It's been around for a while, so we expect many of you are already familiar with A Case of the Crabs, but if Nick Bounty's first point-and-click adventure missed you, now's a great time to give it a go. It's a hilarious parody of classic detective stories, a noir-but-silly tale of a down-on-his luck gumshoe solving the mystery of a murder and a crate full of crabs.

With just enough challenge to engage, but not overtax, the mind, The Wedding Anniversary is a perfectly mellow respite from the workday world. A simple piano tune floats through the air. Relax, kick back and indulge in a bit of sentimentality... a wonderful room escape game that's more fun than a chick flick.

The Malstrums Mansion is a retro point-and-click game with a surprisingly tense atmosphere, in the style of old Apple Macintosh adventures like Shadowgate. The heavily pixilated black and white graphics are chunky but lovingly crafted. If you love games that give you the creeps, or if you just like to relive the early years of gaming, this is a title you simply can't afford to pass up.

How great is it to be a detective? You wear expensive suits, your hair always looks perfect no matter what angle you're seen from . . . oh! And of course you get to utilize everything from hidden objects, spot-the-difference, fun puzzles and more to catch your man! And if you do it by playing one of Big Fish Games' newest releases, CSI:NY, you get to do it all with a substantially decreased likelihood of getting shot! And hey, who doesn't like not getting shot?

The Legend of Crystal Valley is a mini-epic adventure game with an eclectic mix of fantasy and sci-fi elements. Gather items, solve both environmental and inventory puzzles, and examine everything you see as you travel through over 150 locations, each just as extraordinary as the last.

Tower Core is another shining star from John Feltham, the author of the previous "Core" series of games. It continues the story line established in Soul Core without a hitch, and even provides a recap accessible from the main menu. An alien being has decided to attack Earth while it was vulnerable. We can't let this happen. Unfortunately, the planet's defense systems are powered by a special Power Core Deluxe which someone forgot to charge before leaving.

The sixth installment of Mateusz Skutnik's Great Escape series. By now you should know what to expect; beatiful cartoony backgrounds, quirky music, and improbable contraptions you must build to make your unlikely escape. Oh, and bats. Maybe you weren't expecting the bats, but they're in there too.

Neptune is quite different from GUMP's previous room-escape games. It doesn't begin with an interesting introductory movie in which a pink-haired character does not encounter a huge building and doesn't decide to enter it, not passing an enigmatic red ladies' shoe that isn't resting on the ground outside.

Quaint room is a relatively short and easy room escape game, but it is also impressively polished and well-made. The graphics are aesthetically pleasing in a tidy sort of way, and the interface is completely smooth and user-friendly. So, take a break. Relax, step back a few years and enjoy this lovely example of classic Japanese gaming goodness.

Double Fine president Tim Schafer is hosting at this years Game Developers Conference, and he's totally unprepared. Help him out by scouring the backstage area for jokes, scribbled on scraps of paper hidden in all sorts of unlikely locations. If you have even the slightest nostalgia for early graphic adventure games such as The Secret of Monkey Island, then this sharp, clever point and click adventure is made for you.

Another Room, by Japanese designer Mofuya, is a sweet, semi-short example of classic point-and-click that is executed with near-perfect competence. The game's puzzles are simple but well-crafted; while not wildly creative or different, they nonetheless offer a satisfying variety of problems to tackle. The room's neat, somewhat subdued appearance is pleasing to the eye and makes it simple to navigate the surroundings.

Ever wanted to combine a hidden object game with a riddle-centric room escape title? Like strawberries and bananas, the two genres go together remarkably well, as Elephant Games' Lost in the City eloquently showcases. Steeped in mystery, you travel from room to room finding items, solving puzzles, deciphering riddles and completing simple mini-games as you unravel a particularly intriguing storyline filled with strange plot twists.

Back to the basics again with Kagi Nochi Tobira 2, the simple and original puzzle game sequel to the very well-received Kagi Nochi Tobira from September of last year. There's not much else to say other than the raw creativity and sense of discovery in these simple puzzle games create an exceptionally engaging and appealing experience. Another example of why simple ideas are often among the most fun!

Today we have two short but excellent escapes for your mid-week gaming pleasure, and they couldn't be more different. One is gorgeously quirky, an eccentric little time-traveling escape game that will fascinate and bewilder; the other is a gritty and darkly realistic game that challenges the player to break out of the confines of a bleak prison cell. So, take your pick... whimsical or grim? Fantastical or gloomy? Whatever you choose, you're sure to enjoy.

