The Secret Society: Mystery Reviews

by El Paso Crone

As an experienced Hunter in these types of games I am sorely disappointed in this one. The amount of energy you are allowed lets you play one maybe two games before you’re out of energy and have to buy more. The prizes you’re supposed to get for completing a puzzle are nonexistent. At least 50% of the time you get nothing But I message saying “better luck next time”. The puzzles themselves, while a good concept of having to complete a puzzle in order to open a puzzle, have made the objects you’re supposed to find too small and too difficult to find so that you end up running out of time and then you have to buy something to help you complete the puzzle. The puzzles should be challenging, not completely impossible to complete without having to buy something. And everything you have to buy is way more expensive than whatever it is you have in your cash so you have to go to the store and buy more rubies or coins or something else. I understand making money. I’m an accountant and very pro business. But there ARE limits. This group is simply too greedy for my taste. Too bad because I tend to spend a few hundred dollars a month on puzzles I like. But I don’t feel that I should have to spend a few hundred dollars every time I want to play a game. The creators need to wrap their heads around the concept of small profits over a lot of people. Coca-Cola has managed to become a multibillion dollar company by making $.02-$.03 on every can of Coke.

by Quilter's Daughter

Cruel, sadistic and anti-gamer! This last special event (I think honoring Mothers' Day) was virtually impossible to finish. While most objects were findable within a few instances of looking in the picture, there were some items which took waaaaaaay too many---more than 10. There was one which I think took more than 15 but I was too frustrated to keep track. It felt like 100 times! I only kept going to see if the item would ever actually appear. And of course it was the last item so l had already invested a lot in completing this. To add insult to injury, the objects needed to combine the collections were hard to get, and the amounts needed increased a lot over the course of the event. Frustratingly, I did not have enough to combine the last 5 items. A gamer works hard enough to get whatever is needed to look in a picture, and then find the items. The requirements to combine items into a collection should not be so punitive. My suggestion is to make combination elements common for all collections, and make only a small amount necessary. I have shared my enjoyment of this game with friends and family in the past, but no longer. It is just too frustrating now, and I want to discourage others from feeling so stressed over what should be, and could have been, fun. Soon my impulse to rage-quit will overcome my addiction and I will be free of this game. In the meantime, heed my warning and do not get sucked in to this sadistic travesty of recreation.

by Cezer0

I can hardly believe how much you have ruined the enjoyment i have appreciated for quite a few years by your recent use of pop-up ads for your companies other games. They are so frequent that i no longer really enjoy playing. I am considering giving up on this game entirely. What bad choices on your part. You have always tried to encourage the purchase of items in game. I would happily make such purchases if they were much more reasonable for what you is received. But these new, Constant pop up ads totally ruin the rhythm of the game and interfere in concentration which destroys the enjoyment and reason for playing. In addition I sent a report of a seriously aggravating issue with the game since the last update that is preventing my purchased keyboard the i use to hold my IPad from communicating with the game. This Bluetooth keyboard works with all the other apps I have on my IPad and previously worked with this game. Now however i cannot type anything, which is essential to be able to play this game, unless i remove my IPad from the Bluetooth keyboard. All these issues are seriously ruining my enjoyment of this game. You have not bothered to respond to my previous communication at all. Not even the usual we have received your letter and referring me to a sight that is worthless. HELP

by Bat Puppy

These games are not relaxing or fun. I am am disabled, but I used to be a software engineer. I play these games to relax and have fun with friends. It is isn’t either of those. I have complained and they never do anything about. They bombard you with ads to buy their extras throughout their game. And their games get faster and faster so that no matter how good you get at it they are trying to force you to buy their extras so you can keep up with the game. And the game has a lot of glitches. While you are playing it and going along it keeps flashing the screen and changing your entire screen so that you can never keep track of anything. For someone like myself who has epilepsy this is concerning. I can see changing the screen if there are no moves, but it also changes when you do have moves. When you try to send a complaint in, they send you back a conformation email asking you to send back an email with your complaint? Can’t they read? And their email states if you do not send one back they will consider your case closed. How convenient. Why send one in at all. It’s like dealing with AT&T. I could go on and on, but really why bother....

by Psmarshmallow

Lates Update: Aug 21, 2017 - App takes 1+ minutes to either load content, send gifts, or visit friends.

"Ain't nobody got time for that!"

