Mortimer Beckett and the Time Paradox

Uncle Jerome asks Mortimer to help him again, this time with time portals in his manor. Mortimer must enter them and travel to the past and future, to collect anachronistic objects that were sucked by the portals and ended up on the wrong era, causing dangerous time paradoxes.

Mortimer Beckett and the Time Paradox is a hidden object game where, instead of clicking on objects from a list at the side of the screen, the player must search for pieces of objects scattered around the scenery. The objects are assembled and stored in the inventory strip at the bottom, divided in two categories: puzzle items to the left and misplaced items to the right. Puzzle items are tools to be used on certain places to solve problems or gain access to some place, and misplaced items are objects that must be put back to their place of origin.

Each chapter is a different time period with several locations. The map button brings up an overhead view of all available places, and allows instantaneous travel to them. Each place is presented as a series of screens, with hotspots that change the cursor to indicate the action to be performed. The gears cursor appears when over the original place of one of the objects. The jigsaw piece cursor indicates puzzle interaction. The speech balloon cursor shows up when one of the characters can talk.

Some screens have interactive puzzles that must be solved with logic, or using information gathered somewhere else. A notebook at the right side can be accessed at any time. It contains all the clues discovered so far, as they are added automatically to the pages after being uncovered.

There is no penalty for clicking on wrong places. The unlimited hint button highlights the position of one of the pieces, taking a few seconds to recharge after use, and Mortimer warns when there is no piece to be found.