Bowja 3 - Ninja Kami is the latest point-and-click adventure from Pencilkids Games, and the third entry in the Bowja series. As the titular ninja, you use your cunning, skill, and handy bow-and-arrow to find an ancient artifact and save the Ninja Spirit, all along the way finding clever ways to defeat the evil purple ninjas who constantly impede you. Although short on game, the charm of the graphics, animation, and overall feeling of the game more than make up for it. Bowja's latest adventure won't take long to complete, but you'll enjoy the ride while you're there.

Enter the Kid's Room. You left your myPhone behind when visiting your friend's house, and he hid it in the kid's playroom. You go to get it, possibly to get away from your annoying myRobot for a while, but some prankster locks the door behind you when you enter. Of course. It is an excellent piece of work, with puzzles that make sense, fine 3D graphics, and just the right amount of satisfaction when you figure something out.

Tortuga Episode 2 is an escape-the-room game set on a pirate ship; the second installment of the Tortuga series. You have just escaped the locked room from episode 1 and the pirate is still sleeping off the sleepy spray you got him with prior to your escape, but you are still locked up on the pirate ship. You must look for items and clues to reveal a solution on how to get off the ship.

A short demo of a larger point-and-click adventure to be released in April, this is the latest by Gateway series creator Anders Gustafsson. It uses similar play mechanics to his previous games, and yet the graphical engine looks like it has received a complete makeover. A compelling teaser for the beautiful new world of adventure that Gustafsson has in store for us.

All room escape games have secrets. Some room escapes, however, keep their cards especially close to their chests, relinquishing their grasp bit by bit; these are sometimes the most frustrating, and often the most intriguing. Sagrario's Room is such a game, and a superb one at that.

Point and click adventure games will never die, thanks in part to the efforts of Wadjet Eye Games, creator of the Blackwell series, The Shivah, and now, Emerald City Confidential. In the studio's latest title you are cast in the role of Petra, a young private eye trying to make a living in the strange Wizard of Oz-inspired world known as Emerald City. The handdrawn artwork is utterly captivating, the storytelling and writing top-notch, and the game itself is a package you won't be able to tear yourself away from.

An uncommonly lovely escape game that is also, for better and for worse, unusually difficult. We've come to expect great things from Place of Light; their previous games are both excellent and well-executed. With Room Marine, however, they have positively outdone themselves. While the difficulty of the game can be at times taxing, the reward is more than worth it; if you're a serious connoisseur of escape games, you're gonna love this one.

A lovely escape game that does nearly everything right; the graphics are good, the puzzles varied and inventive, the interface clean and user-friendly. Completing Cosmo does take just a smidgen of comprehension of mathematics and astronomy, but it is easily one of the better room escapes to come along recently.

From the creators of Dr. Ichie's Room, Escape from Dr. Ichie's Cafe places you once more in the grasp of the mysterious doctor. He or she has locked you in a cozily wood-paneled cafe, filled with clever puzzles that tread the fine line between challenging and infuriating, providing a mentally stimulating experience that never crosses into head-banging-on-table territory.

The Strange and Somewhat Sinister Tale of the House at Desert Bridge is an unconventional point-and-click narrative adventure by Jonas Kyratzes, the same developer who brought us Infinite Ocean and Museum of Broken Memories. It's not actually a game, per se, so much as a trans-dimensional portal or a window. Above all else, this game is a story. A cute, endearing, wonderful story that gradually peels back its soft-edged veneer to reveal something that is indeed a little sinister, thrusting the player from humor into apprehension into sadness.

New from Gregory Weir, eternally inventive creator of The Majesty of Colors, comes the enigmatic and unsettling Bars of Black and White. It is an escape game, but the point is not to escape the room; it is a social commentary—or maybe it's really just an exploration of one person's mind? The possible interpretations are endless.

T2B Escape 4 offers all the complexity, creativity and whimsy that we've come to expect from this popular escape-the-room series, with the difficulty ramped up a generous handful of notches. It has simple puzzles, complex puzzles, puzzles that cannot be solved until the very end, puzzles that can be cracked with nothing but a little clever thinking... the number and variety are really amazing.