This game is mediocre if you just want to explore/find hidden object games and never win any quests and hardly progress at all. There are quests that require certain modes in pictures in order to complete and also certain pictures require special 'keys' to enter. Whatever G5's program is for you getting the right mode and the right amount of keys to complete a task is set against you. You'll never have enough energy to gather enough keys and play often enough to complete a quest or challenge. I have 10 days left on the current quest and need 2500 keys to play that quest picture. I also need a particular mode for collecting items. I would have to play the quest picture 10x with 250 keys daily to win. But I have to collect the keys first and this uses up all my energy before I can even play the quest room! It has taken me 5 days to collect 125 keys! And when I played and eventually got the mode I didn't get the item! At this rate it is impossible for me to achieve/win the quest. G5 makes their software/games to never benefit the player and forces you to pay to play. You'll never achieve in G5 games unless you pay $$$.

by HonW

Do not download this game. It is full of problems that the developers either don’t care to fix or unable to fix. Used to love it. Not now. They really need to fix this problem with the inability to connect to friends to receive the gifts. The timers are off in all aspects of the game including any hard earned special talismans you activate. They will just disappear and you can do nothing about it and no help will be given from their support team at all. It has gone on long enough. Maybe time to put in some overtime to get it done. The game has even frozen before after I had activated several talisman. Really not happy about being unable to play although its timers were counting down. Support teams need to improve. With so many varied glitches in the game throughout the year it makes it almost impossible to participate in the events or advance in the game. Will probably delete this game very soon. With no answers to the multiple glitches and no one in their support team able to solve them the game is just using up my iPad memory. I was at level 323 on my iPad 2 and 188 on my iPad Air 2. It used to be a great game but with each new update the problems worsened. Apple should not even allow this game to be offered in their App Store. It reflects badly on them too.

by Boguou

The part of this game that really makes it no fun is the pictures where you have to find pieces of a whole. They make it so difficult that it just isn’t any fun. It is one of the reasons I don’t play this game as often as I used, I got frustrated. I also try to avoid those puzzles that have the split circle, but sometimes in order to find something you have to do them. I just finally give up. It’s not worth it. Some of the pictures are also too dark.. This game also never lets you earn crystals. I have been playing for at least three years and have never had more than 12 crystals if that. I am down to four my fault did not realize something costs me Crystals. Unless you spend money crystals are pretty much off the table to earn. The last thing is that this game penalizes you if you play at different times during the day they X out your rewards. You lose credit if you play in the morning one day but play later in the day the next day. We all have different schedules. We also have a life. I really dislike the new puzzle it is creepy. I hate listening to people eat. It’s like watching someone with their mouth open and listening to the sound. The laughter is creepy too.

by NWJoe

I have played this game for over a year. The graphics are good, updates on a regular basis, scenes/ objects challenging, etc. It’s possible to play without pay if you’re patient. However, during this same year there have been constant update glitches, lost progress towards rewards without cause, and changes to scenes resulting in cluttered graphics. In addition, the new quests have become impossible to complete without buying your way to the end— which, from the developers’ perspective, is probably the point, but from a players perspective just plain aggravating. G5 has 64+ games and their response to customers issues has gone downhill. The latest update, January 28, 2019, has caused multiple cases of load and crash. G5 in general states they are aware and are working on a fix. To individuals, G5 blames the crashing on either lack of storage or IOS systems not current (an excuse when players state this isn’t the case). Check fan forums for all the glitches on this game before you start playing. If G5 repairs the crashing problem, I may keep playing a bit longer. But I confess I’m at the delete point—- this is supposed to be fun, not another source of frustration in the chaos of daily life.

by MI-Ogre

March 2019-I’ve played this game for at least 2 years and the major updates lately have been bad. Useful talismans have been removed from several scenes, several scenes have been redesigned to make the objects unrecognizable, and the rewards upon completion have been reduced. In short, the company is clearly looking for more $ to play to the point that it is now ridiculous. DON’T FALL FOR IT. Let’s send a message by not paying another cent.

2016:I've paid money more than once for this game so I find it very irritating that both a uTube and regular splash ad launches each time I play the game. Paying customers shouldn't be interrupted by intrusive ads. Both ads need to be cancelled to return to the game. The game play itself is fine and I will raise the rating if ads are removed.

Update 7/18: the ad splash problem described above was fixed but the latest update has created a new problem. Zoom has been restricted so you now can’t zoom in closely to find hidden objects. Talisman rewards are hard to get. I enjoy the game overall but dislike how updates constantly seem to push users to spend more money. I have spent enough.

by Waterfall5

I started playing this game over a year ago. In that time, the game has gone downhill with each new update. It used to be easier to gain rewards after each completed picture; now I can have multiple items active to increase my chances of finding rewards and still get nothing. And playing one room ~10 times in order to find enough of a special item just to be able to play another room once, in hopes of finding a reward that is needed to continue a quest, when the chances of finding such are going down with each update...well, that becomes an interminable grind, not an enjoyable pastime.
Add in the fact that the last three rooms added have the unpleasant feature of having multiple versions of each object, and the game becomes an exercise in clicking randomly. “Find this dog that is shaped nothing like the silhouette displayed, and also looks different from the dog shown the last time you played this room.” No thank you.
The graphics are still lovely, studying settings is still immersive; if you download it, my advice is, ignore the quests and “storyline” completely, and just enjoy searching for stuff. Since the game is obviously intended to be a money sink, I won’t be buying anything more from the developers.

by Walnut Es

This is a good game with beautiful graphics. It’s a good time waster and you can progress without spending too much money.

