Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is shaping up to be a true whipcracking Indy adventure

We’ll soon have a chance to don our fedoras, grab our whips, and embark on an adventure for the Indiana Jones and the Great Circle achievements. The game launches on Xbox Series X|S and PC, and leaves our list of upcoming Game Pass games to join Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass on December 9. I recently had the chance to live out a childhood dream and step into the shoes of the intrepid archeologist, playing several hours of MachineGames’ upcoming action-adventure title during an Indiana Jones and the Great Circle hands-on preview. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle really is an “adventure-action” gameEven though I had watched numerous in-depth trailers, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. I was definitely excited for it — a chance to become Indy for a short time? Yes, please! — but how that would look and feel from MachineGames, a developer best known for the action-packed Wolfenstein games, was lost on me. From what we had seen up until my hands-on, I was expecting something akin to Tomb Raider’s tight semi-open zone environments filled with a bit of action and some adventure. Thankfully, my expectations were way off, and instead, I found myself playing what felt like an interactive Indiana Jones movie. The team has previously referred to it as an “adventure-action game” as opposed to a contemporary action-adventure game, and it wasn’t until I had a chance to play it for myself that I fully understood what MachineGames was describing.My time was split between the game’s opening moments in Marshall College, the Vatican, and the sand-strewn desert of Giza. While the first two mission areas offered more linear environments focused on the main narrative, the Pyramids of Giza showed off the open-world aspect, allowing me to play around with side quests, find optional but helpful items, and so on. I’m pleased to say that both sessions provided me with plenty of opportunities to engage Nazis in battles of fisticuffs.Before beginning my adventure with Indy, I was pleased to see separate options for both gameplay and puzzle difficulty instead of bundling them all into one option. If you want an easier time with puzzles but more of a challenge when partaking in the aforementioned fisticuffs, or vice versa, you’re free to do so. The game itself begins at Marshall College during a stormy night, when Indy is awoken by a loud crash and sets out to investigate. As soon as I had control of the character, it was clear that MachineGames had poured a lot of time into filling the world with detail. As the storm rages outside, flashes of lightning bathe the dimly lit corridors in bright light, revealing notice boards filled with various advertisements, paintings, and other decorations. Shelves are lined with books and pictures, and when you get to the main hall, glass exhibits are filled with countless artifacts from around the world — simply put, the game looks fantastic.After exploring the halls and finding the source of all the commotion came from a very large man who had broken in and subsequently knocked me out, I quickly learned that my flag knowledge is awful. I faced a simple puzzle: pick up various antiques that had been knocked out of a couple of exhibits, listen to Indy tell you what they are and the country they came from, and place the item in its rightful spot. After a crash course in the world’s flags, you find that a mummified cat has been stolen before finding an item left behind by the mysterious stranger, giving Indy his first clue for this next grand adventure. After packing Indy’s case with the essentials — you search his office for his trusty fedora and whip and other items — and finding a diary from Marion, Indy heads to the Vatican’s secret archive.My time in the Vatican was limited, and I unfortunately never made it to the archive, but I did have a chance to see that MachineGames had filled the linear sections of the level with multiple pathways. The Vatican is under the control of Mussolini’s Blackshirts, so you can’t just stroll along the streets. This was the first time I had control of an almost fully equipped Indy, and thanks to a hint in the newly acquired journal, I realized I could use the whip to pull myself onto a rooftop. There were multiple routes to take to the archive, including lower and upper-level pathways and a route along a rooftop wall, which I found after using a key I had pilfered from a guard room. Although the wall seemed to have the least number of guards in my way, I still managed to come face to face with a few Blackshirts — one of which I rendered unconscious with a broom and then added insult to injury by dropping the broom on his head, which amusingly triggered another hit marker. The fighting in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is fantastic, and it’s something I had plenty of chances to indulge in during the second half of my session.The Pyramids of Giza mission was different, in that there was a large open area