Another week, another review of a Bone game. Bone: The Great Cow Race picks up from where the previous installment, Out From Boneville, left off and launches into a new story — one much loved by fans of the graphic novel.

The Great Cow Race, like Rock Jaw: Master of the Eastern Border (i.e. Volume 5), is a breezy and light-hearted yarn. Fone, Phoney, and Smiley Bone finally reunite — just in time for the annual Spring Fair. While Fone Bone worries whether Thorn likes him enough to walk with him around the fairgrounds, Phoney hatches a scheme to rig the cow race — a Kentucky Derby-like event in which Gran'ma Ben literally races against a couple dozen cows. Phoney’s plan? Dress Smiley up as "The Mystery Cow," convince the townspeople to bet on him instead of perennial champion Gran'ma Ben, and then use the winnings to return to Boneville with his wealth — and pride — intact.

Meanwhile, The Hooded One meets in secret council with the rat creatures, ordering them to bring back "The one with the star on his chest." Hmm, Phoney wears a star on his chest… that can't be good.

As in their adaptation of Out From Boneville, Telltale Games sticks very closely to Jeff Smith's words and spirit, making adjustments as necessary for the sake of gameplay. I wish the company didn't skew the games for a younger audience than the graphic novel, but those unfamiliar with the source material will still find the games well-written and engaging. Speaking of engaging, The Great Cow Race makes its predecessor look positively linear and non-interactive in comparison. This sequel liberates the player to observe, examine or fool around with nearly every object on-screen, and not everything you can place in your inventory will be useful.

But that's the sort of refinement most gamers will take for granted. The big departure from Out From Boneville would be the character selection process. Now that the Bones are reunited, the player switches between them for the bulk of the game. Several puzzles for one character's scenario thus rely on the actions of another character. Does this remind anyone of Day of the Tentacle? It ought to — the project head and co-writer for The Great Cow Race is Dave Grossman.

The puzzles are definitely bigger brain busters than in the first installment too, but not frustrating enough to make one bang one's head on the desk over and over again. Kudos to both the great puzzle design as well as the return of the built-in hint system. You probably haven't had this much fun with a traditional adventure game since The Longest Journey.

At the same time, however, playing The Great Cow Race sometimes becomes a frustrating experience. Despite the advancements from the previous game, The Great Cow Race suffers from a couple of issues with bugs and unnecessary frills.

Going back to the hint system, Telltale added a menu animation this time around for whenever you click to view the next hint. It needs a few seconds to complete and fails to add much stylistically to the game. The hint system in Out From Boneville was fine — click to view the next hint, the text changes. Why mess with a good thing?

More discouraging would be the amount of bugs and glitches affecting the gameplay. At one point, the game completely forgot what actions I just completed in the Smiley scenario, and I couldn’t progress. The only way to refresh the game’s memory, so to speak, was by switching back and forth between characters... for ten minutes. At another point the game even crashed. Yes yes, I know I’m not playing a console game and these things happen… but still.

Musically, The Great Cow Race continues the fine standards set by the previous volume, with some carry-over numbers plus a few new tunes.

In sum, Telltale offers another solid point-and-click based on a great franchise. The Great Cow Race lacks the polish of the preceding volume, yet feels more like a game this time around and less like a tech demo. I look forward to what the company does with the big plot twists in Volume 3 — Eyes of the Storm.

(Originally published July 2006 at http://www.intlhouseofgames.com)