Mermaid Adventures: The Frozen Time

Introduction

Mermaid Adventures: The Frozen Time bundles match-3, hidden-object, and jigsaw mini-games around a story of restoring peace to an undersea kingdom. Developed and published by First Games Interactive, it launched on Steam on 16 February 2018 at NZ$6.99. Its 20 English-language reviews sit at 40% positive, Mixed. This review read all 12 negative reviews in that sample alongside every one of the 8 positive reviews.

A decent concept, credited even by critics

The underlying idea draws some genuine credit, even from the sample's most detailed negative review. "Mermaid Adventures: The Frozen Time's core idea is having an enjoyable mix of various casual mini-games, wrapped in a comic-style story," it reads, going on to praise the story as "decent and nicely presented" — before pivoting to the game's real problems. This review also noticed that several of the game's positive reviews on Steam appear to be unrelated joke submissions, one describing a samurai epic and another praising "3d game" graphics this title doesn't have, thinning out the genuine positive signal beneath the raw 40% figure.

Real, specific execution problems

Set against that decent premise, this review's negative sample converges on messy execution. "As soon as one starts playing, it becomes obvious that despite the good intentions, the implementation is very messy and at times even dreadful," continues that same detailed review. More specific technical complaints follow: "If you are playing in Windows Mode: You can't play H.O.G. scenes. You will continuously crash," reads one account, describing a specific crash tied to windowed-mode hidden-object scenes. Another reviewer reports a hard block on progress: "at level 73, the game is apparently bugged. Movement is impossible to the key," preventing them from finishing the game despite wanting to.

A repeated reuse claim

A separate, repeated complaint concerns originality. "It's a copy+paste of Mermaid Adventures: The Magic Pearl," reads one reviewer, going on to note the lack of proper widescreen support and calling the price "rather ambitious" given free match-3 alternatives exist. This review could not independently verify the specific asset-reuse claim, but confirms both titles share the same developer, format, and undersea theme, and the one genuine positive review in this sample — written in Russian — independently describes this entry as a direct sequel with "improved graphics" over the first game, corroborating the relationship even while framing it more favourably.

Verdict

Mermaid Adventures: The Frozen Time has a genuinely decent mini-game concept at its core, and this review's full read of its negative sample confirms even critics recognise that. But messy, buggy execution — including a level-73 bug that can block story completion entirely — and a repeated claim that it reuses its predecessor's assets are real reasons to look elsewhere in a genre with plenty of better-supported alternatives.