - as in the developers forgot their own world's rules when crafting it, so the answer doesn't make any logical sense.

With its lacklustre HOSs, frustrating puzzles, and hint/skip meter which takes forever to charge, Evil Pumpkin: The Lost Halloween is a disaster on every level. Literally the only thing that the game has going for it is a wry wit that surfaces in a bevy of puns offered for nearly every circumstance. For anyone uninterested in wordplay or adorable talking animals, this game offers nothing to recommend.

I appreciate they tried to do something different. I like to give me an option to play as a hidden-object game or as a more classic adventure game. I also have to admit that the mini-games and other game mechanisms were pretty original, not copied from other games.
However, the gameplay is just bad. Half of the game actions make no sense, items have no description and the boy's commentary is anything but useful. The game gives you so little information about what things are and what you are supposed to do that you're forced to constantly rely on the hint system, map clues and on using everything on everything. This is inexcusably in this genre.

I would have to give this game a provisional "thumb up" due to the difficulty. This is not a game for the casual player, the easily and not so easily frustrated, or anyone who does not take notes while they play. This is a very difficult game to play. (Reminds me of Deponia.) This game has some very obscure references and reading the dialogue is extremely important. (Skip dialogue at your own risk.) More importantly is remembering some absurd remark or off-topic thought of some character a chapter or two later. The clues are there, masked behind riddles that in some cases are very, very oblique, referenced in the boy's journal, various diary pages, or in some dialogue remark earlier in the game. I would like to thank Micheal who posted his playthrough in the community videos, they were very helpful. (Oddly enough he and I never got stuck in the same place. Note: Micheal's playthroughs are in German, but do not let that deter you. The playthroughs are easy enough to follow.) I would also like to thank those in the discussions threads, I found valuable clues and an answer or two.

Storyline: The Boy (whose name is, by inferred references, Lautrec Van Hollow) steals/takes his father's book "Halloween" on October 30th. Being a clever little boy, he says so himself (and quite determined), he wants to find out what Halloween is and why Halloween is never celebrated in his town of Dern. To do this he needs to decypher the book, escape his room (I think he is grounded or it is past his bedtime) and go talk to adults who were around when Halloween existed.

Just a note here: The game dialogue is rather snarky, full of off-kilter remarks, and is very absurd at times. I found most of the dialogue amusing, in a disbelieving type of way, since all the adults seem crazy until the end (and they are hiding a secret). Leave normal reasoning and logic at the door since having both will only deter your gameplay. An example of what I mean is this: The raven, whose name I inferred was Lester, wants a golden pipe, a newspaper, a pair of slippers, and a glass of wine for nightcap before he moves out of the boy's way. Absolutely illogical and utterly absurd, but rather funny too. The whole game plays like this, so be warned.

Gameplay: Difficult, very difficult in places, but not impossible as some of the negative reviews claim. (I personally did not run into a game breaking glitch at the end and running in circles meant taking a break to clear my head.) As I said this game is difficult, and the logic obscure, at best.

The easy parts: The Hidden Object scenes were fair and the objects not unfairly hidden. The items found in each scene basically match the area found, though littered with unusual items. I did not find the actual puzzles overly challenging, but they are brain twisters. The puzzle variety includes music, sliders, logic, recipe and picture puzzles. I would call the "knocking the sock down", "candle", and "lock picking" puzzles, mini-games. The "candle" and "lock picking" puzzles, my son, a player of FPSs and fast paced RPGs did both in about 15-20 seconds, first time, though I took much longer and required several tries. The point is, both are doable with patience and speed, respectively. I only had trouble with one puzzle, and not the "candle" or "torch" puzzles so many have issue with. (The torch puzzle actually made sense to me, and I did it first try.) My trouble puzzle was the gate puzzle going into pumpkin-head town between chapter 4 and 5. The riddle on the gate makes no sense as most riddles in this game seem to do. It really is not nonsense, just extremely oblique. Once I knew the answer it made perfect sense afterwards (even the riddle).

