Justin Wack and the Big Time Hack review

A regular guy minding his own regular business doesn't make for a very interesting game. Send that regular guy several thousands of years into the past and have his place taken by a caveman named Kloot, however, and you've got the perfect recipe for a hair-styling, puzzle-solving adventure through time, with multiple playable characters to boot.

You'll visit three time periods on the ultimate quest to get Justin back to his girlfriend - the classic cavemen-and-dinosaurs era, the present day, and a grim future. Like most time travel stories, there's a certain suspension of disbelief you'll need to get comfortable with to hand-wave the corner-cutting that leads to only a convenient handful of your actions affecting the future as they should.

The game isn't aiming to be super-serious science fiction, however. If the caveman switcheroo wasn't a big enough clue, Justin constantly falling into the clutches of the Pythonic Empire’s robot agents should do it - and their name being a reference to the Python programming language makes it clearer still. Their logic and motivations can be a bit random at times, but hey, we're all guilty of pushing questionable code on a Friday evening.

The settings really shine in the puzzles, and they are numerous! You'll spend most of the game with a bunch of puzzles actively in progress and a plethora of items in your inventory. Three characters in three time periods with multiple rooms to explore - and the possibility to send items between them all - all adds up to be quite overwhelming, but a good challenge nonetheless.

That's thanks to the solutions that are, in the end, quite logical and satisfying. The game could have benefited from giving more hints when the player has the correct item yet without the alterations it needs. You'll usually be faced with a blunt “X”, essentially telling you that action cannot be attempted right now. It's a little immersion breaking (and a missed opportunity for funny dialogue) when attempting to share an item with a character standing next to you is blocked with the “X”. Maybe it's better than the classic "I don't want to do that", but I think we'd all rather not be reminded of what Elon did to Twitter.

The sheer number and variety of puzzles actually leads to funny situations where you can solve a few by accident, thinking you're doing something else entirely. Those are nice jokes and work well for the story, but make repeat playthroughs and hint writing tricky when the intended path has you moving in and out of areas a lot. The hints I wrote aren't your only hope, though - the game has its very own hint system! Daela, a snarky woman you meet at the start of the game, hosts a hint hotline that can be brought up from the main menu. The hints are vague and don't guide all the way to the solution, but still offer a good nudge in the right direction.

It warms my heart to see a hinting system implemented - we all benefit from accessibility options, and having hints in the game is the perfect way to make them more approachable for players who struggle with the puzzle aspects of these games. If you are a game dev and find yourself agreeing, then check out my resources that can help you achieve this - your players will be glad you did!

The game excels in graphics and sound. The wobbly-head characters by Alberto Costa (also seen in their excellent-looking upcoming project) have a modern style that's easy to distinguish items in, and it's always great to hear voice acting in indie games, even if the dialogue itself can be a bit clunky and simple.

Overall, it’s safe to say that Justin Wack and the Big Time Hack is a classic-yet-modern point and click game that's worth playing for its numerous puzzles, references, and wild, wacky story. Daela will be there to guide you, but if you'd rather phone a nicer friend, you can check out my hints for the game here.