Terminal House is the first of a series of four escape-the-room adventures by developer, GUMP, that chart your oddly pastel-blue hero's quest to gain freedom from mysterious captors; perhaps the least sophisticated of the group, it is nonetheless excellent. I love the game's quirky sensibility, its commingling of surreal elements and standard escape-the-room tropes.

We are introduced to the odious yet adorable little green goblin, Griswold, in his first flash adventure, as he tries to retrieve his shiny red rock from some nefarious ne'er-do-well. It's a light-hearted and charming point-and-click romp, one that will leave you with little doubt as to why a sequel had to be made.

Griswold the Goblin: Islands of Fire -- Chapter One is a beautifully compact and well-produced point-and-click adventure game from B-Group Productions. Take the reins of Griswold, a droopy and half-alert fellow with ridiculous posture, as he embarks on a sure-to-be-epic quest, for no other reason than that his TV broke and he's just bored enough to look for some treasure.

December 31st, 1999. A mysterious conversation occurs between two concealed figures, only to be cut short by an unseen disaster. 100 years later, you wake up in a library, disoriented and alone. What are you doing in this strange house, and how can you escape? An escape-the-house, rather than escape-the-room, adventure, Time Escape is a complex quest that will test your wits and boggle your mind.

In Escape, a multiple-room point-and-click escape game in the Trapped series by Godlimations, play as Dialla Reineheart, a spunky red-headed lady detective tasked with bringing down a sinister crime syndicate. Your partner, Mickey, has been tragically slain by the leader of the gang, the ruthless Dan McNeely; now, you must escape from his clutches. This won't be easy.

Yes, it's true--the twelfth and final episode of 10 Gnomes is here. Let's bid a fond farewell to our timid multitude of miniature friends. The next time you look out at the world and fail to see any magic there, just imagine a gnome hiding around every corner. Then imagine you have only ten minutes to find them all.

A simple and charming room escaper from Japan that is just right for an afternoon tea. Filled with objects to find and puzzles to solve, and just a few smallish pixel areas to give you pause. It's simple, short and sweet, like a new year's baby offering promise of a better life ahead. So Happy Birthday 2008!

Cottage is an escape game that manages to successfully combine cleverness with a relatively low level of difficulty; while the puzzles may seem simple, they are still creative and inspired enough to delight even the veteran escape gamers among us. Fabulous graphics, fun puzzles, and an adorably surprising ending... it warms even my cold, grumpy New Yorker's heart.

You might think that after escaping the kitchen only to find yourself locked in a living room, and then a bathroom, and then a basement, that we would learn not to get into tight situations such as these again. But then Mateusz Skutnik sends word of yet another installment in the Great Escape series and we're all lush with excitement. Somehow it just doesn't stand to reason. Or does it?

It's that most special time of year again. Time to get on your softest, most comfortable pajamas, and make a mug of peppermint hot chocolate. A crackling fire would be nice, accompanied by Bing Crosby crooning about white Christmases and silver bells...as you sit down, with a sigh of contentment, to play Neutral's newest holiday room escape game. Ah, that most special time of year, indeed.

How close are you with your family? What if you received a letter from an uncle one night, asking for your help in investigating rumours of an ancient culture deep in the wilderness? Would you pack your bags and head out to help? You might. But the blood on the ground when you arrived might give you serious pause. How bad could things be, right? As befits the first chapter in a series of adventures, you're going to end this one with more questions than you started with, and maybe, just maybe, a prickling feeling of unease at the back of your neck.

Charger Escape, the latest from Pastel Games, is not simple an excellent escape game, it is also one that features ponies! And farm animals! And kittens!! It is a rare game that manages to soothe and relax you even as it challenges your mind. Although not particularly difficult, nor is it very long, Charger Escape contains puzzles that are well-executed and creative.

The Esklavos series is a seventeen-chapter series about two outer-space delivery men named Ungo and Virop. One day they get distracted and crash into a planet called Akea, and as they find out after getting separated, it's in a state of war. With their help, the Akean population must face the Uros and defeat them to restore peace to the planet.

Hotel 626 is an amazingly innovative, beautifully-produced nightmare of a game. After "checking in" (giving the website your name, email and creating a password), you are immediately whisked away into the opening movie: your awakening, in the middle of the night, in your room at this hellish hotel.

