The Elysium Enigma

The puzzles are not too hard, the solutions are logical and there is a nice flow to the unfolding of the story. Definitely worth of my time.

The settings might sound a bit cliché but works well, it reminded me of some Asimov's novels, 'The Naked Sun' or maybe the 'Foundation' serie. There is a distinctively old-school sci-fi aspect to the game.

Technically, I found the game flawless : there was no dead-end, the built-in hint system was really nice and I really liked the conversation system.
(Spoiler - click to show)
Regarding the plot (and the title), maybe I missed something, but I was a bit disappointed that the planet hadn't some sort of secret itself. At one point I even thought that the Elders had manipulated both the Imperial and Federation spies to hide something bigger.

This is an extremely satisfying dialog-driven game.

The puzzles fit seamlessly into the story, and are on the easy to moderate scale. These range from the perennial find-the-key to distract the animal to proceed.

There are three NPC's in the story, two of these are very well drawn. The dialog choices with them drive the narrative forward in a very nice and natural way.

I would have given this game four stars, but have given it three because of a slight niggle with the ending. All through the game you have quite definite objectives, but at the end it is not very clear how to finally finish. In the end I finished the game with 28 points and have been unable to get the final two points, even with the built in hints.