After working exclusively on Wolfenstein and Quake games, Swedish developer MachineGames is finally branching out to more franchises, with the studio’s next game being Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.
It has been over a decade since the last Indiana Jones standalone game, so it’s interesting to see that MachineGames and Bethesda decided that now is the right time to return to the series. This makes sense given that last year’s Dial of Destiny movie was expected to revive interest in the franchise. Sadly, that film got mixed reviews and was a box office bomb.
Sure, Indy may not be as big as he once was decades ago, but his globetrotting adventures should still have a strong appeal. After all, Naughty Dog’s Uncharted series was a massive hit, and those games are often compared to the old Indy movies.
Comparisons between this next Indiana Jones game and the Uncharted series are sure to be made given that Uncharted has now become the template for cinematic action-adventure games. Instead of emulating Naughty Dog’s series though, MachineGames is instead focusing on its strengths by making the Great Circle a first-person adventure.
This upcoming Indiana Jones game’s first gameplay footage was shared earlier this year at the Xbox Developer_Direct. Now at Gamescom, MachineGames showed off more new footage that gives players a better idea of what to expect. Ahead of Gamescom though, MachineGames and Bethesda invited members of the press to watch a preview of the game.
How Indy’s New Globetrotting Adventure Works
So, what exactly can you expect in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle? In this game, players take on the role of Indiana Jones as he goes on an adventure that takes him to all sorts of exotic places.
The story takes place in 1937, between Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom. Picking up after Indy left Marion Ravenwood, he gets swept up in a quest after an artifact gets stolen at Marshall College. This led him to first go to the Vatican, followed by trips to the Sukothai Temples, the Himalayas, and many more.
These locations will allow Indy to explore some larger open areas that act as a hub of sorts. According to the developers, there will be side quests here. It’s not clear how big these are and how traveling between hubs can work, but this indicates that the game won’t just be a linear adventure.
Hub areas aside, Indy will need to spelunk through old ruins that are filled not only with dangerous booby traps but also some brain-twisting puzzles. From the looks of it, these puzzles won’t be too easy, meaning players must use their brains and their array of tools. These include Indy’s camera and journal.
Another tool that’s invaluable for Indy’s adventures is his trusty whip which is necessary to explore various ruins. That’s because Indy can use the whip to swing across environmental hazards. Plus, the whip is also a nifty tool for combat.
While the game has a focus on exploration and puzzle-solving, Indy will inevitably face his typical foes, including Nazis and Italian Fascists. With his whip, Indy can damage enemies or even disarm them. Though that’s not all he can do as Indy can fight foes with his fists or use his trusty revolver. Indy can also pick up enemy firearms.
As players progress in their adventure, they’ll earn Adventure Points which can be used to unlock a variety of useful skills. These include both combat and puzzle-solving abilities, though the gameplay preview did not go into much detail about specific abilities. What was revealed is the True Grit ability which allows Indy to come back from a fatal blow.
Going in guns blazing isn’t the only way to go about enemy encounters though. There will be times when Indy will need to go through areas undetected. For this, Indy will need to don disguises to sneak around, though players must be careful not to get spotted by more perceptive enemies. In a way, this part of the gameplay loop is straight out of the Hitman series.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is Promising, but Some Questions Remain
After sharing a rundown of the game’s core elements, MachineGames showed more gameplay footage. Even though it’s not the longest showcase, it did show a mix of the puzzles and environmental hazards in ruins, along with some snippets of combat and disguise-focused stealth.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway here is the game’s first-person perspective, especially considering other action-adventure games in this vein like Uncharted or Tomb Raider have third-person views. Thanks to the first-person view, I can see that the Great Circle has the potential to be a bit more immersive when it comes to its exploration and puzzles.
There are some weird quirks with the first-person view as the camera will shift to third person when Indy uses his whip. This is a bit of a weird choice as it breaks the sense of immersion. Though that’s not even counting the fact that Indy from the movies doesn’t seem to be agile enough to perform these whip swings.
This weird quirk aside, it’s fair to say that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle holds a lot of promise given that it seems to have a much stronger focus on adventure and puzzles. After all, Uncharted and Tomb Raider (at least the remake trilogy) are very much combat-oriented, with puzzles only serving as a break from the action.
The question now is how this new Indiana Jones will flow together. Since the focus is more on the adventure, the game will need to have an engaging story and puzzles that strike a nice balance of being difficult without being infuriating.
What’s more, the combat will also need to feel good and not just seem tacked on there. Stealth is also another question as stealth sections in some games also feel unnecessary.
We’ll have to wait and see how these will be answered. Thankfully, it won’t be long before it releases as Indiana Jones and the Great Circle launches on Xbox Series X|S and PC on December 9, 2024. It will also be released on PS5 in Spring 2025.