Indiana Jones and the Great Circle for XBox X/S
Nostalgia Done Right
Before I get into this, before I start to break down my thoughts about the story, the gameplay, etc. I need everyone to stand up and applaud Troy Baker. Add a category for Best Voice Actor to the Academy Awards; somebody gives this man a tiny statue because you cannot convince me he wasn’t the best part of this 10/10 game.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is without a doubt, the best entry into the franchise since 1993 (The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones IYKYK). Lovingly developed by Machine Games and shockingly published by Besthesda, who really needed a win, this immersive action-adventure puzzler is a true love letter to the franchise and a balm to everyone who lived through 2008’s Indiana Jones and the WTF Did I Just Watch?
Let me just establish my ethos real quick: I am that person who saw Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade as an innocent 9-year-old and then went on to make every life decision thereafter based on the fact I wanted to be Indiana Jones. I chose my college major because of these movies. I made vital career choices because of a fictional character. I had to go back to school when none of those career choices worked out because of Indiana Jones.
So when I say this game was a 10/10 for me, when I say that it feels like stepping into a 1980s Spielberg film, that it restored some of my faith in humanity, I need you to recognize the weight those words hold.
Story
The game’s story takes place in the time between Raiders and Crusade, a choice that allowed the developers to include all kinds of nifty references and Easter eggs for the fan base. It also means that Indy gets to fight the Fascists!
The game kicks off with a tutorial-style dream sequence that happens to be one of the most famous scenes in all the movies. Indy (yes, I’m going to refer to him as Indy for the rest of this review) wakes up to the sounds of breaking and entering near his office at Marshall College. Going to confront what he thinks is a bunch of unruly students, Indy instead finds a mystery that will take him to the Vatican, Giza, and even Shanghai.
The story is steeped in enough pseudo-science and real-world inspiration to feel plausible, exactly how a good Indy movie should. The writers carefully layered the game’s mystery through environmental storytelling, cryptic notes, and character dialogue. It actually feels like the player is piecing together some sort of 1000-piece puzzle, building a sense of anticipation and accomplishment for the payoff.
I really appreciate the story takes full advantage of the historical and mythological context of the locations Indy visits. As an anti-Ancient Aliener, (and that’s not saying I don’t believe in aliens, I one-million Carl Sagans do, I’m saying I don’t think they repeatedly visited our planet in the past to play legos), but as an anti-Ancient Aliener, I absolutely loved getting to run around the Vatican. The fact that there are labyrinthine catacombs and ancient texts under Vatican City is a known mystery. It makes perfect sense that the Vatican would be filled with secret puzzles and ancient artifacts for eager archaeologists to find.
Each site in the game was well chosen for the questions historians have asked for hundreds of years. Each site feels like a character, with its own story to tell through its environment. Even the time period chosen for the game, the late 1930s, when so many amazing sites and treasures of human ingenuity were being raided and bombed, adds to the story of the game’s environment. Running through the Vatican, carefully finding clues to unlock a secret door, only to have Fascist construction workers tear down the walls to what was once completely untouched, that really happened. I mean, even today, American soldiers in Afghanistan were actually issued decks of Archaeology Awareness Playing Cards to help prevent damage and looting to sites that happen during wars.
All I’m trying to say is that the game’s writers clearly have a deep appreciation for history and mythology, and they blended them into a seamless narrative worthy of Dr. Jones. The mystical elements are believable because they are rooted in beliefs and theories that cultures and religions have held for hundreds of years.
(Tangent: The Maya may have done cranial modification to make themselves look more like corn. Because corn was important in their culture, nooooaaaught because they wanted to look more like aliens. This is an example of writing mystical elements that are not rooted in beliefs and theories that cultures and religions have held for thousands of years. At least says the person who worked as an archaeologist in Honduras for a while).
The visual design of the levels begs players to stop and notice details, and the fact that Indy will actually comment on things like frescoes and carvings just goes to show the settings are not just backdrops, they are integral to the game.
Gameplay
I feel like I’m starting to flirt with this game, but for real, the game flirted with me first. The combat in this game is so quintessentially 80s action movie it couldn’t be any better.
Combat is as straightforward as the street swordfight scene in Raiders. The other guy might have some fancy moves, but Indy has his fists, his whip, and a gun. This is not to say the combat is vanilla, it is actually hilarious. And Troy Baker recorded plenty of sassy lines of combat dialogue to keep me chuckling as I run off and leave unconscious bodies in my wake.
Now, I’ve seen many grumbles about how the enemy AI could benefit from some more of that sophistication stuff, and to that, I say, tell me you haven’t seen an Indiana Jones movie without telling me you haven’t seen an Indiana Jones movie. I mean in movies at the time, Nazis would repeatedly dump Indy in a pit and then leave laughing, “Hahaha, that’ll take care of him,” only to be shocked that he could climb out. I mean, Indy defeats the bad guys at the end of Raiders by…closing his eyes. All this to say, I’m not mad at the sometimes incompetence of the bad guys. I’m not mad that I crawled out of a hole in a wall with a brightly lit torch into a group of four enemies, also with torches, and they didn’t notice me, and I was still able to sneak attack all of them.
And the choice to keep the over-the-top punch sounds just adds that little bit of garnish to a truly satisfying one-two knockout.
I already sort of talked about exploration in the previous section, about how the levels are all amazing blah blah blah, but I want to add one more note about exploration gameplay. It’s perfect. The first time I whipped out my whip and climbed a wall, I was like, why does this feel like so much effort? Then, when I heard the sound effects of Indy’s labored breathing as he shimmed across a drain pipe, or his little uh-ohs of panic as he ziplined from a roof, it hit me, Indiana Jones is not a superhero. He’s a middle-aged professor in a time period when exercising hadn’t been invented! Of course, it’s going to feel like a lot of effort to climb up a drain pipe! I don’t know what sorcery the devs performed in their coding to actually make it feel heavy to parkour, but Indy is not Ezio, and he shouldn’t be.
Conclusion
10/10
The perfect way to end 2024.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is just that, great! Are their flaws, yes, but this is a perfect example of the flaws adding to the charm.
That’s actually the word I want to use to describe this game. Charming. As charming as Indy’s smile when he uncovers a clue.
The actual only bad part of the whole game is the price, $69.99. I know game developers need to pay the bills, but this price point will definitely keep some people from getting to enjoy the game. I played through Xbox Game Pass, so that’s definitely a cheaper alternative for anyone with sticker shock, or, if you can be patient, wait for a sale. Honestly, all I bought on Black Friday were video games, and I think next year, I’ll have this on my wish list to scoop up.
One final word: This isn’t necessarily for the review but more for the owners of the Indiana Jones franchise. This game’s success is not a sign that you should start pumping out more Indiana Jones games (please, for the love of the Last Crusade, don’t give Indy the Star Wars treatment). Rather, the success here is an indication of the quality that fans are attracted to. Hire whoever it was on Machine Games to lead the project team for the next one, and whatever you do, keep Rian Johnson away.
And in conclusion…Oh my gosh, one more thing. I loved that all the characters didn’t speak English. Italians spoke Italian, and I, not speaking Italian, had to read the subtitles. This added one more layer to the immersion.
Okay, I’m done. I liked this game. Get it on Game Pass to save some money, and spend the next month playing it.
Related: Reviews by Michelle Jones
I'm a completionist gamer who just needs to find that one last object and clear that final dungeon. I love all video games, from open world sandboxes on a console to a mindless match three on my phone. In addition to gaming and writing, I am a graduate student working on a thesis about the ancient Icelandic Sagas. Feel free to ask me anything about Vikings.
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