The hard parts: The point and click gameplay is uneven. Some of it is very easy, other parts are very difficult. I think some of the difficulty comes from the size of some objects needed to be found. (The thimble on the train set comes to mind. It is very small.) I hunted and hunted for what needed to be done in that scene and found the thimble by accident. (Oh by the way the cursor does change into a little octopus so careful searching of the entire screen is needed quite often.) The other difficult part of the point and click scenerios is just the flat out oblique logic used and odd use of items (the golf club once totally disassembled comes to mind). The logic of this game really reminds me of Deponia: strange, weird, and HUH? Also the game inhibits the player from moving ahead in the story before the present tasks are completed or gaining items too soon in the story. A good example of this is the guitar string in the toy shop. A player may 'twang' the string early in the game but can not take it until later in the game when needed. I can only presume the string's 'twang' is a subtle auditory reminder that the string is there and will be needed later.

On a more even note: the boy uses a gizbelt, a clever invention of his. The gizbelt carries his gizstruments which by the end of the game include a pairs of scissors, a hatchet, a slingshot, and a pencil. These gizstruments upgrade (or down grades in the case of the pencil) through gameplay as they are used and the pair of scissors that could barely cut paper at the beginning of the game can cut through metal chain by the end. So if the gamer knows they need to cut something and can not do it wait until the scissors upgrade then try it again. These items are used to do certain things and should not be overlooked when needing to do something like cut, break or retrieve things though the gamer might have to wait for the upgrade.

There is a fast travel map once the gamer leaves home and the map is completed. The first chapter takes place at the boy's home which includes 2 upstairs rooms and hallway, the main entrance (called lobby), the basement, the front of the house, the front yard, and the fountain. (No map). There are six chapters in this game. Up until Chapter 6 the game play is linear and the gamer can not move forward until every task is completed for that chapter, and there is no going back. Chapter 6 goes everywhere but once all the tasks are completed in an area, the areas close off. The map will show with "an exclamation mark" if something needs to be done. Using the hint button I would say is a must, if the gamer does not use the map. It will at least get the gamer to the place something needs to found or something needs to be done. The hint button can be refilled by looking for little bats in scenes.

A word about candy, in this game the gamer can collect various types of candy found lying around on the floor, on shelves or stuck to furniture or buildings. The only thing candy is good for is buying Halloween items from the store and decorating the Van Hallow back yard. This has nothing to do with the game so do not fret about missed candy pieces. It is just something fun to do if so inclined.

In conclusion, despite the game's difficulty level and lack of normal logic, I found this game much more enjoyable to play on a replay then the first frustrating and hair pulling time though.

I like this game very much and have to give it a 'Thumbs Up' mainly 'cause I love weird games! However, personally I wouldn't pay full price for this game.

A nice point & click adventure that contains some not-too-difficult puzzles, but also some of the solutions that are not very obvious. Halloween theme with a tint of humour provides for some evenings worth spending over Evil Pumpkin.

Mixed feelings about this one. The presentation is good, nice graphics and music, with tolerable voice acting and limited animation. The story is original and interesting, too.

The areas are very interactive with hot zones that simply provide amusing commentary. There are also a lot of locations with very little backtracking.

A nice little extra is that you can buy items to decorate a back yard with halloween items.

However, this game contains extremely illogical puzzles that are almost unsolveable except by trial and error. On several occasions I simply had to use the hints button to progress and even then I remained stuck until I just tried everything on everything else to proceed.

It also begins to suffer from bad translation errors near the end, possibly because playtesting didn't get as far as often? ("Watter pistol" etc.)

What's worse, is that in some of the later hidden object puzzles in this game the descriptions and the item you need to find simply do not match up. Example: I need to find a knife, but none of the knives register. Instead, I needed to click a trowel as shown by the hints button.
That's why I almost wouldn't recommend this, in a HOG you cannot lie to the player like this!

Yet the game does show a lot of care in other matters and is worth a playthrough. Overall therefore a careful recommendation.

I've been saving this game for part of my yearly Halloween gaming marathon. I thought it might be an odd change of pace from most of the horror games I try. I have to admit, this is an awesome hidden object game. Beautiful visuals, good music, and charming puzzles and setting. I grew up on Shadowgate and I haven't had any problem with the logic of items and their uses. I kind of love it. Perfect to play as I watch horror movies and relax.

I really liked this game a lot. It took some getting used to but I love the graphics, almost like a cartoonish version of Tim Burton. But that is my opinion. I like the fact it was a Halloween themed game as well. I believe if it wasn't, this could have just been "another" game.

Though the only thing that seems "off" was some of the voices. Some of them were not convincing of the characters that were in the game. The owl almost seems to sound like Yoda's less talented brother and the main character (you) sounds like a human version of Jabba the Hutt's sidekick, Salacious Crumb.