It's sad to see Mateusz Skutnik's delightful hidden object series coming to an end. This penultimate installment of 10 Gnomes, titled "The Remains" takes place along a quiet village street, and might be one of the most charming and challenging yet. Can you find all the gnomes? Try for it yourself! Or, go and replay all the 10 Gnomes games.

A short and sweet old-fashioned adventure game from Videlectrix, the faux video game company of the animated Homestar Runner universe. For the Homestar un-hip, "Dangeresque" is the hard-boiled detective alter-ego of Strong Bad, who is the lead narrator and practical jokester at homestarrunner.com. Strong Bad/Dangeresque must solve a murder case from the confines of his office, because the chief thinks the case was solved months ago.

Reemus and Liam continue their journey to save the kingdom from the plague of death slugs that appeared from nowhere in the first chapter. Zeebarf is a fantastic animator and he uses his talents to tell an imaginative story full of interesting characters and fantastic situations. You will be entertained (and perhaps a little grossed out, too). The puzzles are not too difficult, but wacky enough to keep you from just breezing through the game.

Rodrigo Roesler is back with the third and final installment of his Trapped trilogy of point-and-click adventure games. Trapped Pt. 3: The Labyrinth puts you right back into familiar territory: you've just killed a man and now you must escape from a strange house. Oh, and it's about 18 years in the past.

The wait is over! The release of the latest Mystery Case Files: Return to Ravenhearst is finally here. Big Fish Games Studios takes the hidden object genre to unprecedented new heights with an absolutely gorgeous, hidden object / adventure hybrid that is sure to please a very wide range of casual game players. This is one game you don't want to miss!

Onamis seems to be a portmanteau of the French words for "friendly" and "one". As soon as you are trapped inside, you might start to wonder just how friendly people really are. There you are, with no map, no guide, and no inventory. You don't have the ability to turn around or look back. There's not even a clue. Well, except that scrap of paper on the floor. Maybe someone was being friendly, after all.

Turning Burning, the third in Zibumi's Tom "Tucker" Crubucker series of games, picks up where the last one left off. Tom has just escaped the room he was trapped in, and confronts the mastermind behind it, a bizarre prince who asks him to rescue his rose, which has been stolen by a sheep...

Escape from Test Kitchen 2 is a standard escape-the-room game from Japan, somewhat reminiscent of a game from the gotMail folks. Players must collect bottles and mixers, pieces of a map, safe combinations, and the like to find a solution and escape from what appears to be a small cozy restaurant.

Out of Order is a humor-oriented, mouse-driven adventure game in the style of the old Lucas Arts and Sierra titles. You play as Hurford Schlitzting, an ordinary human being in a green bathrobe and bunny slippers. Late one night he's awakened by a storm and goes to get a midnight snack. And then the game ends... wait, no, it doesn't, or we wouldn't have much of a game.

In this brand new point-and-click adventure, the King of Moronia has sent Retardo on a mission to defeat the Iron Golem and restore peace to the kingdom. In return he is promised the hand of the Princess of Moronia. It's up to you to ensure that he accomplishes his mission safely.

In Crypt Keeper, you find yourself plunked down in the middle of a truly spooktastic graveyard. How and why did you get there? Not important. It's the middle of the night, and there are creepy noises and big ominous tombstones and omigosh you need to get out right now!

Tortuga Episode 1 is an escape-the-room game set on a pirate ship; the first installment of a series, from Mateusz Skutnik and Marek Frankowski, that promises to be adventuresome, if not epic. Parrots, treasure, peril and puzzle awaits those intrepid enough to brave the pirate ship.

When we last left the Tipping Point series, it wasn't clear if we were wandering through a surreal dream or being teleported around by satellites and villains with 1980's technology and bad intentions. Tipping Point: Chapter 4 takes over just where we left off, entering another unknown tropical destination with our strange, homemade device in hand.

In Charisma, you play an orange-jumpsuited, blue-afroed dude who is trapped within what appears to be a combination living room/recording studio. There is a second gentleman inscrutably watching you from behind a glass partition, his hand poised above two buttons. He, for whatever reason, is not going to be of any help (and, in another departure from reality, smashing the glass and demanding he release you is not an option). So, it's up to you to explore the room, figure out what he wants and, eventually, set yourself free.

