TR-49 code-breaking adventure has finally launched on iOS
A WWII mystery
- Decode a mystery at Bletchley Park
- Crack codes and link texts in mysteries spanning decades
- You'll also be guided by a voice that keeps reacting to what you do
There’s something unsettling about TR-49 long before it ever tells you to be afraid. Maybe it’s the idea that two post-war engineers at Bletchley Park spent half a century feeding books into a machine not to catalogue them, but to understand reality itself. Or maybe it’s the fact that when the machine finally speaks, it already knows your name.
TR-49 is out now on iOS (and PC/Mac), and it’s the latest narrative deduction experiment from inkle, the studio behind 80 Days and Overboard!, which is usually a good sign that you’re about to be trusted with something strange, clever, and slightly uncomfortable.
This time, you’re poking around a WWII-era computer hidden in a church basement, navigating an archive of obscure texts, journals, and letters in search of a single stolen book. A book that, apparently, shouldn’t exist.
If you’ve read my earlier coverage, you’ll know inkle released an interactive pinboard ahead of launch. I stared at it for far longer than I care to admit and came out absolutely clueless, which feels appropriate in hindsight. TR-49 doesn’t rush to explain itself. It wants you to make connections, to sit with uncertainty, and to accept that understanding comes slowly, if at all.
Mechanically, this is narrative deduction in its purest form. You link texts, trace ideas across decades, and slowly piece together the lives of the machine’s creators - Cecil Caulderly and Beatrice Dooler - as well as your own role in whatever they set in motion.
There’s also a constant audio presence as a voice on the other end of the line, which keeps reacting to your progress and nudging you forward. It’s not an easy experience, and it doesn’t always feel welcoming. But there’s also something compelling about a puzzle that refuses to simplify itself for you.
And if you want a more measured take before you jump in, check out Catherine’s full review of TR-49!