Though not the deal breaker, I am probably thinking due to budget, the voice acting is what it is.

But in general, a great game to play.



UPDATE.....

Steam cards have been added! YEES!

Also, I am playing this game again, with Halloween around the corner. I just want to change my viewpoint on the game. The voice actors are appropriate. At first it was really hard to get used to it, but on my third play, I realize that by this time, it's part of the magic of the game. But again, you'd have to have played it a few times to realize that. I guess I got used to it and would probably think differently if they changed the voices now, and then it doesn't sound normal anymore.

Also a great game to reinstall in October :-)

One of the longest and best hidden object games I have ever played! It took something like 33 hours! Great plot, great graphics, lots of HOGs, and side games. Many areas to explore. I highly recommend this one. The only downside (A sluggish cursor) fixed itself later. Try it!

Good Halloween theme game.
Nice story, good plot.
Not always easy to know what you need to do next, the more bats you find, the more hint you can use, and don't be shy to do so. I had fun even by using my hints.
I recommend this game!

I play hidden object games with my wife as a way of bonding and having a good time after the kids go to bed. This game suffered from translation issues, poor design and a repetitive background music. A lot of the puzzels are unfair and to difficult, other are ridiculously simple. Half of the time I felt like a genious the other half I felt like I was the dumbest person in the world. Clickable zones are a mess, reusable items are great but why not rope, or the lockpick you get halfway through the game. Bad design, inconsistent difficulty, and poor translation make this a game to pass on.

I enjoy Hidden Object games, so considering the good price...I decided to try out Evil Pumpkin.

It wasn't very good. The graphics were nice enough, but the storyline and ending felt incomplete.

In my personal opinion, the best sort of hidden object games are the ones where you find items in your surroundings and puzzle out how to use them (as compared to going straight from one hidden object scene to another hidden object scene with no plot or puzzle in between.) This game does follow those guidelines; however, the game doesn't play out quite right.

You have to do things in a cetain order to trigger events (which isn't unusual) but if you haven't finished something..you aren't able to continue on in the game until you do. An example of this is when I found a crop of flowers that I needed to get my hands on. In my possession I had a knife, scissors, hatchet, and pruning shears (or something like that.) Yet, it told me that I was using the wrong items. About 30 minutes later, I got to a point where I needed the flowers , I searched for an agonizing amount of time because I hadn't picked up anything extra that seemed like it would work. Of course, it was one of those very items that I was supposed to be using! It had kept telling me the item was wrong so I guessed that I was just missing a crucial item I didn't see. I am not sure why I couldn't just cut the flowers and carry them around in the inventory for a bit, but that is the nature of this game.

It doesn't tell you what is required with puzzles...you just have to guess correctly. Including the ending...it was extremely frustrating and then it was just....over.

Sorry, I had a lot of hope for this game, but it just didn't hit the mark.

Yes it's kinda campy in terms of theme, but campy is fun for Halloween. The artwork is pretty cool and I really enjoyed the puzzles. A couple of the mini games were irritating as heck, but they are skip-able if you get too frustrated. I did enjoy the plot too. I would grade it as a 9/10 for me.

I do recommend this game but only if you really like Halloween, have lots of patience with puzzles, don't mind mixed quality graphics and sound, and can purchase the game for 5 dollars or less. Worse parts were the boy's voice and the ending. Best part was all the cool Halloween related scenes.

The graphics are neat, as is the story. But the voice-acting is mediocre, compared with other games. Plus the gameplay as such and the puzzles annoyed me. Some of the mini-games didn't make any sense to me, I found many of the puzzles/item combinations/solutions counter-intuitive. I think there's never been a game where I had to use the help-function more than in this one.

The game itself is quite good. However there are way too many bugs in the mini-games that prevent you from progressing further in the game. Since you can't save in stages, this means that your only option when you encounter a bug is to restart the game from the very beginning.

I restarted the game twice before I just gave up.

I love this game! I am so sad because I cannot finish it. My game is glitching at the puzzle in the "upside down labrynth" when I am doing the object search. There seems to be no key to open the chest to get the necklace. I have watched a walkthrough for the game, and my game just doesn't have the key to open to chest. Looks like I can't complete this game that I paid for... and I was really loving it too.