MachineGames
2024
Xbox Series, PC (PlayStation 5 Spring 2025)

At times, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle follows in its publisher Bethesda’s lineage as the year’s best “turn your brain off and follow these waypoints” game of the year. With three major open world hubs, major sequences of your playtime will likely be dedicated to opening your questlog, heading to a section of the map, knocking unconscious every fascist guard in sight, and picking up whatever quest item you need to bring back to the quest giver to unlock another segment of your health bar. I cannot stress enough that unless you enjoy this kind of play, the game does not require it, and in fact the gameplay may even get worse by your process of unlocking overpowered disguises, upgrades to your health and ammo, and having explored cool locations before the main story intends you to do so.

This stuff is here because it allows the game to function as a mystery. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle takes place somewhere between Raiders of the Lost Ark (barring an incredibly misguided intro where you play that film’s opening) and the Last Crusade, the Nazis still spreading influence throughout the world but not quite openly at war, Marion Ravenwood having dumped Dr. Jones. A giant played admirably by the now-deceased Tony Todd (not quite his final screen appearance thanks to this year’s upcoming Final Destination: Bloodlines) ransacks Marshall College and sets Indiana on a globetrotting trip to uncover a classic fascist plot to weaponize one of history’s great artifacts.

Ultimately, while you spend a lot of this game knocking out or killing fascists (the game is not shy about identifying Blackshirts, Nazis, or the Empire of Japan) the game is more about exploring the environments, solving puzzles, and trying to figure out what the overarching mystery is going to be before the game gives away its own story. (Yes, it involves Jim Alison’s obscure Great Circle conspiracy.) The game gives Indy a sounding board in journalist Gina Lombardi, a nemesis in Nazi archeologist Emmerich Voss, and a collection of local friends more knowledgeable about what’s going on in their city (think Sallah.) It’s propulsive enough to dollop information to you regularly, and in the early running of the game, solving puzzles captures some of that staff of Ra feeling. It’s very satisfying, and the game’s lack of emphasis on combat and gunplay helps keep things feeling like the better movies in the series.

I also think the little worlds MachineGames (who are previously known for their Wolfenstein reboot) has built for Jones to explore are quite compelling. For one thing, while they make use of negative space at the ground level for wide streets, gardens, and open deserts, the maps are very thoughtfully vertical in design. There are tunnels under, roofs over, and so much scaffolding set up alongside buildings. When you’re infiltrating enemy camps, there are often watchtowers, multi-floor buildings, tunnels underneath, and ziplines between parts of the camp. It creates a running tension of always having reasons to look for pathways, and then the game still manages to surprise you when a secret was right under your feet the whole time.

I also think this game is notable as a really impressive use of a limited scope. While the budget obviously hasn’t been reported, I think it’s evident playing the game that MachineGames largely knew where to invest the highest fidelity graphics and where to use fairly limited character animation. There are some effects that are less impressive than others, like when you burn a cobweb or when waves splash against a boat. And yet this game still often feels huge, that promise of “next generation” feels achieved, even where a game like Cyberpunk 2077 still feels “more expensive.” The way sunlight hits in this game is pretty consistently incredible.

Jones is played pretty admirably by Troy Baker (among other credits, Booker DeWitt from BioShock Infinite and Joel Miller from The Last of Us) who does a fairly impressive Harrison Ford impression without being afraid to sound like himself at Jones’s louder cries of pain or distress. I admit, as much as I love Raiders and Last Crusade, as people discuss rebooting Indiana Jones I’ve lamented that he’s a pretty thin character without Ford’s charisma to anchor the role. I’d say MachineGames landed on an interesting characterization – they’ve made him a little more of a cad, slightly flanderized his fear of snakes, and they settled on a refusal to face his personal problems as part of the call to adventure.

If I hesitate to put this game higher, it’s because the game’s back half really drops the ball. While the actual spectacle gets way higher – this link is to a MASSIVE spoiler, but it’s the coolest goddamned image in the game – the gameplay gets messy. The third hub forces you to pilot a boat that’s unpleasant to control. A late temple gives you a really noxious enemy to escape and sneak around by trial and error. The characterizations the game has been emphasizing don’t quite come to satisfying conclusions. And the climactic cutscene, while narratively communicating enormous stakes, really drops the ball in terms of the game’s visual effects and cinematic storytelling. I like the denouement pretty well, and while the actual grand mystery was perfectly acceptable, I wish it maintained the quality of what had come before. The Great Circle does not stick the landing, but I was hoodwinked enough to finish the game – and, well, I also like to run around a hub and knock out guards, sue me!