However, this latest update is about to be a deal breaker for me. After solving each puzzle, instead of the very slight loading pause ( for the home screen to return) I am being shown an advertisement for 1 of the hundreds of other games this company makes. It’s annoying. You can’t bypass, you can’t ignore, you are stuck watching a 10 second ad over and over and over again.......we already are shown an ad to all these games when we first log into the original game. We are also invited to play other games by the “friends” we make in this game. Now I get to watch a loop of 2-3 different gameplay demos for 10 seconds each, every time I finish a puzzle. And did I mention this time waster also does not pause special talisman I’ve activated, or special offers I’m using in my real game,.....the game I actually want to play? So it appears that the makers have found yet another creative way to lessen the rewards of their game. Surely they wouldn’t do that on purpose......?

by Mimzy437

I HAAAATE THIS NEW UPDATE!!! I've enjoyed playing this game for a couple of years now. The graphics are beautiful and the puzzles are challenging. However, I do get a bit frustrated at times. Each update brings a new "quest". The achievements in these quests are virtually impossible to attain unless you spend money (which I do not do because well... I'm cheap) to buy items needed to play the new boards. Then when the time period is up for the new quest, you can only get a few of the needed items from one or two other boards and that takes FOREVER. I think once a quest is over, we should have unlimited access to all the boards while we wait PATIENTLY for the next update. It's bad enough to have to wait for the correct "mode" and then not get what we are hoping for time and time again. I also think the items should stay the same and not change each time you play that picture. A dog is a dog, not 4 different dogs. Especially when the "silhouette" does not even come close to resembling what I'm looking for! C'mon!!!! But overall, this game is challenging enough to help me escape my circus of a life for a few minutes throughout the day! But the "quests" are just too stupidly impossible to keep my attention. I'm just sayin'...

by Shop_Diva

The constant ads for other games is annoying; the pop-ups with special offers makes sense because that’s how you make money. The ads freeze my screen and when they finally appear it’s often when I’m trying to accept a completed task which causes TheSecretSociety store to open. So then I must close that, in addition to waiting for the ad to complete, and return to the game, plus many of them have two screens to close. Have you considered having a paid version that comes with no ads? That would at least give us a choice.

It would also be great if we could add the required items (Arrows, Carrots, Fireflies, Ladybugs and Tokens) to our wish list. They are giftable so there should be a way to add them to the wish list, which would be easier to do from the inventory tab for all combining elements, especially now that you add new combiners with every event. The list is getting quite long. The game depletes my battery very quickly and it seems that the more “stuff” there is makes this worse.

by Sassypenelope59

I love this game except for the problems with gifts. Several times it has started crashing every time I try to collect gifts. Re booting my iPad does not work. If I cancel the game then download again it re opens with hundreds of gifts from people who are not my friends. I have tried deleting these but it crashes. I collect them but before I get the last couple it crashes. I re download again and all the stranger gifts are back. I am not getting any of the gifts from actual friends. Very frustrated. It needs to be fixed or I will quit. Bummer. I have not had the above problem since I quit for a year and came back on my new iPad. However, G5 did not recognize me and made me start all over. I lost avatars I loved and 100 levels. My son in-law has had to start at the beginning every time he gets a new device. You need a better recognition system for players. I do not spend a lot of money to play because I do not have it. I used to be able to win avatars because I play a lot but it has gotten so hard to get the last level it is not fun just irritating.

by Deidmgt

Update May 2020 - so for 2 months the game won't open. Can't get past opening credits. Done! Update August 2018- the game can be fun but once again there are constant glitches and G5 does not respond to emails. Crystals that magically disappear, collections that won't update, earned prizes that never materialize and the inability to accept friends. Update-was great for a while now all 250 of my friends are gone, collected items go missing, and timing is screwy. It's been a week already! Fix it! __update- for the 3 rd time this game has "lost" my crystals. At one per level they take forever to get so this is huge -tokens, ladybugs, etc are impossible to collect in a timely manner -been trying to collect the object from banquet for 13 days. 25invitations per attempt+ must be in morph mode+takes repeated attempts to get the object = beyond frustrated -can no longer get to friends at all. - some pictures are so dark and/ item is created in shadow makes the object and/or picture an irritation to play. -1 crystal to per level is ridiculous too.

