Building comparison
head to head
Rusty Lake HotelvsTales of Monkey Island
Neither is meaningfully harder - they pose close to the same test. The widest gap is optimization, and it is a single point.
Rusty Lake Hotel
Optimization · Pure Optimization
Untangling surreal fixed puzzle chains room by macabre room.
Tales of Monkey Island
Optimization · Pure Optimization
Telltale's episodic comedy adventure sending Guybrush Threepwood after a pox plaguing the Caribbean.
Rusty Lake Hotel leans Optimization (Pure Optimization); Tales of Monkey Island leans Optimization (Pure Optimization).
Rusty Lake HotelTales of Monkey Island
Axis by axis
Execution0 vs 0
Same score on execution - which means the number cannot separate them. The difference is in what each one asks of you.
Rusty Lake Hotel
Pointing and clicking - no dexterity involved
Tales of Monkey Island
Click-driven; no physical demands.
Reads0 vs 0
Same score on reads - which means the number cannot separate them. The difference is in what each one asks of you.
Rusty Lake Hotel
No opponents, only macabre puzzle rooms
Tales of Monkey Island
LeChuck and pirates are pure script.
Variance2 vs 2
Same score on variance - which means the number cannot separate them. The difference is in what each one asks of you.
Rusty Lake Hotel
Solutions are hidden until discovered, then fixed
Tales of Monkey Island
Modern design telegraphs most puzzle information.
Optimization6 vs 5
Rusty Lake Hotel leans a little harder on optimization, though the gap is small.
Rusty Lake Hotel
Chaining surreal puzzle logic per room is the whole game
Tales of Monkey Island
Episodic inventory puzzles each have one intended solution.
A matching score does not mean a matching test. Two games can both sit at 10 on execution and demand completely different things of you - which is why the reasoning above matters more than the number beside it.