The 4th in a series of Great Escapes by Mateusz Skutnik and the Pastel Games crew, The Great Basement Escape is another short and fun room escape game in the same whimsical style that we have come to love and expect from the series.

Ghostscape, a new escape game by Psionic, is just chock full of supernatural goodness. You play a veteran investigator of the occult who, upon hearing rumors of a haunted house, cannot stay away...and what a paranormal gold mine it turns out to be! Chairs and cups move as if grasped by some invisible hand, mysterious diary entries litter the floor, grotesque paintings adorn every room. And then, of course, there are the ghosts.

10 Gnomes episode 10: Seashore is the tenth installment of hunt-and-click gnome-finding from the indefatigable Mateusz Skutnik. That means if you've been following the series from the beginning, you've already ferreted out 100 gnomes. A hundred gnomes!

At long last, after a year and a half of waiting, Tucker Bowen has released Something Amiss Chapter 3, the final installment of his truly excellent point-and-click adventure saga. This chapter finds the intrepid escaped test subject Alice back in custody, awaiting her fate at the hands of persons unknown.

Neutral Halloween mini-game is what I'm calling this cute and easy escape game with a Halloween theme (well, it used to have a Halloween theme. The pumpkin has been replaced with a piggy bank now.) It features the same excellent implementation features of all the other Neutral games, along with simple yet appealing and effective graphics. I'm sure you will find this one worthwhile of your time!

It is a classic horror scenario: the car broken down in the middle of the road, the swirling snow and biting cold, the beckoning light visible just over the hill. A house! Oh, thank goodness. But what's this? The lights are on, cheery fireplaces crackle in every room, yet no one is there. You call out a hello, but your voice echoes unanswered through the hall. How strange.

Dr. Ichie's Room is a solid escape game experience from Japan with polished and appealing graphics, logical puzzles and no pixel hunts necessary. Although the game is from Japan, there are English translations included for all descriptions and explanations, making this Weekday Escape a worthy investment of your time.

The fourth in the "Core" series of point-and-click adventure games created by John Feltham has just been released. Soul Core is similar to other games like this, and yet introduces a unique concept as well. Use your mouse to add items to your inventory; click on inventory items and drag them to the game view to use them. Try to complete the game with 100% "soul" rating.

Ticket is a brand new game from the talented room escape designers at Gotmail. Like so many of their games to come before, this one features the same highly detailed, gorgeous pre-rendered scenes and the same point-and-clickery puzzles one would expect to find in a game of this nature. The only downside? There is no English version, so that will surely turn off a few.

Matt Sandorf: Journey to Endless Entertainment is not just an artistic point-and-click game. It is an advergame—a promotion for the Sony empire from music to gadgets to games. It was created by Rodrigo Roesler, creator of the very popular Trapped series of games, and this one follows similar construction.

There is something oddly compelling about gnomes. They are cute, mythical creatures that spark the chemistry in our brains that control imagination and curiosity. Perhaps that's why when someone hides a bunch of them within a series of interactive images we jump to task of finding every one of them.

And really, that's what this delectable duo is: delicious, unpretentious, snack-sized games just bursting with escapey goodness. Are they remarkable? Not really. Satisfying? Absolutely. And as a plus, they won't leave grease stains on your couch.

Room escape fans will be pleased to learn of a brand new installment available to play in the T2B Escape series. The new game, T2B Escape 3, features similar artwork, some pixel hunting and the lack of any backstory as in previous games, but that shouldn't stop all the room escape fanatics from enjoying another T2B Escape experience. Go forth, point-and-click your mouse, and escape!

If you're unfamiliar with the Hoshi Saga series, then you're in for a treat as there are now 3 full games for you to experience. For the uninitiated, Hoshi Saga is a simple game of discovery. One part point-and-click and one part puzzle game, the objective in each stage is to find the star. How you go about doing that is different for every level. The task is up to you to figure out how.

In the Dog House is a cute sliding puzzle game that tasks you with sliding rooms around a grid to create a path from dog to dogfood in the kitchen. To encourage the pup to move, simply grab the bone and drop it somewhere in the house. You'll also have to contend with mechanical contraptions such as elevators and security gates, not to mention the tempting distractions of a cat!

White Zone is an intriguingly different sort of room escape game; it does not take place in any sort of concrete space. There are no walls, no ceiling, no door; instead, the player is faced with a few pieces of furniture—two chairs, a television, and a dresser, to be exact—arranged in a circle, seemingly suspended within a white void. Some forgotten corner of the Matrix? Perhaps.

