The Big Secret of a Small Town is a cute little puzzle game that has great potential, but fails at some of the most important aspects of the gameplay.
If this review is too long for you, I suggest you to only read the first paragraph about the game's content and the final verdict at the end.

There is a small town, where the mayor suddenly disappears. You also have to find where the town gets all its electricity and catch the villain.

• The Story and Voice Acting | I gotta say, the story in this game is quite good. Every once in a while, you will encounter a cutscene about what happened with the city. These cutscenes are nicely animated and voice acted, which is, hand on heart, the best thing in this game.
  
• The Puzzles | Puzzles in this game are quite enjoyable, but they can also be extremely difficult. Quite a few times, I had to brute force the solution as the game was at some points very unhelpful when it came to puzzle solving. But I still enjoyed the whole thing a lot.
  
• Item Handling | As in most games of this genre, you have an inventory to store your items. I have to say that you never have so many items that it confuses you (which happens in some games) and all of the items usually make sense and it's clear what you have to do with them.
  
• Hand-Drawn Environment | This game looks awesome, as everything is hand-drawn. You probably noticed from the screenshots that the whole look of the game is nice, moving elements are animated perfectly as well. I have to mention one problem with the graphics, however, which you will find under Cons.

• Incredibly Hard / Impossible Ending | In the end of the game, there is a puzzle in which you have to hit a villain with an electrical beam while he's trying to avoid you. The rules are perfectly clear and it's even pretty simple to figure out what is the winning move, but he just won't move to that position. If he does, the player is usually too far from the villain to win. Some people managed to do it somehow (that say it was pure luck) but I couldn't do it in 30+ min. This shouldn't be a thing in a video game.
  
• Resolution Problems | The resolution is locked at 1024x768, so be prepared for temporary disturbances when Steam notifications cover a quarter of your screen.
  
• OS Compatibility and Steam Integration | As you can probably assume this game only supports Windows. Also, there are no Achievements because the dev refuses to implement them. I don't know what is the point of this, there is probably none. Also, no Cloud support. Get ready for a full data wipe every time you delete the game.
  
• Hint System | So, there is a rechargeable hint button that helps you when you get stuck. It's a nice addition since some puzzles are insanely hard, but sometimes, the hint button doesn't help you at all, which is why I used bruteforcing on some occasions. The hints are suffering mostly from being too general and sometimes even from including a bit too advanced English words.

It was hard to decide how to rate this game and I wish (as you can also see in some other reviews) that there would be a Meh option. There isn't one, so I decided to leave this game a positive review, as playing this game was certainly a great experience and I want this developer this game to keep making games.
However, this game still has some major problems that should not be in a released game. The puzzle in the end is next to impossible and only solvable with a big amount of luck. Other than that, the game was mostly enjoyable, despite hard puzzles and useless hints.

Greetings,
BirdCute

Note that my copy of this game was obtained for free for reviewing purposes. However, this did not affect the quality and objectivity of this review.

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[b]The Big Secret of a Small Town[/b] is a cute little puzzle game that has great potential, but fails at some of the most important aspects of the gameplay. If this review is too long for you, I suggest you to only read the first paragraph about the game's content and the final verdict at the end. [h1]What is happening in the game:[/h1] There is a small town, where the mayor suddenly disappears. You also have to find where the town gets all its electricity and catch the villain. [h1]Pros:[/h1] [list] [*][b]The Story and Voice Acting[/b] | I gotta say, the story in this game is quite good. Every once in a while, you will encounter a cutscene about what happened with the city. These cutscenes are nicely animated and voice acted, which is, hand on heart, the best thing in this game. [*][b]The Puzzles[/b] | Puzzles in this game are quite enjoyable, but they can also be extremely difficult. Quite a few times, I had to brute force the solution as the game was at some points very unhelpful when it came to puzzle solving. But I still enjoyed the whole thing a lot. [*][b]Item Handling[/b] | As in most games of this genre, you have an inventory to store your items. I have to say that you never have so many items that it confuses you (which happens in some games) and all of the items usually make sense and it's clear what you have to do with them. [*][b]Hand-Drawn Environment[/b] | This game looks awesome, as everything is hand-drawn. You probably noticed from the screenshots that the whole look of the game is nice, moving elements are animated perfectly as well. I have to mention one problem with the graphics, however, which you will find under Cons. [/list] [h1]Cons:[/h1] [list] [*][b]Incredibly Hard / Impossible Ending[/b] | In the end of the game, there is a puzzle in which you have to hit a villain with an electrical beam while he's trying to avoid you. The rules are perfectly clear and it's even pretty simple to figure out what is the winning move, but [i]he just won't move to that position[/i]. If he does, the player is usually too far from the villain to win. Some people managed to do it somehow (that say it was pure luck) but I couldn't do it in 30+ min. This shouldn't be a thing in a video game. [*][b]Resolution Problems[/b] | The resolution is locked at 1024x768, so be prepared for temporary disturbances when Steam notifications cover a quarter of your screen. [*][b]OS Compatibility and Steam Integration[/b] | As you can probably assume this game only supports Windows. Also, there are no Achievements because the dev refuses to implement them. I don't know what is the point of this, there is probably none. Also, no Cloud support. Get ready for a full data wipe every time you delete the game. [*][b]Hint System[/b] | So, there is a rechargeable hint button that helps you when you get stuck. It's a nice addition since some puzzles are insanely hard, but sometimes, the hint button doesn't help you at all, which is why I used bruteforcing on some occasions. The hints are suffering mostly from being too general and sometimes even from including a bit too advanced English words. [/list] [h1]The final verdict:[/h1] It was hard to decide how to rate this game and I wish (as you can also see in some other reviews) that there would be a Meh option. There isn't one, so I decided to leave this game a positive review, as playing this game was certainly a great experience and I want this developer this game to keep making games. However, this game still has some major problems that should not be in a released game. The puzzle in the end is next to impossible and only solvable with a big amount of luck. Other than that, the game was mostly enjoyable, despite hard puzzles and useless hints. Greetings, BirdCute [quote]Note that my copy of this game was obtained for free for reviewing purposes. However, this did not affect the quality and objectivity of this review.[/quote] [i]--- If you liked this review or want to see more recommended games, be sure to follow our curator group: [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/Original_Curators_Group#curation]Follow Original Curator Group[/url][/i]