Ice Stone Escape
Although most room escapes take place in an actual room, this week's foray into escapist escaping takes place in...Well, I'm not sure how to describe this one. It's a single space to be sure, but one that appears to be made of glass and is a very odd geometric shape. Almost like trying to escape from a geodesic dome, one without any visible doors. Can you solve your way out of Ice Stone Escape? Strawberry Cafe certainly hopes so, as do I. Welcome to Weekday Escape!
Strawberry Cafe does tend towards whimsical, almost nonsensical escapes, and Ice Stone Escape fits right into their oeuvre. Wander around the limited area and solve a variety of puzzles based on color, shape, and pure logic and perhaps you will make it out of this...greenhouse? Deck? What the heck is this place anyway? Whatever this place may be, it certainly needs to be escaped from, and for some reason you can't seem to take the simple, logical step of throwing something through the glass and breaking your way out.
Navigation is handled with arrows at the sides and bottoms of the screens, although there's not that many places to go. Inventory control is pretty simple with the help of an "About Item" button that allows you to examine the things you've picked up, and you'll need to pick up a fair few things to puzzle your way out of this odd place. There's even a "Save" button, which is a nice inclusion, but not terribly necessary as this escape is pretty logical and easy. Unfortunately, though, there will be a fair amount of pixel hunting involved as Strawberry Cafe still has not incorporated a changing cursor into their escapes.
Ice Stone Escape is a Japanese game, although that's not much of a downside as basically everything is pure logic. In fact, within the game, you might encounter Japanese text only a couple of times as you click around the room, and you don't need any knowledge of the language to play or defeat the game. What you will find as you wander around is Strawberry Cafe's usual use of geometric objects and of course their signature color scheme of light pink, dark pink, and red.
So it's not the most difficult point and click out there, and the pixel hunting can get a little annoying, but Ice Stone Escape delivers some fun logic and puzzles in this compact little room escape. Cute backgrounds and quirky, logical puzzles make Ice Stone Escape a fun mid-week break, something that will refresh your logic circuits and help you clear your mind for the rest of the week. And after this particular week, we all probably need a little mind clearing.
Walkthrough Guide
(Please allow page to fully load for spoiler tags to be functional.)
Full Walkthrough
General info:
The "Looking around" section has some anvil-licious hints if you don't want to read the full on solution later in the walkthrough.
There are color-based puzzles, and instructions for the colorblind will be given.
Looking around
Facing the table & chairs, we see a weird sculpture thing with a key attached to the center.
Note that there are four bells you can ring, but we don't know yet what order they are in. We can zoom in on the right chair, but not the left.
Moving on to the left, there are two cabinets, one of which is locked, and three pots of cacti, one hexagonal, gray pot, with one cactus; one star shaped, gold pot, with one cactus; and one square, green-ish pot, with nine cacti.
Zoom in on the big cactus and click at the joint where the left arm meets the trunk to collect a GREEN CRYSTAL.
Look in the right cabinet for a LARGE CRYSTAL.
Note that the cacti in the green pot form an X shaped pattern, and some cacti are round, while others are x-shaped themselves.
There's a smudge on the glass at the top of the screen, but the Japanese text says it is too small to read.
Nothing else to do here so move left.
The dias requires a three digit number code. We'll come back to it later.
There is a big sign that says garlic. Zoom in on the stand it's on to collect a SQUARE CRYSTAL.
Nothing else here so turn left again.
On top of the cupboard are two pots: one circular, white, with one cactus, and one crescent shaped, red, with with five cacti. There is also a round stand with a square outline. Take the RED CRYSTAL from the bottom point of the crescent.
Zoom out, then zoom in on the cabinet fronts. Take the body of a TELESCOPE from the top left. The top middle and bottom right are empty.
The top right cupboard requires a four color combination to open. Good to know.
The bottom middle cabinet requires a three-digit number code, and the bottom left requires a key.
Opening some doors
The bottom middle cabinet in the chest requires a three digit number code and hints with an image of a square, crescent and circle.
There is something crescent shaped right above us, conveniently. We need to get a number from it.
The code is the number of cacti growing in the pots that match the shape.
951
Take the TELESCOPE CAP and RED SHEET. The RED SHEET is beneath a hint saying 'Chair.'
Attach the CAP to the TELESCOPE. Use the TELESCOPE to examine the smudge on the glass above the star shaped cactus pot.
The image is of an X with each branch numbered:
2 4
\/
/\
1 3
What have we seen that has four branches?
The sculpture on the table has four bells in an X shape. Ring the bells in the order shown in the smudge to release the CIRCLE KEY.
Use the CIRCLE KEY on the bottom left cabinet to get a HAMMER and PUZZLE BOX
Use the RED SHEET on the right hand chair. The red screen reveals a CLOVER KEY. Use the CLOVER KEY to open the left cabinet next to the big cactus. Take the CHERRY CRYSTAL and the HINT SHEET.
The HINT SHEET points to the top right box in a 2x3 grid.
Use the colors of the cactus pots in the given shapes to unlock the cabinet. The colors are yellow, white, red, and green-grey. From left to right, click each button the following number of times to get the correct color:
1, 2, 6, 3
Once the cabinet is open, press the switch on the top. Back out to see a light shining out of the square outline.
Place the SQUARE CRYSTAL in the light and zoom in to see the number 708
Opening the puzzle box
Each button can take a circle or X shape.
Match the buttons to the pattern of round and x cacti in the square pot. Open the box to get the AQUA CRYSTAL
Endgame
Enter the code in the keypad on the dais
708
Click on the left side of the pedestal to find the LAVENDAR CRYSTAL
There are six slots on the front of the pedestal, but so far we only have five crystals.
Use the HAMMER on the LARGE CRYSTAL to reveal the
IVORY CRYSTAL
The hint for the order of the crystals is nearby
Each crystal color starts with one of the letters in GARLIC
Starting from the top and proceeding clockwise, enter the crystals in this order:
Green, Aqua, Red, Lavender, Ivory, Cherry.
Posted by: MmeTurbulence
|
November 3, 2010 11:37 PM