What with all the upcoming winter festivities and such, and reappearance of Sam and Max for their Santa-themed new episode is not only a jolly thing indeed, but a rather appropriate one too. As the more eagle-eyed of you might have noticed earlier this year, I cast my withering eye over the entire first series of the capering duo’s return to PC screens worldwide, ending with the opinion that it had all been a bit of a mixed bag, but at the same time certainly worthwhile. Armed with a whole raft of fan feedback from what no doubt was a toe in the water, Ice Station Santa immediately sees a the new series start on a very promising note.

Not that you should go into things expecting a massive departure, obviously. Despite a rather natty new intro, early proceedings will see you being reacquainted with Sam and Max, their office and all of its oddball contents. Peoples’ Christmas presents are going on the rampage for some bizarre reason, and it’s up to you to get to the bottom of the issue via some rather amusing quips, gags and set-pieces. In some ways it is immediately familiar to those who have played anything from the first group of six episodes.

Following in the familiar vein, you’ll also come across many characters that you will either love or hate, depending on how you enjoyed their individual quirks in previous games. You’ll once more run into Sybil, Abraham Lincoln’s giant stone head, Bosco and – as much as you didn’t want to – the Soda Poppers. Perhaps someone ought to mention to Telltale that, whilst it’s all well having Sam and Max showing visible disdain at having to once again bother themselves with Whizzer and whatever his brothers are called, it doesn’t give them much of an excuse to recycle them again even if the joke is at their expense.

Thankfully, this is pretty much the sum of the episode’s negative parts. What Telltale have managed to do with Ice Station Santa – something they often failed to with previous episodes – is fill it with satisfying puzzles to get your teeth into. The main puzzle itself features Sam and Max having to collect four themed figurines from various sources, a task which in itself involves four separate puzzles that require you to talk to characters and link their problems with solutions located elsewhere. It’s not exactly rocket science, granted, but it’ll leave you exercising your brain muscle and at the same time never relies on the frustrating tactic of you having to pick up an obscure object or use completely random items on other things in some kind of desperately baffled last resort.

The locations you’ll be visiting are also refreshed, with the office and Bosco’s convenience store (which itself has undergone a rather radical make-over) paired with a couple of brand new environments, one of which looks like it’ll become a regular jaunt throughout the second season. There’s a couple of mini games packed into proceedings – one a driving game and one something rather more satisfying if not a little easy – and the humorous comments Sam, Max and some of the other characters come up with are genuinely funny; insulting one of Santa’s little elves to make him cry had me cackling like a demented man-witch into my screen, no doubt to the consternation of Jay.

Which is what it’s all about, really. For an evening’s worth of gaming (you should see the end within four or five hours unless you’re as blunt as a wax crayon) it fills the void in a really entertaining, light-hearted way whilst at the same time still providing a rather satisfying challenge, which is something you couldn’t say for all of the last series. For what amounts to being £4, you can’t say fairer than that.