Find key, then find door—
Kagi Nochi Tobira—
How hard could it be?

Zeebarf returns and you'll be pleased to know that his work just keeps getting better. Your job is to guide opportunistic exterminator Reemus and his ursine companion Liam through a series of eight oddball misadventures on a quest to... well... do something or other. Go to a castle and save the world, I guess. They get sidetracked a lot.

In Another Side, you inexplicably find yourself confined within a dollhouse-like room, a pretty little place marred by the giant wall of rock that exists in place of a door. That's right, there's not even a door to unlock! But there's plenty to explore and examine.

In this world of change, however, there is one constant. Come rain, come sun, come snow, there will be rooms to escape from. When the glaciers melt and California falls into the sea, there will still be screwdrivers and scraps of paper to collect. And in billions of years, when the sun finally blooms into a red giant and consumes the Earth, we will be here, faithfully, delivering Weekday Escape to you every Wednesday. ...Well, ok, maybe not then. Definitely up until the week before, though. After that we'll be updating from Mars.

A deeply satisfying escape game presented by Place of Light, you must find your way out of what is undoubtedly the oddest bathroom you've ever come across; codes and secret panels grace the toilet, gems are scattered across the floor and weird golden masks watch over the sink and bathtub. Perhaps it's the work of some eccentric, puzzle-obsessed billionaire....who has, um, slipped, hit his or her head and forgotten how to escape? Yep, that must be it.

Miniature white gnomes have been spotted all over the city for half a year now, and their number only appears to grow. Their presence seems permanent, and there is no apparent end to them. Join us in trying to find them all, please.

This week, we present the exclusive debut of a super-duper, extra-special room escape game, one we can guarantee that absolutely no other website has yet featured. Don't you feel special? To all the JIG faithful, we present to you the world premiere of.... Casual Gameplay Escape!

Diversity is more of an escape-the-house game, rather than escape-the-room; in order to finally achieve freedom, the player must exit first a bedroom, then an office, then a nursery and finally a bathroom. This aside, Diversity is a well-executed, if fairly standard, point-and-click game, no doubt inspired by the classic Crimson Room.

Floating Islands Game is a puzzle title, created by Hempuli, that plays a lot like Rob Allen's Hapland series with a distinct Lemmings slant to it. In each level you must guide the main character through the stage, collecting all of the gold stars before reaching the flag at the end. You can only affect his movements indirectly, however, by clicking and changing different parts of the environment at just the right time.

Surprise! Suspense! A scintillatingly superb set of sequels, specifically suggested by your escape specialists for another Weekday Escape. Sequester yourself away, take a sabbatical from the scathing stupor of your work week. Salud!

Arijigora is a point-and-click puzzle game from Japan starring stick figures against a diabolical biological creature. Click on the right items, and with the right timing, to save the stickman race from the threat to its existence. If you're familiar with the Hapland series, then you'll feel right at home with this new game from author Hozo, who even gives a nod to Rob Allen's original as the inspiration behind this one.

Rooms: The Main Building is an upgraded full version of the Flash game Rooms released early last year. Created by HandMade Games, Rooms: The Main Building is a clever combination of puzzle and adventure elements. Bored with simple sliding puzzles, the main character receives a strange gift that transports him to another world. Here, rooms are broken into a series of spaces that can be moved around a grid like a sliding puzzle. Gather items to unlock more rooms as you search for puzzle pieces that lead the way out of this bizarre realm.

It's Wednesday, and you know what that means. Yes! It means we're half-way to another Weekend Download, two days shy of a Link Dump Friday, and smack-dab in the middle of a Weekday Escape! So grab your mouse, your point-and-clicky finger and let's escape some rooms!

The 3rd in a series of Great Escapes by Mateusz Skutnik and the Pastel Games crew, The Great Bathroom Escape is another short and fun room escape game that will surely entertain like the others to come before it.

Bird's Eye View Escape is a unique, well-made room escape game that offers a new perspective (literally) on the genre; it also happens to be really tough. If you're willing to take on a challenge and have the stamina to crack open some seriously enigmatic puzzles, we heartily recommend this game.

