Last year I wasn’t even sure I’d end up playing Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. I had no previous experience with the franchise, neither the movies nor the games, and quite frankly I had no interest in it. However, my love for action-adventure games filled with puzzles and a great story piqued my interest enough to give it a shot. Needless to say, I enjoyed it so much that now here I was eagerly anticipating the Order of the Giants DLC. But does it build on what made the Great Circle… great or does it fail to live up to those lofty standards?
Indiana Jones finds himself heading back to the Vatican at the start of The Order of the Giants to meet a new character, Father Ricci. Father Ricci believes he’s onto something big related to the legend of the Nameless Crusader inside the Casina, however he’s been kicked out by the Blackshirts. With his trusted parrot Pio and the help of Indy, Father Ricci is determined to find out what is hidden there.
What transpires next is roughly 2-3 hours of what made Indiana Jones and the Great Circle great to begin with as Indiana uses his trusty bull whip to traverse the tombs, sewers and parts of Rome and his keen knowledge to figure out the various puzzles. The puzzles in The Order of Giants are really some of the best in my opinion and did a fantastic job building on the foundation laid out in the Great Circle. Additionally the voice acting is once again superb. While there isn’t as much dialogue, Troy Baker and co do a great job lending their voice to Indy, Father Ricci and the few other characters that do appear.
More Of The Same
The actual story being told here feels almost too similar to the base game however. I know DLC is expected to be a continuation of a game, but with the base game revolving around the Nephilim’s, a tribe of giants. That is more or less the same story being told in The Order of Giants, with Father Ricci on the hunt for the cylinder pieces to unlock and find a Roman artifact that is said to be held by a legendary giant.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be that surprised as it is DLC, but The Order of Giants story made it feel like this was just a chapter they removed from the game and added it on as DLC instead. The only major difference between the 2 is that you have a new enemy to worry about beyond the Blackshirts.
The main enemy in The Order of Giants is the Cultists of Mithras. These enemies don’t act any different than the Blackshirts did though, they just have a different aesthetic. They aren’t even really involved in the story either beyond just being the enemies. If you read all the notes you can get some more backstory on them, but for being the main enemy of the DLC I thought they’d be a bit more prevalent.
Additionally I was hoping a bit more time would be spent in the streets of Rome itself. I’m all for the underground locations, it is a game about unearthing ancient artifacts after all, but you are only above ground for very brief spurts in The Order of Giants.
And that really is a shame because what Machine Games did a fantastic job with in the Great Circle is creating these great open spaces and little towns. What we do get in Rome is great as well, I just wish we spent a bit more time with the cafe’s of Rome and less time in the sewers.
One last additional thing that should be noted is just how difficult it is to return to Rome after you’ve completed the DLC. While you can still “revisit” Rome through the menu, depending on where you were in Rome last you may have to traverse the first section entirely again without any idea of where to go. It took me almost an hour to figure it out, and its clear with the comments online I wasn’t alone.
This is a minor thing to most, as unless you are interested in collecting all the notes or artifacts it won’t matter much to you. Still it was a weird design to say the least. Luckily if you have this problem I’ve created a guide to help you navigate things much easier which you can find here.
Final Thoughts
Overall, The Order of Giants doesn’t bring much new to the world of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. Instead it builds on a great foundation with an enjoyable, albeit short, additional chapter. If you enjoyed the Great Circle and want more Indiana Jones you won’t come away disappointed by this DLC. You may however come out a little stinky after spending the vast majority of your time in the sewers of Rome.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: The Order of Giants was played on Xbox Series X. All of the DLC’s achievements were obtained before writing this review.
