Layton’s Mystery Journey review: It’s only talking!

Katrielle Layton takes the reigns of the Layton series with her own brand of grace, good humor, and puzzling in Layton’s Mystery Journey.

Developer: Level-5
Publisher: Level-5
Platform: Android (Version reviewed), iOS
Release Date: July 20, 2017

Layton’s Mystery Journey’s mere release details provide two major reasons to raise eyebrows both for fans of the series and those with a vested interest in handheld games. The first is that the game is not only the first main series Layton title on mobile platforms, and is releasing there before it appears on 3DS. The second is that Professor Layton has disappeared, stepped down, or otherwise been removed as the protagonist, leaving us with a new heroine: Katrielle Layton, who brings a breath of fresh air to the series with her personality, if not with her puzzles.

Though fans may cling tightly to the mystery of Katrielle’s missing parent, Layton’s Mystery Journey mostly skips that entire question and opts to set its new heroine up as just that: a main character poised to carry multiple future installments with long-term plot lines and a strong cast of supporting characters. This particular collection of twelve mysteries, hundreds of puzzles, and a handful of minigames treats each new chapter as its own vignette, and waits to bring the pieces together for an emotional conclusion at the very end. You’ll need to be patient for the payoff in Layton’s Mystery Journey, and it’s certainly worth it, but I’d be lying if I said I’d have enjoyed a more connected storyline overall.

This is especially true given the strength of this new cast. Katrielle is joined by a mysterious talking dog whom she dubs “Sherl,” a starry-eyed young man named Ernest with a huge crush on her, the gruff Inspector Hastings and the clever criminal profile, Emiliana Perfetti. Truthfully, the animated cutscenes in all their Ghibli-esque charm were far more appealing than the written dialogue that composes most of the game. If Layton’s Mystery Journey ever wanted to drop the puzzles entirely and just be a cute animated movie, I’d embrace it warmly. Everything from the movements to the voice acting to the adorable expressions oozes charm.

I more than once spent far too long on a puzzle because I was focused on solving for a value rather than framing its phrasing differently.

But as I said, the written text in between falls far short of that charm, and even can feel as though it were written by someone else entirely. The early game is bogged down by lengthy, useless tutorials, while the rest of your journey often plods along while the characters ponder obvious moves or make bad puns. This leads to some weird pacing, where some sections drag on far too long, gearing up for big, satisfying payouts later.

But this is Layton, and you’re here for the puzzles. Here’s my disclaimer: I haven’t played Layton games before. But knowing their popularity, I expected clever and challenging puzzles throughout. And while some satisfied, many of the puzzles exasperated me for one of two reasons: they were either easy to the point of laughter, or troublesome due to being framed as riddles, rather than puzzles.

My expectations, based on a limited understanding of the series and the tutorials, were to expect puzzles with concrete, solvable solutions. But many of Layton’s Mystery Journey’s puzzles are merely wordplay tricks, or clever phrasings intended to throw you off the trail. Now, I love a good riddle. I do! But without any distinction as to what type of answer I was looking for, I more than once spent far too long on a puzzle because I was focused on solving for a value rather than framing its phrasing differently.

Furthermore, I found it odd how rarely the puzzles seemed to have anything at all to do with what was happening in the story. At times, they seemed to be themed around an object, clue, or idea recently mentioned. But many others were offered by random passersby for no obvious reason. This may just be a Layton series thing; I’m not sure. And I understand the difficulty of setting every possible themed puzzle you come up with to the theme of your mystery. But in general, it felt odd to be solving mysteries without actually doing any of the meaningful work of solving one outside of tapping the screen to progress dialogue. And that goes doubly for the “solution” to each mystery, which is completed merely by progression and has nothing to do with player input at all.

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Layton’s Mystery Journey proves a cute and clever new start for the series, though after playing the Android version I wish I had picked up the 3DS one instead. Microtransactions aside, I never felt that my phone was the right size to allow me to easily manipulate puzzles, and I actually had my save file wiped twice during the review period for various reasons, though a connection to a Level-5 sign-in now should prevent that for the future.

The game also made my Android phone fairly hot even while playing in short bursts. It’s clear that the best experience will always be on the 3DS, though I will still laugh at anyone complaining about having to pay $15 for a mobile game. Whatever you think of the puzzles, Layton’s Mystery Journey is certainly a complete title worth its low full price regardless of platform choice.

A copy of this game was provided to App Trigger for the purpose of this review. All scores are ranked out of 10, with .5 increments. Click here to learn more about our Review Policy.