An adventure puzzler with a "choose your own" path style. This unique and animated game uses a comic book motif to present the various paths the player may take when choosing what to do. Very stylish and fun, the comic stills mixed with the animation is a nice touch. Fun, quirky puzzles, a surreal premise and a fantastic score make this game enjoyable to play.

In a city overrun by photo-snapping tourists, Mateusz had to hunt, not for gnomes, but for a quiet secluded setting, far from the maddening crowds, where he could begin his work. Then he remembered a little known place, just around the corner from the sightseers, in the center of his old town. A quiet, relaxing and peaceful place. And the gnomes were there.

What do robots and exotic birds have in common with stop motion animation? They're all components of this week's selection of Weekday Escape! Featuring three worthy escape games for your weekday escapism.

Welcome to another edition of Weekday Escape. This week we highlight a trio of escape games that, while not quite exemplary enough to warrant a full review, are nonetheless well-done and entertaining. So, enjoy this triple treat! See you again next week, same time, same channel.

Gigolo Assassin is a new point-and-click adventure from Mediatonic and created for Adult Swim. In this first installment of a three part series, you must guide your gigolo (I named mine Bruce Digelow) through an isolated tropical island in order to put a stop to the sinister goings on of one Alana Lamia. In so doing you will meet an assortment of unique (and decidedly non-unique) characters as well as solve item based puzzles much along the same vein as the old Sierra and Lucas Arts point-and-click adventures.

Upon first playing Escape Artist, a new room escape game, you may be surprised that this is a creation of the same designers who produced such dark, brooding classics as the Submachine and Covert Front series. You'll soon find out, however, that Mateusz Skutnik & company do sweet, serene and light very well indeed; Escape Artist is lovely, cute without crossing the line into saccharine, and a real pleasure to play.

This just in! Gotmail, creator of numerous esteemed escape games, has just released Free Falling for our escaping pleasure. I haven't yet played through the entire game, but so far it conforms to the usual high Gotmail standard: beautiful, lifelike graphics, ingenious puzzles, and....a pachinko machine? Interesting.

T2B Escape is a good-looking, clever and impressively well-designed escape-the-room game, easily a cut or two above most others of its kind even if the premise isn't anything spectacularly new or creative. T2B has two or three puzzles that genuinely made me chuckle with delight upon solving them, which to me is a significant part of the pleasure in playing such games.

Boat House is the latest in a series of excellent room escape games from Gump, in which the player must navigate a chamber filled with initially-puzzling gadgetry, codes and machines in an effort to escape, this time all the way home from some distant location in space. And it's extremely well done.

Ruins of Pantheon, the fifth and latest chapter of the Jinja Series, Aztec's ongoing, epic point-and-click saga, has just been released. Take one part Indiana Jones, mixing in a few heaping spoonfuls of mysterious alien technology. Add a nice dash of interstellar warfare, a sprinkling of impending doom, and plunk it all down into a tranquil, traditionally Japanese setting. Voila!

Hot on the heels of a mention in a G4TV feature, Mateusz Skutnik unleashes more gnome-mania onto the world. This latest installment, 10 Gnomes (#6), is a hidden object game like the others to come before it. Your task, as per the usual, is to find 10 gnomes within 10 minutes.

After successfully defeating the ginormous Gi8000 in the first mission, Bowja the Ninja is back again and this time it's Bigman's Compound that is the target of ninja stealth and fortitude. Help Bowja defeat Bigman and save innocent people before it's too late in this charming point-and-click adventure.

A new room escape game has just been launched by Neutral, creator of some of the most highly rated games here at JIG! Switch confines you again within a stunningly rendered room and dares you to escape from it. Use your point-and-clicking fingers and your logical puzzle-solving skills to unlock the mysteries that await you in this fresh new game.

Little Hostage preserves the finer points of developer Zibumi's previous effort, The Final Spell, while adding complexity and cleverness. While still not excessively challenging, Little Hostage is a fun, satisfying game perfect for a coffee break or random escape-the-room craving. Those new to the genre will find it to be a relatively accessible introduction to the beautiful world of point-and-click.

These fun, quirky little point-and-click diversions star a large-headed, unusually plucky baby who must traverse land, sea and even across the street to rescue his beloved bamba snacks from the clutches of an evil squirrel (and then, when things take a turn for the weird, from a giant mosquito). So...adorable...excuse me while I go suck on a lemon to balance the sweetness.