to explore. However, a quick look from a vantage point with Indy’s new friend Gina revealed that Nazi soldiers patrol the streets. While there is a main story mission to work through here, there are also side quests and the opportunity to find disguises and a helpful lighter. Before setting off, Bethesda had dropped a bundle of Skill Books in our inventory. Skill Books can be found scattered throughout the game, offering you additional benefits like increased health, stamina, improved fighting mechanics, and the like — I highly recommend using a skill that gives you a few seconds to crawl about the floor to find Indy’s hat for a chance to get back up when knocked down in a fight. You unlock the abilities with Adventure Points, which you earn by completing missions, finding all kinds of lore items, taking pictures of points of interest (a small camera icon pops up on the screen when you’re near one), and so on. Experience in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle all comes from the adventure aspect of the game, pushing you to explore your surroundings.Fighting the enemy doesn’t seem to have any reward other than the satisfaction of beating up Nazis, making the majority of your encounters with them optional. During my time at the Pyramids of Giza, I decided to work through a side quest for Gina’s friend Dame Nawal as the hunt for Steles took me all over the map. The place is crawling with Nazis who will try to kill you if you’re spotted, and enemies are equipped with a variety of weapons. I came across soldiers armed with guns, shovels, and other items during my short time with the game — they’ll even resort to throwing stuff at you if they can’t reach you — but disarming them is simple when you have the whipping skills of Indiana Jones. The whip is probably the most satisfying item in the game, and you can use it to traverse the environment by latching on to various surfaces, but it’s also a phenomenal tool in combat for disarming or stunning your opponents, leveling the playing field, unless you’ve picked up a gun of your own.Once in combat, the left and right triggers control Indy’s punches with each arm, while LB lets you parry — a successful parry opens your opponent up to a counter-attack so you can give them a good slug. Just to highlight some of my favorite fights, I whipped one soldier off the back of a chair and quickly pounded him into the ground at one point, and during another brawl on a set of stairs in a tomb, I hit one Nazi and his head collided with the wall sending his unconscious body tumbling down the stairs. In another scenario, a dog seemingly ran out of nowhere and mauled me to death, so that was good fun. You can buff your health and stamina via food you find when exploring, which helps mitigate some of the heavy damage you take when fighting, but fights with more than one opponent can quickly become deadly encounters, so you’ll not be able to run through the world tussling with everyone. There was ample opportunity to explore the world when not fighting Nazis, and I quickly found that almost everything on the map could be explored. Once I had a trusty lighter in hand, which I bought from a lady with a monkey that Indy didn’t trust (a great callback to the manipulative monkey in Raiders of the Lost Ark), I could explore the various ruins with a bit more light, burning away cobwebs to reveal crawlspaces and so on. This gave me a few opportunities to solve some very basic puzzles, such as one that required me to put three symbols depicting animals in their rightful spot on a wall — the silly Nazis couldn’t even work out a simple side quest puzzle, but it’s alright, I beat them to a pulp soon after. If you get stuck at any point, you can refer to your Journal, as you might have picked something up that gives you a clue for how to proceed. Within the journal, there are tabs for the Map, Journal, which slowly fills up with notes and pictures you collect on your adventure, Books for upgrading Indy, and Travels. One thing I noticed in Travels is that you can use it to return to previous areas, and a checklist in the corner reveals how many Adventures and Fieldwork side missions you’ve completed and the number of Mysteries and Discoveries you’ve found in each. I wouldn’t be surprised to see an achievement linked to completing everything.Overall, my time with Indiana Jones and the Great Circle was great, revealing that the heavy focus on exploration does indeed make it an “adventure-action” game. That doesn’t mean the combat is an afterthought, however, as the crack of Indy’s whip and the theatrical knockout animations make it a satisfying activity when not scouring for lore. Its slower pace gave me a chance to soak in the incredible detail packed into each area, and I look forward to seeing how that holds up in other parts of the game. We’ve not got long to wait, as Indiana Jones and the Great Circle launches on Xbox Series X|S and PC on December 9. From this early look, MachineGames could have a contender for our list of the best Game Pass games.



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