by Cathyleed

I used to love this game. Even though it is frustrating to have to work so hard for clues and tools, it WAS my favorite game, but no more. It is too hard to get the tools/items needed to enter the rooms and complete the scene, and if that weren't enough, now I can't get my 28 gifts that have been piling up for days! The game crashed-I started over, I couldn't get the tools/items to finish the collections-I tried harder and longer. Not being able to get gifts is my final straw, I don't want to play anymore! For example, why do I have to work so hard for arrows for Tree of Dates? I see others have been complaining about the same thing, along with few diamonds/rewards, so it can't be you aren't aware of the issues! I'm recommending my fellow players try out "Mirrors of Albion". It is similar in many ways but you do have regenerating tools and you do get gifts, and you can complete collections. A game is supposed to be fun, not stressful, I hope you get it figured out!

by Cheebs@cheese

I have been playing this game for several years now and I enjoy it. A couple of complaints though. When I first started playing every once in a while a crystal deal would pop up, 100 crystals for $1. That never happens anymore. Also I think it’s way to difficult to earn ladybugs, the arrow for tree of dates room etc and when there’s a new room, the new items to connect the prizes. I’ve been playing for over a week and have gotten very few pink bows and the other new ones. I don’t think that the push to force players to spend a ton of money is fair. I buy things every once in a while but without the $1 crystal deal and long droughts of acquiring ladybugs and other items you need to search a room is very frustrating. Also back a while when the time ran out for the new room goals the special item would turn into ladybugs etc. and it was in the 100’s for each. Like I said I don’t mind buying things but it seems now that it’s far to often and I’m getting very board. I do like the new rooms to get something new to do.

Thank you,
I hope you will consider my feed back and make some minor changes.

by Crev68

I have been enjoying playing this game. I particularly appreciate the ability to open a new room each month.

I DO NOT like all of the invitations to join other games that appear every day. It has been brought to my attention that although it says a particular friend has sent the invitation, when checking with them, they often have never sent any invitation. Recently a friend contacted me to ask that I stop sending them invitations. Not only HAVE I NEVER EVER SENT AN INVITATION TO ANYONE, I HAVE NEVER EVEN OPENED, DOWNLOADED, OR LOOKED AT ANY OTHER GAME BY THIS COMPANY TO EVEN CONSIDER SENDING AN INVITATION TO JOIN. APPARENTLY G5 IS GENERATING THESE INVITATIONS AND SENDING THEM OUT USING A PLAYERS NAME WITHOUT PERMISSION. I AM QUITE SURE THIS IS ILLEGAL AND WOULE LIKE G5 TO STOP SENDING INVITATIONS IN MY NAME IMMEDIATELY. MOST PLAYERS DO NOT APPRECIATE THESE INVITATIONS. MANY MANY POST REQUESTS TO NOT SEND INVITATIONS. I WISH G5 IN GENERAL WOULD ALLOW YOU TO OPT OUT OF RECEIVING INVITATIONS. BUT SPECIFICALLY I WOULD STRONGLY REQUEST THAT G5 IMMEDIATELY STOP USING MY NAME TO SUGGEST THAT THE INVITATION HAS BEEN SENT BY ME. PLAYER Crev68

by Likes Hidden Object

I played this game diligently for more than a year until my iPad could no longer handle the upgrades and even entering the game was so slow it was at first torturous and then impossible so I deleted the game from my device. Recently I replaced my iPad and decided to try again. It has been like finding a former friend while being older and wiser. I have started from scratch but many scenes are familiar. Some older scenes have been updated, so they aren’t exactly the same but are still a challenge. I’m taking the collections less seriously and looking to complete the ones that will give me the reward I want then saving the versatile collection items for the more obscure collections. I miss the way friends were added in the past, but I am adjusting. I don’t necessarily want to befriend everyone in every G5 game which seems to be encouraged in this newer version. I don’t mind the ads, they are briefer than in some other games these days. The scenes are beautifully rendered and that is what I enjoy the most. All in all I’m glad I decided to give this game another chance.

by Chibigosu

Having played several hidden object games -including others by G5- this is by far the best. It’s hard enough to be challenging yet easy enough to not dissuade you from wanting to play. The game is also doable without having to buy in-app purchases. Something unlike others I tried. If you want to speed along faster, the option of in-app purchases is there. It’s not hard to do without, though. I personally never had to spend and I’m still singing their praises. They have monthly events to acquire totems, rare items and such which are easy enough that anyone can do them but again, challenging enough to keep your interest and still be a “challenge”. Adding other players in-game to ask for assistance is key. It will help you a LOT. Quests are always flowing which helps keep your interest and make you feel accomplished upon completion. I play another G5 hidden object game that differs a lot from this game in every way that I mentioned. I wish it was more like this one. This game is one of my favorites which allures me into playing every day.