Paris, Sep 2023
If you follow the TERPECA rankings (and you should), then you’re more likely to have come across Magician of Paris as one half of ‘The Full Experience’; Deep Inside offer it in combination with their second game as a double-bill. We chose to play just Magician because our group didn’t fancy the horror theme of the second game, and I’d heard that the connections between the two games are actually a bit tenuous.
What links them is the “City of Martyrs” setting, a fictional subterranean city beneath Paris. This provides a lovely linking framework as well as an immersive entry into the game. Even the standard health and safety briefing was cleverly incorporated in a naturalistic way. (They also provide costume, though it’s your choice whether to wear it through the game or not.)
In Magician of Paris, you’re sneaking into the home of a reclusive conjuror, to steal something and perhaps discover his secrets. And the conjuring theme is used beautifully, with an early wow moment that sets the tone and a clever sequence later on that provides the game’s fulcrum. In smaller ways too, puzzles and decor reference and are inspired by the world of magic performance.
The weakness of Magician is that it feels a bit short; and thinking back on the puzzles, the content was just a little thin, with too much reliance for my taste on search and the ‘journal of clues’ trope. Like a conjuring trick, the immediate impression is jaw-dropping, but close analysis may reduce the wonder. Maybe that’s because we omitted the second half of the double bill; maybe the combined experience would have felt a lot more substantial. But for Magician at least, the reason to play is not heavy-duty puzzling.
However, what Magician does it does exquisitely well. It leads you into a hidden world and introduces you to the strange and dangerous characters who live there; it toys with your expectations, has you perform magic, and performs magic upon you. The set piece moments of this game are wonderfully memorable, and I guess there’s a limit to how much I can criticise it for following the showman’s maxim, by leaving us wanting more. 
