It's 7:16am on June 30th, 1908. The First World War is still six years away and the first nuclear bomb will not be detonated for another thirty-seven years. This quiet region of Siberian forest is peaceful and understandably chilly. In just sixty seconds, however, a massive explosion containing upwards of twenty megatons of energy will be unleashed, devastating the region and flattening sixty million trees in a two thousand square kilometre area. The region of Tunguska will forever be remembered in the history books from this day forward.

The massive explosion that shook the Tunguska region really happened - and to this day nobody is entirely sure what caused it. The Tunguska event remains one of the greatest mysteries in the world and so it is a good choice for the central event around which Secret Files: Tunguska is plotted. I've been waiting a long time for a good fiction book, movie, or game to be made about Tunguska, and finally German developers Fusionsphere Systems and Animation Arts have brought the Tunguska mystery to the front of public gaming attention. But did they do a good job?

Secret Files is a point-and-click adventure game with a third person perspective. It's been many years since I last played one of these and I was interested to see if modern high definition gaming experiences had dulled or changed the amount of fun that was to be had with this genre. In case it's been so long you've forgotten how to play, the idea behind this genre is to use your mouse to interact with objects and people on screen; there are no fights, no action sequences and no need for reflexes, so if you're an action junkie you can forget about this game now. If, however, you're looking for something a little different, then Secret Files may be worth a look.

The main protagonist is Nina Kalenkov, a Russian girl whose museum curator father mysteriously disappears at the beginning of the story. Nina then sets out on an adventure that takes her across Europe, trying to discover where her father has gone, who took him, and why. Early on she discovers that her father had been researching events linked with the Tunguska explosion and she is not the only one interested in this event - dark figures in cloaks, along with Russian secret agents, are hot on the trail too, but on the trail of what?

The story itself is very good and definitely the best aspect of the game. Tunguska has always been an interest to me though and I was eager to find out the developers' take on the event. Sadly, the game itself is something of a let down; although I enjoyed playing through it, I was playing more as a means to an end - I wanted to find out about Tunguska, but I didn't particularly care for the characters themselves. Let me explain.

Nina is a nice bit of crumpet, as you can probably see in the screenshots, but she has a personality like a blank beige canvas. The game was originally written in German so I'm not sure how it was meant to feel, but the English dubbed version feels like a Japanese survival horror game, without being funny. The voice acting is, quite simply, terrible. From Nina's whiney nasal tone to the Russian train driver with a very New York voice, the game is chock full of American accents, with absolutely no attempt to emulate the German and Russian voices that the characters, being German and Russian, should have. It sounds as if the developers just got a few of their friends to come over during lunch and record the English voices; it's poorly produced, sounds stilted and comes over as just plain amateurish.

Secret Files does fairly well with the graphics, however. Nina is rendered quite well, as are most of the characters, but the camera views rarely allow the player to see any of the characters close up. However, backgrounds are clear and well presented, the animation is smooth and adequately realistic and the interface is simple and uncluttered. One very nice touch is the addition of a magnifying-glass button; one click instantly locates all items and locations of interest on the screen, so you don't have to go pixel hunting for that one little item you need to solve the next riddle. It is a good solution to one of the biggest problems of the genre, but it also creates a new problem -since everything you can interact with is clearly pointed out, every single problem can be solved through trial and error by simply matching all objects in every possible combination. You can't die in Secret Files and you can't make a mistake; you either do it right, or do nothing at all.

Secret Files also falls flat in the puzzle department. Aside from the fact that you can, and will, eventually solve everything by pure trial and error, there are very few puzzles that require any thought. I can think of perhaps three puzzles in the entire game that required some brainpower, one with some coins, one with a compass and another with some stones. As expected in a point-and-click adventure, many of the puzzle solutions have rather non-intuitive answers. How do you fix the little girl's bicycle tyre? Why, with a bucket of water, glue and a rubber glove of course! Got a penguin sitting on a vital object you need? Use a whale-oil-soaked blanket to break the shelf that holds the items you need to fetch the penguin a fish. I'm really not lying; you have to soak it in whale oil before you can use it.

I really wanted to love Secret Files but I walked away feeling disappointed. The moment I finished it, I cleared it off my hard drive, since there's practically no replay value and no part of the game that I enjoyed enough to replay. The story is compelling, yet I can't help but feel it's a little unrealistic that the daughter of a museum curator can go from 'girl next door' to 'fly across Siberia and fight KGB agents' within a 24 hour period. Secret Files: Tunguska could have been an epic recreation of one of the greatest mysteries of the Twentieth Century, but instead it's a simple diversion that will eat up a few hours of your day, albeit one with a good premise for a story.

Reviewed by Steve Rosenthal for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).